At its best, technology is able to tackle huge problems with remarkable ease.

The General Services Administration, for example, has found a way to save $13 million a year in energy costs across 180 buildings — all thanks to a proprietary algorithm developed and monitored from many states away, in Massachusetts. Among the problems discovered: malfunctioning exhaust fans.

And Kohl’s department store has installed energy-efficiency software in 1200 stores nationwide. “We look at the energy meter and know exactly how much the store is consuming at any point in time,” says Paul Oswald, Managing Director at Environmental Systems Inc., which provides the service along with SkyFoundry. According to ESI, its automation system saves its clients an average of 8%-18% in energy costs every year.

These efforts are a top priority of both businesses and government.

That’s because buildings (both commercial and residential) are the largest single consumer of energy in the US, and up to 50% of that is pure waste, according to an industry expert. That means $200 billion a year is evaporating into thin air — along with significant toxins. Commercial and residential buildings account for about 34% of greenhouse gas emissions. However, in New York City, upwards of 75% of the city’s carbon footprint comes from buildings’ emissions.

Big Data To The Rescue

Prompted by potential savings as well as government mandates and programs, enterprises are using advanced technologies to diagnose and fix costly inefficiencies within their buildings.

The General Services Administration, for example, turned to Massachusetts-based analytic software company FirstFuel to assess its buildings.

FirstFuel’s process is driven by big data. When taking on a client, FirstFuel only requires a few pieces of information: electric meter data and the address of building (and natural gas data, when applicable) – that’s it. From there, FirstFuel uses highly sophisticated weather data, Geographic Information System (GIS) mapping, and semantic public web search to gather information on the client site.

"So we use things like Google maps and Bing maps to zoom in on the physical building," FirstFuel CEO Swap Shah tells Business Insider. Shah says the GIS mapping allows the FirstFuel team to see things including the number of floors, what purpose the building serves, and occupancy. FirstFuel can sometimes identify the building's HVAC system based on the equipment pictured on the roof, and they look for whether or not the building has a lighted parking lot — anything that contributes to energy costs. The data collection process then creates a profile of the building without ever stepping foot or putting any devices on site.

“We've made the whole process of analyzing the energy performance of buildings incredibly scalable and low cost so the time you would normally take to physically walk through and generate a report for one building, we can do for thousands of buildings now,” says Shah.

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Leaps In Efficiency In Last Decade

Much of the leaps in energy efficiency are possible due to the widespread adoption of networked and highly sophisticated energy meters around the country over the last 10 years. Energy meters used to be checked on site once a month, generating 12 basic data points a year, read and logged by humans. Now, meters register a raft of data every 15 minutes, accessible anywhere remotely, generating 36,000 data points a year.

One of the GSA buildings FirstFuel analyzes is the 4.1 million square foot Ronald Reagan building in Washington D.C. From its remote location in Massachusetts, FirstFuel used the data generated by their algorithm and noticed energy spikes at 10 AM and 3:30 PM, unusual times of day for a surge in energy use.

FirstFuel's team of building engineers then examined that data, along with precise details on the power surge, pinpointing two large exhaust fans in the garage that were unnecessarily operating at full speed. Adjusting the fans' setpoints to their original design levels contributed to the Reagan building saving $800,000 in one year. GSA’s overall savings, much of it in eliminating manpower auditing and monitoring costs, is $13 million, roughly 90% just in evaluation costs, across its 180 sites.

Often, It Comes Down To Turning Off The Lights

Much of the energy waste in buildings stems from operational inefficiencies, like turning off lights and adjusting the AC.

At Kohl’s, each site is monitored by a building automation system that is connected to the temperature control and lighting units. The data fed back to the building automation system shows if the fans are running, if the stages of heating or cooling are working, if lights are on or off, etc.

Many building problems are easy fixes, says FirstFuel’s CEO Shah. “Nobody's advocating that we should live in the dark. We're all are advocating that there's absolutely no reason to be comfortable and still be wasting that much.”