LEED and other certification have been driven a shift towards more energy efficient buildings. Yet, most buildings don’t perform as well as was anticipated at the design stage – deviations of 2 to 5 times the predicted energy use are reported. Poorly controlled installations and ‘bad’ user behaviour are to be blamed. Certification based on tracked actual building performance is what we need not to fall short in reducing emissions. The good news: regulations increasingly adopt incentives for smart metering, automation and control functionalities, while establishing legal frameworks to help the general public embrace digitization and (big) data evolutions.
