Author: MaintenX

Winterizing Tips

Keep your building warm, the elements out, and your energy bill low with these winterization tips.

Protect Pipes

If your building is in an area of the country with harsh winter temperatures, you’ll need to protect your pipes from bursting. Pipe insulation comes in many forms, but all will help protect your building water infrastructure. Make sure you insulate pipes that are most exposed to the elements first.

Ceiling Fan Direction

Many people don’t think of this, but if you have ceiling fans in your home or office, they can help save on the energy bill just as much as they do in the sweltering summer months with a single flip of a switch. Most ceiling fans come with a direction reversing switch. Make sure all fans move clockwise in the winter. This directs hot air that accumulates near the ceiling down towards the floor. Simply switch them back in the summer months to allow for cool air to circulate.

Keep Warm Air In

Place caulk around windows and use outlet protectors to prevent cold air from entering your home. It’s also a good idea to ensure that the attic is properly insulated.

Window Film

Window film is a cheap, efficient way to cut down on heat loss in your home or office. What’s more, it’s practically invisible. After winter ends, simply peel the film off.

If you’d like to know more about properly winterizing your home or office, call MaintenX today!

What Is HVAC Zone Control?

HVAC zone control is a system that regulates the temperature for individual areas, or “zones” in a building instead of one temperature for the entire building. These systems can increase employee comfort, accommodate equipment that requires certain temperatures for peak performance, and reduce energy consumption and therefore costs.

Commercial Spaces

Utilizing HVAC zone control in office environments is a great option. Anyone familiar with the “battle of the thermostat” can tell you that people have vastly different preferences when it comes to temperature comfort. With HVAC zoning, each area can be set to its own personalized temperature. The same area can also be set to different temperatures at different times of the day to further optimize staff comfort.

If you’re office is like most, your conference room is usually vacant. With HVAC zoning, you can save company resources by only heating and cooling rooms when they’re in use. This can be achieved with motion sensors that turn on climate control when they sense that someone is using the room. This system can also be used with lights, eliminating the common issue of people forgetting to turn off the lights and wasting electricity needlessly.

Residential Spaces

Home HVAC zone control possibilities are limited only by the imagination and personal needs of the homeowner. The simplest home versions use only two zones, a good option for the budget-conscious homeowner. But if comfort and energy conservation are important to you, you can tweak the temperature demands of every room depending on its age, layout, and ductwork.

Want to know more about HVAC zoning? Call MaintenX today!

Innovations in Facility Management Technology

These days, it seems that technology plays a role in almost every facet of our lives. From video doorbells to automated thermostats to voice-controlled devices that can order your groceries, the modern home looks quite different today than it did even five or ten years ago. It’s natural that the same thing would happen in the field of facility management.

Technological innovations have made great strides in facility management in recent years. Below are just some of facility management’s newest innovations.

Automation

It may seem more like a sci-fi movie than reality, but automated systems that use drones and robots have already entered the field of facilities management. Cleaning robots sweep, mop, and tidy up facilities, while drones explore hard-to-reach places, assess system damage, and report it to facility managers; automated security systems monitor the safety of buildings without the need for a human security guard.

Using these systems and technologies, facility managers can now increase not only facility performance, but human productivity, as well. Automatically generated work orders and smart environmental sensors that change temperature and lighting based on employee habits and preferences are just two examples of the many new applications of these technologies.

Smart Buildings

Smart buildings integrate a facility’s various systems and sensors to boost resource efficiency, lower energy costs and harmful emissions, augment worker environs to increase comfort, and improve productivity at almost every level.

How do Smart Buildings Work?

First, a facility’s major systems (HVAC, lighting, and various sensors that track such factors as temperature, motion, and air quality) collect data. Then, the relevant data is relayed back to a central hub. From here, using facility management software, the data is organized and the information can then be viewed, tracked, and system behavior modified—either by FMs and/or artificially intelligent systems.

Want to know more about the latest trends in facility maintenance? Call MaintenX today.

Facility Condition Assessments

For facility managers, figuring out facility conditions and maintenance needs can be a major—and majorly expensive—task. Luckily, today there are highly efficient ways of performing these assessments and estimating your facility’s maintenance needs. We’ll explore some below.

What are Facility Condition Assessments?

In a nutshell, a facility condition assessment (FCA) is a streamlined process of tracking the condition of a facility and its systems by noting key factors: age, materials, design, assets, etc. While performing a facility condition assessment might sound like a tremendous undertaking, it’s critical to extending the life and performance of your facility and its systems. No matter what the building is being used for, a detailed FCA might just save you from a maintenance crisis in the future.

Why do a Facility Condition Assessment?

