Apartment heat metering: problems and solutions.
Introductory
Yu. Luzhkov: Muscovites are too wasteful in their consumption of energy resources. (Prime-TASS).
Muscovites are excessively wasteful in their consumption of energy resources, says Moscow Mayor Yuri Luzhkov. “According to various sources, per year per person in Moscow there are 4 tons of standard fuel — this is the most wasteful consumption compared to other countries, for example, Sweden or Canada, where the climate is the same as in Moscow,” said Yu. Luzhkov at a meeting of the capital’s government.
The mayor believes that saving energy resources by citizens will lead to a reduction in fees for housing and communal services. “If we reduce consumption by at least 15-20 percent, it will not only be a big gift to the state, but also a reduction in personal expenses for housing and communal services,” said Yu. Luzhkov. According to Yu. Luzhkov, “saving is one of the main tasks, and everything is important here — both energy and heat.”
Experts’ opinion
According to most experts, the combination of apartment metering and regulated heat consumption provides maximum opportunities for realizing the energy saving potential in residential buildings.
Subscribers have an incentive to monitor the consumption of thermal energy, just as, for example, they monitor the consumption of electricity. Apartment accounting systems are becoming relevant for Russia and are being used here. However, their implementation requires compliance with certain technical conditions. In addition, the most modern and accurate accounting system may not work if the issue of the procedure for settlements between consumers in an apartment building is not resolved and ways to resolve it are not determined.
A matter of technology
The main technical condition for organizing apartment accounting is the presence of horizontal heating distribution. In this case, the heat meter is installed at the entrance to the apartment. Otherwise, apartment-by-apartment accounting is simply impossible (we are not considering per-radiator accounting here, since its organization is based on different principles). It should be noted that today there is successful experience (for example, in Belarus and the Baltic states) of converting buildings with a vertical (riser) heating system to a horizontal scheme. In the construction of new modern residential complexes, this approach is now quite widely used in Russia.
The choice of metering devices and network technologies for automatic readings is key. The heat meter must not only be reliable and metrologically stable, but also compact and easy to operate. In addition, it is necessary to be able to take readings remotely, since metering devices are most often installed directly in apartments. For these purposes, as a rule, inexpensive dispatch technology based on the M-Bus protocol is used, which has already been tested in Russian conditions.
For example, such a system was used to organize the collection of data from metering devices in a business-class building on the street.
Tchaikovsky in Yaroslavl. Here, 61 heat meters are connected to two hubs (M-Bus Master), which allow you to take current readings and calculator archives at any time. “Data from all meters is sent to a computer, which automatically reads the information at a given interval. The convenience of the system lies in the ease of its setup and further use. After all, the chairman of the homeowners association, who does not have special skills, must control the readings,” says Igor Rachkov, a specialist at the Croiss company, which set up the accounting system.
In many cases, it is necessary to organize data on the consumption of heat, water and electricity into a single database. This significantly simplifies the work of responsible persons in the HOA who distribute payments among apartment owners.
However, if metering devices of different brands are used, difficulties may arise with the compatibility of data output formats.
Therefore, some manufacturers, such as the Danish company Kamstrup, a leading global manufacturer and supplier of system solutions for energy metering, are developing technologies based on their own measuring instruments that make it possible to easily combine data on the consumption of all resources.
However, even if all technical conditions are met and high-quality and convenient metering devices are used, HOA managers (or service organizations) are often faced with the problem of distributing bills for thermal energy.
Practical experience
An example is the Novaya Zvezda residential complex in St. Petersburg (Pesochnaya embankment, 12), which was put into operation in April 2005.
The design of this house included a technically competent and easy-to-use apartment heat metering system, which was predetermined by the high class of residential real estate. However, calculations based on instrument readings have not yet been carried out — a decision on this must be made by the HOA. But while there are a number of issues regarding the distribution of payment, consideration of this item is postponed. What is the reason for this situation?
The building is supplied with heat by its own boiler room, which supplies hot water supply, heating and air heating systems for fresh air ventilation. The operating mode of the boiler room (and heat supply to the apartments) is set by the operating organization and is maintained automatically depending on weather conditions. Residents can adjust the temperature in the premises using 4-pipe fan coils of the comfortable climate system. Additional heating of the air is provided by coolant supplied to the closers from the heating supply system, and cooling is carried out thanks to Carrier chillers installed in the building. Since the volume of thermal energy consumption is regulated precisely with the help of a comfortable climate system, it was decided to organize apartment-by-apartment metering using fan coil units.
“Each apartment has 2 MULTICAL® meters installed (a total of 156 devices for 78 apartments): one for cooling in the comfortable climate system and hot water supply, the other for heat from fan coils and hot water recirculation,” says Alexander Lebedev, a specialist at the Climate company -prof,” who installed engineering systems in the building. — The choice of metering devices was determined by their ability to work in heating and cooling systems, as well as the necessary accuracy and the ability to integrate into a single network. Dispatch and control are based on the LonWorks system.”
