Maintaining accurate schedules within the Optimize platform is paramount to extracting the full benefit of the software. Measures, Baselines, and Advisory observations all rely on accurate building schedules. Users may experience nuisance Measure alerts and will not receive accurate Baseline consumption estimations if their building schedules are set incorrectly in Optimize.
How to set your schedule
The main Schedules page for a specific building can be accessed by clicking on the green “View Schedules” link in the top-right corner of the Performance page. From the Schedules page, users can set the building’s global schedule and add one-off schedule exceptions. The building’s global schedule can only be accessed from this link on the Performance page.
Base Occupancy Schedule
The main building operating schedule is called the “Occupancy Schedule” in the schedules page. This is a repeating weekly schedule that only applies to the building shown in the top left of the screen; each building in a portfolio or region must have its own schedule set via the “View Schedules” link on that building’s Performance page. Temporary or one-off exceptions and changes can be made to this base schedule via “Schedule Exceptions”, discussed further below. If a building schedule is not set up, it will default to Monday to Friday, 6:00 am to 6:00 pm local time.
A good rule of thumb for setting a building’s Occupancy Schedule is to enter the leasing operating hours, or the typical working hours of the building tenants. Occupancy hours should be used and NOT equipment operating hours, as the software is designed to understand when buildings should be starting and shutting down based on occupancy and weather conditions.
- Example: An office building has leasing requirements from 8:00 am - 6:00 pm Mon-Fri, and has an optimal start window of up to 4 hours, depending on outdoor temperature. The Occupancy Schedule in Optimize should be set occupied 8:00 am - 6:00 pm, Monday through Friday, and unoccupied on weekends. The schedule should not be set to 4:00 am - 6:00 pm even though the equipment typically starts around 4:00 am.
Optimize’s Measures will flag possible early starts when the building is unnecessarily starting too early in the morning, among other measures, and we want that early start measure to catch if the optimal start sequence is too aggressive. This is why we do not recommend including warm-up periods or optimal starts in the Occupancy Schedule.
To enter a new occupancy schedule or to edit an existing one:
- Click the green “View Schedules” link in the top right of the Performance screen.
- Click the green “Edit” button in the top right corner of the Occupancy Schedule screen. The Occupancy Schedule will adjust slightly to allow it to be edited.
- By default, Saturday and Sunday are unoccupied, but if they do have occupancy hours then check the box to the left of the day you wish to be occupied.
- Clicking on the start or end times will open a dropdown menu to choose a time of day. Times can also be typed directly into the time box for more precise values.
- When complete, click on the green “Save” button in the top right corner of the screen.
Occupancy schedules should be updated as necessary to maintain accuracy to the building’s occupancy or leasing hours. One-off or temporary occupancy changes should be set using a Schedule Exception instead. See the ‘Schedule Exceptions’ article for more information on how to do this.