Ingenium has been involved for years in the development of the SRI or Smart Readiness Indicator that indicates the readiness of a building to offer smart services. An unofficial test phase is currently underway in Belgium under the direction of the WTCB. This involves applying the SRI to actual buildings. The results of that test can be a trigger for governments to start the European-mandated official test phase. This is decisive in the government's choice whether or not to link the SRI to the EPC audit on a mandatory basis.
Determining how smart a smart building is effectively requires an indicator. This identifies several things: the capacity of a building (section) to adapt its operation to the needs (health, comfort, well-being) of the occupant/user, to optimize energy efficiency, and to adapt its operation to signals from the public grid (energy flexibility).
The SRI occupies a special place among these indicators because the European government itself is taking the initiative to develop a tool that can serve as a standard for the whole of Europe. VITO was the lead agency in the consortium set up for this purpose at the request of the European Commission DG Energy.
Introduction provisionally voluntary
The SRI is committed to the intelligent control of technical installations to ensure maximum comfort and well-being of building users, on the one hand, and efficient use of available energy to reduce consumption, on the other. The tool was developed over the period 2017-2020. The output is a standard list of services to be considered (heating, hot water, electricity generation, etc.) and weighting factors that check the maximum achievable level of each service against the actual level. A part will be common for the whole EU, supplemented by degrees of freedom to be filled in by each member state.
However, since neither Belgium nor the states have yet defined the degrees of freedom, the existing standard list is currently being used. For the time being, Europe is also letting the introduction take place on a voluntary basis. An officialization can only take place after the completion of the mandatory testing phase which - as mentioned above - has not yet started for Belgium. But in the current proposal for the revision of the EPBD, the calculation of the SRI may possibly become mandatory for buildings with installations with a capacity greater than 290 kW.
Test on concrete buildings
To demonstrate the potential of the SRI, the WTCB recently launched a test group including representatives from engineering firms, contractors, digital energy platform developers and government. Each of the 10 members completes the tool for 1 concrete (existing) building. To do so, they base themselves on the plans and rule descriptions, a site visit, the data collected by the building management system and the knowledge of the building manager. Afterwards, the WTCB compiles all experiences and the tool is evaluated. Later this year, the results will be published and presented at a WTCB seminar.
A tool that evolves
Ingenium is active in another working group: the 'Maintenance & potentional extension of the SRI calculation methodology WG2'. This group with 15 members from various European countries (with for Belgium also VITO and WTCB) works on the maintenance and further development and improvement of the SRI. The fixed list of services is reviewed on a regular basis. Matters already covered in this working group are:
- Streamlining a common EU approach: what is important to have in common and what can be localized?
- Variability of the SRI methodology: regions, building type, building age, etc.
- Impact of piloting results on SRI progression
- Energy recuperation for elevators
- Transparent change management process: reflect future process in case of calculation methods get changed
- How to request for changes on the SRI: for service catalogue, for scoring and weighting and maintenance of common part within EU vs country specific.
Precursor
There are several reasons why Ingenium participates in the development and testing of the SRI. As a forerunner, we always like to keep our finger on the pulse of the latest evolutions in the field of sustainable energy and comfort management in buildings. In the specific case of the SRI, two other issues come into play. There are several developers developing and (trying to) market similar tools. Only a few of them will eventually survive. The SRI seems to us to be a great contender for the club of survivors, since the European Commission supports its development and wants to introduce that tool in as many countries as possible. We also believe that such an indicator can be interesting for rentable buildings and that the SRI proves its value as a starting point for innovation in both new construction and renovation. Certainly in the office market, labels that measure sustainability, comfort and data quality are gaining in importance. A smart readiness label can be a valuable addition to this.
Want to know more about the SRI? Contact our expert Jasper Meynen at jasper.meynen@ingenium.be or by phone at 050 40 45 30.