Facility Condition Assessments help facility managers understand and respond to changes in asset and facility performance, develop appropriate budgets, and properly prioritize needed maintenance.

The goal of a facility condition assessment is to:

  • Assess the need to perform or defer maintenance
  • Pinpoint system deficiencies
  • Evaluate the remaining useful life of all facility systems
  • Verify overall system compliance with local, state, and national safety codes and operation standards
  • Check the compatibility among individual systems
  • Creating a detailed and prioritized list of necessary repairs and/or routine maintenance
  • Calculate operating and asset replacement costs

To learn more about how you can keep your facility in tip-top shape with audits and inspections, contact MaintenX today.

Temperature in Relation to Workplace Productivity

Comfort is key to workplace efficiency. That’s why facility managers and business owners often spend a lot of money on ergonomic desk chairs, eye-catching artwork, and indoor plants to create a more inviting workplace. Many businesses, however, overlook a fundamental component of worker comfort: temperature. If it’s too cold or too hot, efficiency and morale take a hit regardless of office décor.

Sex Factors

Sex plays a role in the temperature debate. Because of their generally higher muscle mass and lower skin-to-volume ratio, men are less prone to getting cold than women, who feel cold more easily in their extremities. This is because female bodies tend to pool blood around vital organs, drawing hot blood away from hands and feet. Consider the male/female balance in your workplace when setting the thermostat.

Importance of Warmth

A warm office environment can foster warm relations between colleagues. This is because the experience of bodily warmth is intrinsically linked with trust and affection. The part of the brain that’s stimulated by warmth is also stimulated when we experience trust and compassion for others.

The opposite is also true. Colder temperatures tend to make us feel withdrawn and isolated. Cold temperatures also use more of our bodies’ resources, as the human body shivers and increases blood flow to compensate. So it might be better to opt toward warmer environs than cold ones.

So what’s the best temperature for your workplace? That depends on many factors, but generally speaking, people tend to work at their peak productivity at between 71.6 and 77 degrees Fahrenheit.

Want to know more about temperature and productivity? Call the HVAC experts at MaintenX today!

What Is Deferred Maintenance?

Deferred maintenance is an all-too-common issue facing Facilities Managers. Putting off a renovation or system overhaul in a facility might seem like the easy choice for the inexperienced, but deferred maintenance can wreak havoc on your facility by swelling costs, increasing equipment downtime, and otherwise hindering efficient function. Facilities Managers wrestling with deferred maintenance concerns must therefore make timed maintenance decisions carefully.

What Is Deferred Maintenance?

Simply put, deferring maintenance on a building and its assets is suspending or delaying upkeep due to a lack of financial resources.

Lack of funding for routine maintenance can lead to high repair and replacement costs in the future. This problem is further magnified when maintenance is deferred to meet a business’s other financial necessities.

Common Reasons Maintenance is Deferred:

  • Lack of required staff
  • Workers do not have the technical expertise to carry out maintenance
  • Maintenance would interfere with business operations
  • Necessary parts are not readily available

New Systems Simplify Maintenance

These days, many facility systems are more intuitive than before. Smart buildings, for example, can pinpoint potential failures before they happen. This streamlines resource allocation and allows you to more efficiently address maintenance requirements.

Reduce Deferred Maintenance

Deferred maintenance can become a money pit if not resolved quickly. Make sure your facility takes maintenance very seriously.

If you’d like to know more about the importance of routine repairs, look no further than the maintenance experts at MaintenX. Give us a call today!

What Are New Energy Star Metrics?

This year, the United States Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) had planned to release an updated version of its ENERGY STAR® certification program’s scoring system, but put its plans on ice after an outcry from businesses and homeowners.

What is ENERGY STAR?

The EPA’s ENERGY STAR program rates the energy performance of commercial and institutional buildings and facilities. These ratings run on a scale from 1-100 and can be used to benchmark the energy efficiency of buildings and industrial plants against the average energy performance of comparable structures. These metrics are also used to determine if a building qualifies for ENERGY STAR status.

Outdated Rating System

The current energy rating system is based on data from 2007, making the existing standards over 15 years old. The proposed update would alter the energy efficiency rating of countless buildings and, in many instances, substantially lower their scores.

Change of Plans

In October 2018, the EPA announced that it was pausing its program’s facelift in response to outcry from business and property owners across the country. Because of the age of the old metrics, many buildings that were awarded the coveted ENERGY STAR designation would lose it under the new metrics. This would likely present a hit to their bottom lines, as many tenants and business owners today look to rent apartments and office buildings with the ENERGY STAR designation.