The final adjustment of the entire metering system has not yet been carried out, although the operating organization already has the opportunity to use the device data to solve its own problems in servicing the engineering systems of the residential complex. “Computers are installed in switchboards inside apartments,” explains Alexander Lebedev, “and this caused a number of problems. Firstly, it was difficult to choose the time for commissioning work, because… It is difficult to find the owners of the house. Secondly, many moved the shields during repairs, so everything had to be reconnected. In addition, not all apartments have been renovated yet, so the comfortable climate system does not work everywhere.”
Another problem is related to the operating mode of the chiller. As the chief engineer of the facility, a specialist in the Comfort Management of RBI Holding, Alexander Petrochenkov explains: “For example, last winter only two apartments used air cooling, others did not have such a need. The question of who and in what amount in such a case should be charged for the maintenance of the chiller and the electricity it consumes has not been finally resolved.”
One of the options for solving this issue was found by the NEO HOA, formed in house No. 45 on Lenin Street in Khabarovsk. Here, a comfortable climate system provides indoor air cooling. To pay for its maintenance, the residents agreed to use the following scheme. “If fan coil units operate in all apartments, then the chiller operates in optimal mode with high efficiency, in this case, for every kilowatt of cooling energy there is 0.46 kW of electricity,” says Andrey Atroshchenkov, chairman of the HOA.
— To calculate this value, we divided the rated consumption of the chiller by its maximum cooling capacity. Otherwise, the efficiency is significantly lower. This is how we do it: Those who use cooling pay for electricity at the rate of 0.46 kWh, according to the readings of the MULTICAL® cooling meters. And we divide the remaining difference, along with payment for the maintenance and service of the chiller, among all owners, in proportion to the area of the apartments. Thus, there are two components, with the second part being payment for the opportunity to use the service.”
When distributing heat bills, the HOA also faced the difficult task of accounting for energy consumption for various purposes — heating, ventilation, hot water supply.
The house is connected to the city heating network, the heating of the premises is regulated using radiator thermostats. Apartment accounting has been organized. “We have a common heat meter at the entrance to the house,” explains the chairman of the HOA, “and then the coolant flows into 3 different systems: heating, hot water supply and an air heating system for fresh ventilation. Currently the ventilation is not working, so we are distributing payments as follows.
How much energy is spent on heating can be calculated by summing up the data from all apartment heat meters. Then we subtract this figure from the total consumption of the house and consider the resulting balance as the cost of hot water supply (heating of the common areas in the residential complex is minimal and it was decided not to take it into account). Then we divide this amount between apartments in proportion to their water consumption. But how we will calculate the payment for ventilation is not yet clear.”
Thus, if there are several systems operating in a building that use thermal energy (heating, hot water supply, air conditioning), it is advisable to install building-wide heat meters separately for each of them. This will allow you to obtain the data necessary to generate separate invoices for these services. In addition, the presence of summary indicators makes it easier to balance and reconcile data with the heating company.
Legal aspects of accounting
By law, only the provider of these services (the energy supply organization), which the HOA is not, can charge for housing and communal services. The heating company cannot accept residential meters for commercial registration because The boundary of the balance sheet is the wall of the building. Therefore, the situation with apartment-by-apartment heat metering is different than with water and electricity — payments within an HOA can only be carried out within the framework of agreements between its participants.
As has been shown, achieving them is not always easy, and not so much because of the reluctance of people to find a common language, but because of a lack of experience. Experts believe that preparing recommended calculation schemes, as well as creating the necessary regulatory framework, can help owners in this matter.
Several other issues will have to be taken into account when developing these schemes. In particular, the organization of payments for heating staircases and equipment maintenance.
Their solution also requires revision of the legislation. For example, as Alexander Verbitsky, leading researcher at the State Unitary Enterprise MosvodokanalNIIproekt, notes: “In Europe, payment for heating “common areas” is regulated like this. From 20 to 50% of the amount of heat measured at the entrance to the house is distributed between apartments in proportion to their area (unregulated component).
The rest of the payment is made in accordance with meter readings. Unfortunately, the developers of the “Rules for the Provision of Public Utilities to Citizens” (RPKU) ignored the European experience. Therefore, today we can only talk about the formal availability of the necessary regulatory documents.”
“The regulated share should be 70%,” says Vadim Livchak, head of the energy efficiency department of construction of the Moscow State Expertise, vice-president of NP ABOK. — in addition, the specific heat consumption per square meter of apartment area, depending on its location (corner, on the first or last floor, in the middle of the house) can vary, according to some data, by a factor of two.
Therefore, appropriate coefficients for the position of the apartment should be entered. It is probably necessary to introduce another increasing factor for the constant component, which would allow for the heating of staircases and other common areas to be taken into account.”
For buildings where various engineering systems that use thermal energy operate, an individual calculation scheme is required. It will allow taking into account the specifics of the project, the financial interests of residents, the operating company and the heat energy supplier.
For example, in some European countries, payments between owners, energy supply and operating organizations are carried out using billing companies. They offer the optimal tariff scheme and take care of all the calculations.
So, we can see that the prerequisites for the introduction of door-to-door accounting exist today. Modern technical means make it possible to solve almost any technical problem, and projects that have already been successfully implemented are clear evidence of this.
The point is to organize an effective system for distributing payments among homeowners.
Taking into account the existing experience of a number of HOAs, it is quite possible to do this.
JSC «Kamstrup»