How to read a monthly energy review report for a building portfolio

The annual benchmark report tells you where a building stands. The monthly energy review tells you what to do this month. It is the document that turns an action plan from a binder into a habit, and its value depends on being short, consistent and readable by people who do not manage energy for a living.

This article walks through the monthly review report VE-MAP produces for each facility, section by section, with the questions each section answers. The structure follows the E-MAP format the Energy@Work team has used with property teams for years, rendered from validated bill and meter data.

The reporting month

Every figure in the report is anchored to a reporting month. Bills do not respect calendar months, so the platform assigns each bill to a month with one rule: if the billing period starts before the 15th, the bill belongs to that month; if it starts on or after the 15th, it belongs to the next month. Invoices that span more than 45 days are prorated across the months they cover. The rule is applied identically to bill PDFs, Green Button records and RETScreen imports, so the Overview, the Bills Manager and the report agree. The validation article has the details.

Section by section

Cover and E-MAP team

The cover carries the facility photo, the portfolio and address, floor area and the reporting month. The E-MAP team page lists who is accountable, by organization and title: owner representatives, property management, operations and the service team. It exists so that nobody reads a finding and wonders whose job it is.

Objectives and priorities

Three objectives for the program, then the priority list: measures with an owner, a status and a date. Priorities are stored once for the portfolio and can be extended per property, so the list an executive sees for the portfolio and the list a superintendent sees for one building are the same list, filtered. This is the living form of the action plan.

Utility review

One chart per commodity: monthly consumption as bars with cost as a line, for the trailing period, with the reporting month highlighted. Read it for three things: the seasonal shape (is heating load where it should be), the cost line diverging from the consumption bars (a rate change or a billing problem), and any month that is missing or doubled.

Energy dashboard: month over month and year to date

A grouped bar chart shows January to December for up to three years side by side per utility, with the reporting month shaded. Two callouts summarize it: this month versus the same month last year, and year to date versus the same period last year. The same-month comparison is the fastest test of drift; the year-to-date comparison smooths out a single cold month. Donut charts show the trailing twelve month split of cost and of greenhouse gas emissions by commodity, which is usually the first time a property team sees that gas, not electricity, drives their emissions.

Interval heat maps and findings

For electricity meters with interval data, an hour by day grid for the reporting month with a weekday header, an outline around the hours of interest (for example 9 AM to 5 PM in a commercial building) and daily high and low temperature rows underneath. The findings paragraph beside it is written by the reviewer: overnight base load, weekend operation, a schedule that slipped. The heat map article explains how to read the grid.

Performance indicators

Trailing twelve month figures ending at the reporting month: total energy in equivalent kWh, energy use intensity per square foot, cost intensity, greenhouse gas emissions and, for residential assets, cost and energy per unit or per bed. Each indicator is shown against the portfolio average and against the Energy@Work average, which is defined in the report as the mean trailing twelve month intensity across the facilities in the Energy@Work program. The twelve month window ends at the reporting month, not at the latest bill, so a report for May does not leak June data.

CUSUM and M&V, electricity and gas

Two charts per commodity. The M&V chart shows actual consumption against the weather-adjusted baseline model, from zero, with the baseline period shaded. The CUSUM chart shows cumulative savings against the baseline: positive is saved, negative is lost, and a change in slope marks the month something changed. An M&V table lists the trailing twelve months with actual, baseline, difference and bill type (estimated, actual, or actual from Green Button) and a total row. The method and its origins in RETScreen and the IPMVP are covered in weather normalization, CUSUM and RETScreen M&V.

Building automation notes

Free text from the operations team or the reviewer about schedules, setpoints, overrides and equipment status. This is where a CUSUM slope change gets its explanation.

Calendar

Month sections from the reporting month onward: seasonal changeovers, filing deadlines (Ontario EWRB is due July 1), incentive windows, review meetings. The calendar is shared across the portfolio with per-property additions.

A five minute reading order

1. Priorities: what is open, what changed status.
2. Same-month and year-to-date callouts: is the building up or down, before weather.
3. CUSUM slope: is the building up or down, after weather.
4. Heat map findings: is there an operational cause visible in the load shape.
5. Utility review charts: any billing anomaly (missing, doubled, cost line out of step).
6. Calendar: what is due before the next review.

What makes the report trustworthy

Every number traces to a bill or a meter record. Bills are read from the PDF with layout-specific rules, compared against Green Button data over the same date window, and flagged when they disagree, duplicate or show credits. Corrections are made once, with a note, and flow into the next report. The report is produced as a PDF and as an editable Word document, in landscape, so charts are never clipped and the property team can annotate it. The data path is described in turning utility bills and meter data into a portfolio view.

FAQ

How soon after month end is the report available?

As soon as the month's bills are in. Green Button data arrives within days; PDF bills arrive on the utility's cycle. Most reviews are produced three to five weeks after month end, when the last bill lands.

Who writes the findings and priorities?

The charts and indicators are generated. The findings, priorities, BAS notes and calendar are entered by the reviewer, in a review dialog before the report is produced, and saved so they carry forward.

Can we get the underlying data?

Yes. Monthly rows can be pushed to a Power BI streaming dataset, and consumption can be pushed to ENERGY STAR Portfolio Manager meters. See the use cases page for the reporting configurations we support.