Our Building is Up Now What?

Nearly every commercial building is built for the purpose of creating income in some way, shape or form; to offset the costs it takes to keep it maintained. Whether it’s a retail location to serve clients or a head office to run your business, you still have to pay for things like lighting, heating and much more. It’s important to keep this as balanced as possible, and cut corners when you can in ways that won’t threaten the integrity of the building in any way. There are tons of ways you can lower the costs and save yourself money after a commercial building has been completed. Here are just a few.

Programmable Heating

Using a programmable thermostat is a great way to save money since you won’t need to have the temperature the same all day. You can set timers to change the room’s temperature at different times of the day, depending on whether or not people will be there or not. You can set it to lower during the nighttime for example, since nobody will be in the building to know the different. Heating and cooling are the biggest chunk of any type of energy used in your steel building, and programming the rise and fall throughout the day and night can reduce your bill by up to 10%.

Insulate!

Insulation is extremely important for your steel structure, and there are plenty of types that work for every kind of budget. Focus on how resistant the type that you’re looking is to heat transfer – or how air from getting out and cold air from getting inside the building. This is called the “R-Value” and every kind of insulation has a different level of it. It will be important for you to do just a little bit of research as well as looking around in order to find the kind that works best for you and your steel building.

Sensitive Lighting

Lights are another thing that eats up tons of energy, and the fact of the matter is that they don’t need to be on all the time. If nobody is in the space, it’s much better if the lights or off for obvious reasons. However, even the function of turning the lights on and off manually might cause you to waste energy. The reality is, it’s easy to forget things like that and you might not end up with any savings at all. Installing motion sensors that turn the lights off or on depending on if someone walks in is crucial. Any space that is only used sometimes during the day – like bathrooms, conferences rooms and more – work to save you plenty of money on your electricity bill.

Minimize The Work

The heating and cooling systems inside your steel building can’t be doing all the work, so it’s important that you find ways to minimize the workload of these appliances. Things like weather stripping your doors and windows to prevent air leakage and cold air from getting into your structure. Choose energy efficient windows and doors to make it a bit easier, and during the construction process pay attention to where you put certain features like windows. South-facing windows will allow much more natural light and heat into your space, taking some extra pressure off your heater.

For more information on our steel buildings, call us at 1-888- 449-7756