Singapore learnt to measure cooling. ASEAN should follow

Singapore has been diligently working to improve its ability to measure how well buildings perform, particularly in terms of energy use and cooling systems. For larger commercial buildings, energy consumption is benchmarked and cooling systems undergo regular energy audits. Building owners, engineers, and facility managers are familiar with plant efficiency and the relationship between cooling provided and electricity consumed.

This level of measurement is not yet common across much of ASEAN or in many Australian buildings, where owners are more focused on how much electricity they purchase without fully understanding how efficiently the building systems are using it.

An important metric for evaluating the efficiency of a central cooling plant is kW per refrigeration ton (kW/RT), which measures the amount of electrical power needed to produce a given amount of cooling. Comparing two plants, if one operates at 1.2 kW/RT while the other operates at 0.6 kW/RT, the first plant is using twice the electrical power to generate the same cooling output.

As cooling demand in Southeast Asia rapidly increases, with the International Energy Agency predicting the residential air conditioner stock in the region to triple by 2035, buildings are becoming a significant source of electricity demand growth. The IEA ASEAN cooling roadmap estimates that electricity used for space cooling could surge from 80 TWh in 2020 to 300 TWh by 2040.

The growing demand for cooling is driven by urbanization, rising incomes, and the importance of access to cooling for improving living standards. While more renewable energy generation, storage, and grid improvements may be necessary, it is crucial to first address the issue of waste in existing electricity supply. Singapore serves as a useful example, as it has treated building performance as something that should be measured rather than assumed.

Since 2013, building owners in Singapore covered by regulatory regimes have submitted annual energy information for benchmarking, and the country requires periodic audits of cooling systems to ensure their continued efficiency. Measuring a building's performance is vital because a well-designed plant can perform poorly, and an older plant may perform surprisingly well.

Singapore adopted this approach for building performance, pioneering it through the work of Lee Eng Lock and later promoting it internationally by Amory Lovins and the Rocky Mountain Institute. Australia, on the other hand, has taken a different route, focusing on making actual operating energy performance visible across the commercial property industry through NABERS ratings, which utilize measured energy data and allow buildings to compare their performance against similar assets.

While both Singapore and Australia provide valuable insights, there remains a gap in understanding how well equipment is performing. To truly evaluate a building's energy consumption, it is essential to measure the machine directly, taking into account electricity input, cooling output, flow and temperature, and the behavior of chillers, pumps, and cooling towers under varying loads and ambient conditions.

Improving the efficiency of existing equipment and implementing conservation measures can lead to significant energy savings without the need for new infrastructure or increased generation.