Potential Effects of the ENERGY STAR Scoring System Overhaul

If the EPA does decide to release the new version of this program, most scores will go down. This does not mean that the energy performance of any particular home or facility has gone down, but simply reflects that the average building in its category is today more energy efficient, owing to the fact that construction and electrical technologies have improved in the 15 years since the program was implemented.

How to Do a Roof Inspection

Your roof is your facility’s first line of defense against extreme weather. When business owners and facility managers trust their roofs without inspecting them, they could end up with big problems including structural deterioration, mold development, or damaged insulation. The solution? Regular, comprehensive roof inspections.

When inspecting your facility’s roof, look for the following:

  • Fractured caulk or rust spots
  • Buckling, curling, or blistering shingle tiles
  • Missing or broken shingles
  • Cracked rubber seals around vent pipes
  • Moss and lichen, which could be a sign that a roof is rotting from the inside out.

If you find piles of debris from asphalt roof tiles in the gutters, that’s a sign of a much bigger problem; check the age of your roof to determine if it needs to be replaced.

DIY Inspections VS Professional Inspections

Most people can spot an obvious roof problem (missing shingles, interior leaks, etc.) without having to climb up on the roof. Other types of damage, however, require close-up inspection by a trained eye to detect. That’s why it’s generally a good idea to get a professional to look it over for you periodically.

If your facility’s roof is older than 10 years, hire a trustworthy roofing contractor to come out and inspect it. If you suspect your facility’s roof has been damaged, call the property’s insurance carrier first. Depending on the policy, the needed repairs may be covered. If your insurance covers the repair, they’ll handle the inspection scheduling.

Want to know more about roof inspection? Call MaintenX today!

Modern Advances in Boilers

Boilers have been a vital element of building design ever since they were developed. Boiler technology has seen countless changes over the years, leading to more efficient and eco-friendly boiler systems.

Some of these innovations include:

  • Fuel flexibility
  • Lower greenhouse gas emissions
  • Higher turndown
  • Longer lifespans
  • More stable burner systems

This has led to improved facility operations. We’ll discuss the particulars of some of these advances in boiler technology.

Amplified Use of Condensers

Replacing non-condensing boilers with the newer condensing designs has led to an overall boost in system performance and efficiency. That also brings with it a reduction in operational costs.

Ultra-Low NOx Burners

Ultra-low NOx burners prevent thermal NOx or prompt NOx. Using this new boiler technology, these burners systematically pre-mix fuel and air before combustion. This process eliminates most fuel-related waste created by the older, less efficient models.

Advantages of Using Ultra-Low NOx Burners:

  • Reduce the incidence of major complications in system operation
  • Can be combined with complex boiler systems to lower NOx levels.
  • Substantial decrease in harmful gas emissions.

The Future of Boiler Design

The future of boiler design will likely involve integration with renewable energy sources (solar energy, geothermal, wind, etc.).

Solar energy is gaining popularity in the U.S. to pre-heat water tanks. A solar water heater usually can’t provide enough heated water by itself, but it can increase the energy efficiency of the system and supplement a boiler’s heating needs.

If you’d like to know more about boiler technological advances, contact MaintenX today.

Plastic Piping Technology

Plastics are indispensible in the piping service field. When used in landscape irrigation systems, drain, waste, and vent (DWV) systems, and sewage transport, plastic-based solutions can offer countless benefits.

Contemporary materials, such as polyvinyl chloride (PVC), chlorinated polyvinyl chloride (CPVC), and high-density polyethylene (HDPE), are installed more and more frequently by utility companies. Below, we’ll explore the advantages of these various plastic designs.

PVC

Improvements in PVC technology have allowed for increased durability in pipe, construction, wires, medical tubing, flooring, and even fabrics. Manufactured from industrial salts and carbon, PVC requires less oil or gas in its production, making it a greener option as compared to older designs.

Types of Pipes

There are three basic types of plastic pipes:

Solid-wall Pipes

These pipes have one layer of uniform thermoplastic material and have many applications.

Structured-wall Pipes

Structured-wall pipes have an improved design to enhance mechanical performance.

Barrier Pipes

Featuring a flexible metallic layer of three bonded materials, barrier pipe provides an added shield for liquids requiring purity, like drinking water. These pipes block out chemicals or other pollution where they are placed.

Improvements in Plastic Piping

One way to help make the nation’s piping systems more energy-efficient would be to minimize the number of leaks in pipe networks. Replacing and rehabilitating current water distribution systems made of traditional materials with plastic piping products could help reduce leakage and improve energy efficiency.

Developments in plastic pipe construction don’t just benefit utility companies, they also curb the nation’s energy consumption and lower greenhouse gas emissions, which has become an increasingly important factor in the decisions of companies and consumers alike.