A portfolio-wide energy efficiency plan for government

Challenge

JLL has a government client that operates a large, national real estate portfolio comprising approximately 70 sites and a diverse range of property types. The total building area of the portfolio is more than 200,000 square metres. Each of these properties has complex, critical operational requirements.

Our client engaged us to provide energy and sustainability advice. Prior to this, it had taken measures to improve energy performance, but did not yet have a formal sustainability policy or strategy. Several sites were operating at a 0-star NABERS Energy efficiency level, and there were opportunities to incorporate sustainability measures across the portfolio.

We worked with our client to identify how it could increase the sustainability performance of its portfolio, including establishing a sustainability strategy, as well as a processes for implementing energy efficiency projects with minimal disruption to day-to-day operations.

Approach

A partnership spanning over six years and two property services contracts meant we knew our client and its property portfolio well. This allowed us to align our processes to suit the client’s needs, and tailor our recommendations to suit its overall property strategy and site-specific requirements.

Several specialist teams within JLL work on this client account, including in energy and sustainability, leasing and lease administration, facilities management, procurement and finance.

By combining the teams’ knowledge of the portfolio, we were able to identify opportunities to reduce energy consumption, costs and emissions, and then create a plan to implement reduction measures.

Our sustainability team worked with our facilities experts to obtain site-specific information and to engage existing maintenance contractors. This improved our ability to identify and implement performance improvement measures. The sustainability management plan we developed also incorporated guidance for the market evaluation of new properties.

We identified and put in place energy saving initiatives including LED lighting upgrades, uninterrupted power supply (UPS) system replacement, lighting and air conditioning control upgrades and recommissioning, computer room air conditioning recommissioning, and building management system (BMS) upgrades. A solar photovoltaic installation is also being undertaken via a Power Purchase Agreement funding arrangement.

Our client’s operational requirements were of the highest priority, and so we had to work around them. This meant navigating security clearances, escorting requirements and processes to access secure areas. Additionally, we had to consider the potential impacts of power shutdowns and changes to building controls in sensitive computer room environments.

Result

We achieved a 20% reduction in electricity consumption across our client’s portfolio between 2016 and 2022. Electricity costs reduced by $1.3 million per annum, and emissions also reduced by 9,000 tonnes per annum.

This focus on energy efficiency resulted in an improved NABERS (environmental building certification) performance for 10 large sites by an average of 1.5 stars over three years. Some sites achieved an improvement of three stars.

In recognition of these efforts to reduce its energy consumption, our client received a prestigious industry award and subsequent commendation. In addition, the approach taken to reducing the cooling energy of the critical environments in the portfolio through increased temperature set-points, soft-starters on fans, sealing of leaky airflow routes, and recommissioning of controls, was put forward as the gold standard for how other government entities should approach critical environment cooling.

We are continuing to work with our client to build on these achievements, which are paving the way for future investment in sustainability and net zero carbon operation from the client.