The monthly energy review: what a good one contains

Most portfolios have reporting. Few have a review. The difference is that a report presents numbers and a review ends with a short list of things to do, each with a name against it. This article is a specification you can hold a provider to, or build your own process around: what a monthly energy review should contain, where each number comes from, and who is supposed to act on it.

If you already receive one and want help reading it section by section, that is covered in how to read a monthly energy review report. This piece is about what should be in it in the first place.

The idea is not new. Natural Resources Canada's Energy Management Guidelines describe energy management as a continuing cycle of planning, measurement, review and action rather than a one-time study, and monitoring and targeting practice has said the same thing for decades: the value comes from a regular comparison against an expected figure, not from a single detailed report. What has changed is that the data capture behind that cycle can now run without anyone retyping a bill.

What goes in a monthly review

Six sections, in this order, because each one depends on the one before it.

1. Coverage and exceptions: which accounts and meters were expected, which arrived, what is missing or estimated. This is the integrity statement for everything that follows.
2. Utility review: consumption and cost per building for the reporting month, against the same month last year, with weather accounted for.
3. Portfolio benchmark: energy, cost, emissions and water intensities across the buildings, on a consistent basis.
4. Movements worth explaining: what changed beyond the normal range, with the likely cause where the data supports one.
5. Priorities: a short list, each item with an owner and a next step.
6. Verification of anything in progress: whether a project or an operational change is delivering what it was supposed to.

Six is deliberate. A review that runs to forty pages is filed, not read. The detail belongs underneath, available to anyone who wants it.

The data behind each number

Every number in the review traces back to a captured bill or a meter feed, and the review should be able to show that trace. In practice this means three things.

• The source is kept. The original bill PDF or meter file stays attached to the numbers derived from it, so any figure can be checked against the document it came from.
• The reporting month is a rule, not a guess. Bills rarely align to calendar months, so the review states how a 34 day period spanning two months is assigned, and applies that rule the same way every time. The detail is in utility bill validation and the reporting month.
• Cost is separated from consumption. Taxes, riders, retailer charges and price changes move cost independently of use, so they are reported separately from consumption and never blended into a performance claim.

What changes month to month

The recurring content is the comparison. Consumption this month against the same month last year, weather adjusted, per building and for the portfolio. Cost the same way, with the price effect separated. Intensities updated. Emissions updated from the same validated consumption using published factors.

Then the part that takes judgment: which movements are worth a paragraph. A 3 percent rise on a mild month with a new tenant is noise. A 14 percent rise in base load on a building where nothing changed is a question. Interval data makes many of these answerable within the review rather than after it, because the hour by day pattern usually shows whether something started running when it should not.

Who reads it and what they do next

The same review serves three audiences, which is why the structure matters more than the volume.

• Property or facilities manager: works from the priorities list. Chases the site with the overnight load, books the contractor, confirms the setback schedule.
• Owner, board or asset manager: reads coverage, the portfolio benchmark and the summary. Wants to know whether the numbers are complete, whether the trend is right and whether anything needs money.
• Finance or accounts payable: uses the cost and exception detail. Wants the estimated reads, the duplicate, the account that is being billed on the wrong rate class.

Condominium boards are a particular case, because the review often has to serve both the board's reporting duty and the manager's operational work in one document. That distinction, and where an audit fits alongside it, is covered in condo energy audit or monthly energy review.

A sample structure

For a portfolio of a dozen buildings, a workable review runs to a few pages: one summary page, one page of portfolio benchmark, a page per building only where something needs explaining, and the exceptions and priorities. Annually it is joined by a benchmark report covering the full year, with ENERGY STAR Portfolio Manager kept in sync so external reporting draws on the same validated figures rather than a parallel set.

Where a project is running, the review carries its verification: expected consumption from the baseline model against actual, cumulatively, so the saving is stated rather than assumed. The International Performance Measurement and Verification Protocol sets out how that comparison is structured, including the adjustments for weather and operating changes that keep it credible. The same discipline is described in measurement and verification without the spreadsheet grind, applied monthly instead of once at the end of a project.

The formal version of the surrounding process, including targets and roles, belongs in an energy management action plan. The monthly review is what keeps that plan alive between annual updates.

FAQ

How long should the review take us to read?

Ten minutes for the manager who works the priorities list, and two minutes for the owner or board reading the summary and the coverage statement. If it takes longer than that, the detail has been put in front of the conclusion.

What if a bill arrives after the review is issued?

It is captured, validated and included in the next month, and the prior month is restated where the change is material. The coverage section is what makes late arrivals visible rather than silently changing a published figure.

Do we need interval data for a monthly review?

No. A review built on validated bills covers consumption, cost, intensities, emissions and reporting. Interval data adds the operational half: base load, schedules, and whether something is running when the building is empty. Most portfolios start with bills and add meter feeds where the utility supports it.

Can our existing software produce this?

Often it can produce the charts. The parts that usually have to be arranged separately are the monthly capture of every account, the validation before publication, and the judgment that turns movements into a priorities list. The comparison between running the tools yourself and taking the review as a service is in energy management software for building portfolios. To see the format on your own data, request a review.