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August/September 2014Issue 93

E f f i c i e n t c o n t r o l o f u t i l i t i e s a n d f a c i l i t i e s

theenergyst.com

Dexma formed in the UK in February 2013 and after a successful first

year of trading it is looking to expand even further with its software that has the ability to be developed by the user as an app.

“Ultimately its all about data,” states Norman, “and you could use an excel spread sheet set up to produce the analysis that most monitoring and targeting software is able to perform. But the complexity as well as the potential for human error would mean that the energy manager would spend all of their time doing this. Software enables very quick gathering of data from sometimes-disparate systems and is able to integrate them seemlessly.”

“The thing that you have to realise with monitoring, metering and benchmarking,” continues Norman, “is that it is a tool; it enables understanding and to spot

24 August/September 2014 | water energy & environment theenergyst.com

ENERGY MANAGEMENT

New app-roach to software The UK is probably the most mature and crowded market place in the world for automatic monitoring and targeting products so what made Spanish company Dexma decide that its product would be good work here. Tim McManan-Smith got met up with UK managing director Steve Norman to find our why

where improvements can be made. It allows benchmarking and comparisons and prevents drift after energy reduction programmes have been implemented. Although it can be a really powerful tool and a necessary one to have a complete overview of energy efficiency projects within an organisation it won’t actually save a single kW of energy.”

Presenting data in the correct manner, such as with dashboards, has been an increasing part of the market but most do not address the issue of energy saving that effectively argues Norman. Although he does say that it can act as an aid to behavioural change, especially for those non-energy related staff.

The Dexcell system“Dexcell is our cloud-based systems that has all of the data in one place and allows analysis of this. It is particular adept at project based energy

reduction programmes. The software allows you to run projects with a time line to a measuring and verification standard such as IPMVP,” says Norman.

“How do you know if a payback that is quoted will be true? The ability of our system is that the repository of data is anomalously used to verify what others similar to you have done and how it panned out in the past. It is possible to conduct a virtual e-audit from past data that enables you to spot the best technology and manufacturers that would suit your particular future project”, comments Norman. The thing about exception reporting in general is that it spots waste but doesn’t tell you that you should change the lighting or the boiler says Norman.

Norman believes that you have to use the data in an effective and timely manner to get the best result from it. “Energy management software is like gym membership. If you don’t use it in the right way it won’t do anything for you,” says Norman.

Although the UK is a mature market for energy management software Norman says that it is still only at the tip of the iceberg. There are lots of companies who could be using software more effectively and many that would benefit by looking at their data differently. Regarding ESOS Norman says that he believes that it does help energy managers because it works in the same way as energy managers do. Unlike the CRC, for instance, which was a cap and trade,

“Energy management software is like

gym membership. If you don’t use it in the right way it won’t do anything for you

theenergyst.com August/September 2014 | water energy & environment 25

carbon based scheme that recycled money and appealed to the finance department of the company. ESOS works on an energy management level and is all about identifying opportunities to save.

It’s all about the apps“The thing about the Dexma software – Dexcell; what makes it different to competitors, is that additional functionality can be obtained from apps.

“Dexma has an open API (application programming interface) so that anyone can devlop apps for the Dexcell system. You can devleop it in-house, get another party to develop it or Dexma is able to assist too. You keep the IP for the developed app and can sell it to all of our other customers if you wish to on

our app store,” states Norman. An example of the sort of app that has been developed would be an app to utilise BMS functionality to, for instance, change the lighting from the Dexcell systems directly.

Norman believes that the apps will help Dexcell become the product to standardise on. He can see 500 apps available within the next year. Dexcell’s job is to capture, store and deliver data in the best way possible, others are then able to add further functionality to this offering through the development of apps.

“Data for your company is pre-processed in all the time needs that you require and stored in these time dimensions; minutes, hours, weeks, years and so on. This increases the speed of data retrieval

significantly,” says Norman.Dexcell will integrate

directly with the manufacturer’s hardware., this is important as people want a single place to look at all of their data.

Another benefit of Dexcell is that SMEs are catered for as much as I&C companies because the only licensing element that Dexma charges for is the data points that it has to store and not user numbers. “I am confident that some customers will understand with certain systems they are being charged for both volume and users numbers and realise that they are being double charged,” comments Norman.

dexmatech.com