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Energy Audits

Inform Decisions and Drive Results

Preliminary Assessment & Benchmarking
Establish baseline energy performance and identify whether deeper analysis is justified. Benchmarking places your facility relative to peer performance and identifies early opportunity areas.

ASHRAE Level 1 — Screening Audit
A high-level walkthrough that summarizes basic energy use drivers and highlights obvious no-/low-cost opportunities. Typically used to determine whether more detailed analysis is warranted.

ASHRAE Level 2 — Detailed Survey & Analysis
A deeper evaluation of energy-using systems, incorporating end-use breakdowns, financial metrics, and prioritized improvement measures. This level produces quantified savings estimates and cost–benefit insights suitable for budgeting and planning.

ASHRAE Level 3 — Investment-Grade Audit
A full engineering-grade analysis designed to support major capital decisions and project execution. This includes detailed data collection, modelling, and cost/savings validation to reduce investment risk.

While audits can support regulatory compliance and sustainability reporting, Bowerbird’s focus is on informing decisions that reduce operating cost, manage risk, and justify capital deployment. Whether you are planning a deep energy retrofit or evaluating resilience upgrades, a proper audit provides a defensible foundation for action.

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Energy Audit FAQ's

What is an energy audit?

An energy audit is a structured engineering assessment of how a facility consumes energy, how its systems perform, and where inefficiencies exist. It evaluates major energy-using systems (HVAC, lighting, controls, process loads, envelope, and plug loads) and identifies opportunities to reduce consumption, improve performance, and lower operating costs.

Why would my organization need an energy audit?

Organizations pursue energy audits to understand where energy is being lost, identify cost-effective improvements, and establish a technical basis for investment decisions. Audits are often used to reduce utility expenses, improve system reliability, support capital planning, and inform long-term energy or resilience strategies.

How is an energy audit different from a simple walkthrough?

A walkthrough provides high-level observations, while a formal energy audit applies engineering analysis to quantify savings, costs, and performance impacts. Higher-level audits include data analysis, equipment evaluation, and financial modeling to support defensible decisions rather than general recommendations.

What types of decisions can an energy audit support?

Energy audits support a wide range of decisions, including:

  • Whether to pursue equipment upgrades or deep energy retrofits

  • How to prioritize capital investments

  • Which systems present the greatest operational or reliability risk

  • Whether on-site generation or storage is viable

  • How to plan phased improvements across a portfolio

How do ASHRAE audit levels differ?

ASHRAE audits are commonly categorized into three levels:

  • Level 1 provides a high-level screening to identify obvious opportunities

  • Level 2 includes detailed system analysis and quantified savings estimates

  • Level 3 delivers investment-grade analysis suitable for major capital decisions
    The appropriate level depends on project size, risk tolerance, and decision needs.

Can an energy audit help justify capital funding?

Yes. Energy audits provide technical and financial documentation that helps justify capital expenditures by quantifying expected savings, payback, lifecycle costs, and operational impacts. This is especially important for organizations competing for limited capital budgets or public funding.

How do audits support deep energy efficiency retrofits?

For deep retrofits, audits establish the baseline performance of systems and model how multiple upgrades interact. This allows bundled measures to be evaluated holistically rather than independently, reducing performance risk and improving long-term outcomes.

Are energy audits only used for efficiency projects?

No. Audits are also used to support resilience planning, electrification strategies, renewable integration, equipment replacement planning, and risk mitigation. In many cases, audits identify operational or control issues that can be corrected without major capital investment.

How do energy audits relate to measurement and verification?

Audit findings often inform how savings will be validated after implementation. For projects requiring performance confirmation, audit assumptions and baselines are aligned with future measurement and verification approaches to ensure results can be confirmed.

When is the right time to conduct an energy audit?

Energy audits are most valuable when:

  • Utility costs are increasing

  • Major equipment is approaching end of life

  • Facilities are being renovated or expanded

  • Energy or emissions goals have been set

  • Reliability or comfort issues persist without clear causes

In these cases, an audit provides clarity before committing resources.

What is a Facility Condition Assessment (FCA)?

An FCA is a systematic, data-rich evaluation of a building’s physical assets, systems, and infrastructure to determine their current condition and remaining useful life. 
  • Purpose: To create a long-term capital plan, identify deferred maintenance, and predict when equipment will fail.
  • Scope: Covers all critical systems: structure, roof, facade, HVAC, plumbing, electrical, and fire protection.
  • Output: A “Facility Condition Index” (FCI) is a metric that compares the cost of repairs to the cost of replacing the building, and a list of prioritized capital replacements.
  • Focus: “Is it broken or near failure?”