Hotel/Motel Property Management System - WITH UTILITIES INCLUDED WITH ROOM

Energy management in the lodging facilities poses special challenges not found in other types of businesses. Both large hotels and small motels are active around the clock; they may routinely provide a wide variety of services through a physical plant that frequently consists of more than one building. For example, in addition to guest rooms and other public areas, hotels must maintain conference facilities, restaurants and dinning rooms, lounges, recreation and exercise centers, gift shops and administrative offices. To support these areas, these facilities often include kitchens, laundries and maintenance rooms. These operations usually complicate energy management in hotels, without even mentioning one of their primary energy-using variables, guests. Even with the rising costs of equipment and the relentless demand on hotel systems, many hoteliers and managers remain reluctant to spend extra money and time replacing still-serviceable equipment. Fortunately, there are many management and conservation tactics that can be easily be incorporated into the daily operations that do not require a capital expenditure. Most hotel guests leave items turned on to discourage intrusion. Also there is no additional cost to keep a room warm or cool for a pleasant return at the end of the day. If you multiply this three or four dollars by 200 rooms at 80% occupancy by 365 days per year you are looking at a quarter of a million dollars spent! Does an employee making this much need a manager? You bet! What if you could spend $10,000 one time for a permanent manager that could save you $25,000 each year. Would you do it? The hospitality industry has traditionally replaced lighting fixtures in an effort to reduce costs. This provides only a fraction of the possible savings compared to billing guests for itemized usage. See http://www.eere.energy.gov/buildings/hotels/energy_efficiency/ Interfaces directly with hotel/motel PMS for guest folio insertion (Execu/Tech, VisualMatrix, RentManager(tm). As often they say you snooze you lose!

Apartment/Condo/Public Housing - WITH UTILITIES INCLUDED IN RENT

Many existing condominium and apartment structures still rely exclusively upon the master utility meter installed during initial construction. This has proved to be a very real problem, both in operating cost overruns and in management/tenant relations. When utilities are included with the rent, where is the incentive for the individual tenant to turn out that unnecessary light or AC unit when leaving for the day? The cost of operating that unit is spread out amongst his fellow tenants, so his personal increase is small. It is the responsible tenant who suffers, paying for more power than he consumes. Anyone who has sat in on a homeowners' or tenants' meeting can testify to the management/tenant-relations havoc that this essentially unfair situation can wreak. Why continue to deal with this situation when installation of a microMETER Sub-metering System can place the accountability squarely upon each tenant, relieving the problem for all time. A simple solution for a complex problem, that's what microMETER is all about. This is a common situation in Texas. large Texas apartment building, large Texas public housing project, large Texas public housing project

Apartment/Condo/Public Housing - WITH INDIVIDUAL UTILITY-OWNED METERS

Like homeowners, many apartment residents contract individually with the local utility as "customers of record". They must pay deposits, wait for service connect/disconnect and pay a monthly "customer charge" of about $8 to $10, whether or not they use any power at all. They pay the highest kwh rate that the utility is allowed to charge. This is about 8 cents per kwh in Florida. When a master demand meter is used to serve a multifamily complex, the rate is considerably lower, about 5 to 6 cents per kwh, depending on time of use and peak demand. There is only one customer of record and only one customer charge. But how do you divide this big bill fairly based on individual usage? SUBMETER it! The customer charges alone for 8 to 10 months would pay for the necessary submetering equipment for each apartment. Then the rest is pure savings of 25 to 30% for all residents.

The Brooke Amendment to the United States Housing Act of 1937, 42 U.S.C. § 1437a, provides that a tenant's rent may not exceed a fixed percentage of his or her income. As indicated in 42 U.S.C. § 1437f(c)(1) (Supp. IV 1992), Congress clearly intended rent to include an allowance for utilities. HUD regulations establish that the allowance is intended to "approximate a reasonable consumption of utilities by an energy- conservative household of modest circumstances consistent with the requirements of a safe, sanitary, and healthful living environment." 24 C.F.R. § 965.476(a) (1993). HUD's definition of rent therefore takes into account a utilities allowance: Tenant Rent. The amount payable monthly by the Family as rent to the PHA. Where all utilities (except telephone) and other essential housing services are supplied by the PHA, Tenant Rent equals Total Tenant Payment. Where some or all utilities (except telephone) and other essential housing services are not supplied by the PHA and the cost thereof is not included in the amount paid as rent, Tenant Rent equals Total Tenant Payment less the Utility Allowance. 24 C.F.R. § 913.102 (1993); see also 24 C.F.R. § 965.472 (1993) (defining "tenant rent" in virtually identical manner). The Tenants argue that by converting from checkmetering to retail service, THA is effecting an increase in their rent in violation of the Brooke Amendment because they will be required to pay a security deposit to TECO, and in some cases an arrearage as well. This argument fails to recognize that rent is defined as the "amount payable monthly by the Family ... to the PHA." 24 C.F.R. § 913.102 (emphasis added). Amounts paid under retail service are not paid to the PHA, but to the utilities; thus, they are not within the HUD definition of "rent." The HUD regulations recognize this fact when they speak of utilities "not supplied by the PHA" and state that "the cost thereof is not included in the amount paid as rent." Id. (emphasis added). Tenants sue to have submeter

