September 15, 2026

Featured ASHRAE Journal Article: Making the Business Case for High Efficiency HVAC Equipment

Article Abstract

A growing challenge for contractors in today’s price-sensitive market is the ability to provide building owners with an estimate of energy cost savings when proposing to replace existing HVAC equipment with new, more energy efficient equipment. This “business case” challenge has become increasingly acute in today’s highly competitive environment where building owners demand an economic justification for the premium typically required when installing higher efficiency equipment rather than less expensive, minimally code-compliant equipment.

Compounding the challenge is the fact that most building owners are unwilling or unable to invest the resources (time and money) to have an energy cost savings assessment conducted. This is particularly challenging in the small-to-medium-sized buildings (SMB) market, i.e., buildings less than 50,000 square feet, which represent most commercial and multifamily buildings. 

While sophisticated methods do exist for estimating energy savings, e.g., building simulation modeling, these methods are relatively complex, require special expertise, necessitate a considerable amount of input data related to the building and its construction, are time consuming and relatively expensive to conduct. As such, a relatively quick and less complex approach that could still approximate energy savings would be desirable, particularly in the SMB market.

This article discusses one such approach that may be used to estimate energy cost savings accruing from replacing existing equipment with higher efficiency equipment.

*This article was originally published in the ASHRAE Journal, September 2026 Issue. To learn more about ASHRAE, visit www.ashrae.org

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