Renovation and Turnaround - Condo Conversion - Real Estate Flipping

This is unquestionably the best improvement you can make for a resale profit. It is cheaper than paint. It allows you, without any rewiring, to sell a building with individually metered spaces. This very quick improvement can upgrade the use of a structure for a profitable resale with a virtually guaranteed success formula. Don't omit this from your new house plans or real estate models. Yields a tsunami of enery-saving data. With the passing of the 2004 Energy Bill, it may be that every household receives a 100% Internal Revenue Service (IRS) tax credit on the purchase of a microMETER and other renewable sources. A modern solar-powered home panel installation with full net power flow analysis.

Holiday Lighting

Some folks like to go all out. With a small additional purchase of a microMETER, the display can be measured, compared and monitored. The fun thing to do here is set up some X10 (tm) controls with the controller by your PC. As you turn things off and on, you can see the results in the software display.

Upscale House Trends

Do you have a smart house? A digital sub meter can track all of your branch circuits and report power meter anomalies. Even the most impressive homes today can't claim to have all the greatest technology currently available if they don't have a microMETER in the electrical panel. Don't miss out on a serious discussion topic that actually has conservation merits as well. Be the "green geek" at your next company picnic. Pfizer Inc. CEO, Henry A. McKinnell, The leading resource for affluent homeowners.

Things found over the years

Refrigerators can contribute about 25% to a household bill. They also do funny things at night when you look at their graphs. You see when they defrost and make ice cubes. You can also tell when someone has opened the door. For those interested in holiday displays, how could they really impress people if you have to wait a month to see what they do to your January bill?

Have you seen these devices on the market that save power while running a motor? Try that with a LOADED motor and use your microMETER to get the facts.

A kwh saved is a kwh produced. "Kill a watt"

More cost-effective than solar, wind, geothermal, or hydro, it has the same renewable energy tax credits. Home owners and home builders alike are using the latest technologies and practices to increase residential energy efficiency with whole house energy monitoring and data acquisition. The following reports describe some of these efforts and how they are paying off in lower energy costs. Solar power, which involves using photovoltaic panels to convert sunlight into energy, is not a new idea but it hasn't been a particularly cost-effective one either. Although clean and renewable, the technology is costly and panels have been rather inefficient compared to other sources of energy. As a result, solar usage is non-existent in this country, with the share of electricity produced by solar cell technology less than 1 percent. But monitoring power (kill-a-watt) is gaining momentum due to incentives, tax breaks, and the rising cost of fossil fuels. Moreover, improved technology is creating a new generation of whole house energy monitoring that is more efficient and cheaper. As a result, home energy monitoring systems increased 2700 percent in 2004, say industry officials. Hanley Wood Acquires Two Commercial Construction Magazines "Electricity Usage Monitor" "ECO-STUCTURE and METALMAG will expand Hanley Wood's portfolio into sustainable/green building—a rapidly growing sector in commercial construction," says Peter Goldstone, President, Hanley Wood Business Media.(Electric Power Usage Monitor)

Temporary Shared Living Arrangements

The booming economy of the 1980s created great personal wealth, and wealth found expression in domestic architecture, as it always does. These large houses were variously referred to as trophy houses, starter castles, and McMansions. It isn't just that they were big, like their namesake Big Macs; it's that they celebrated bigness. For the moment, America is being subjected to the slow squeeze on gasoline prices, rather than a sudden sharp shock, with the pumps now averaging $3.09 nationwide. But there's a lot tension accumulating in the process. Gasoline prices are going up remorselessly now mainly because of bottlenecks in the refinery sector. The more interesting point in all this, for the moment, is that the media has still not put together the collapse of the housing bubble and the permanent oil crisis. These events will be happening simultaneously. The housing industry, so-called, will never recover because the oil crisis spells the end of the suburban build out. The cycle is over. The big production homebuilders will go down and never come back. Office of Affordable Housing (OAHP) administers three separate programs designed to address the nationwide shortage in affordable housing. The HOME Investment Partnerships, Self-Help Homeownership (SHOP), and Homeownership Zone programs bring federal resources directly to the state and local level for use in the development of affordable housing units, or to assist income-eligible households in purchasing, rehabilitating, or renting safe and decent housing.

Who needs affordable housing? More people than you might realize. The economic expansion of the 1990s obscured certain trends and statistics that point to an increased, not decreased, need for affordable housing. The generally accepted definition of affordability is for a household to pay no more than 30 percent of its annual income on housing. Families who pay more than 30 percent of their income for housing are considered cost burdened and may have difficulty affording necessities such as food, clothing, transportation and medical care. An estimated 12 million renter and homeowner households now pay more then 50 percent of their annual incomes for housing, and a family with one full-time worker earning the minimum wage cannot afford the local fair-market rent for a two-bedroom apartment anywhere in the United States. The lack of affordable housing is a significant hardship for low-income households preventing them from meeting their other basic needs, such as nutrition and healthcare, or saving for their future and that of their families.