Worcester: A greener future, today.

To comprehensively track its municipal energy use, Worcester is now using MassEnergyInsight (MEI), a web-based energy information reporting and analysis system developed by a consultant for the Massachusetts Department of Energy Resources (DOER) and offered to municipalities and other public entities free of charge.

Electricity and natural gas usage (kWh and therms) and associated costs for each municipal utility account are obtained from the utilities and uploaded to MEI roughly on a monthly basis. The heating oil, diesel and gasoline data, as well as solar electrical production data are uploaded by City staff directly into the system, in order to have a full picture of all energy use sources, costs and greenhouse gas emissions.

MEI displays and analyzes the data in the form of spreadsheets as well as various reports / dashboards, helping to visualize the data and use it for energy analysis, monitoring, reporting and decision-making (example of an MEI chart can be seen below).

MEI is a great tool that can be used by department heads and energy managers to compare building energy performance to similar buildings in the state and identify opportunities for energy savings.

The data is currently being used by the City to report on the progress toward the 20% municipal energy reduction goal from the FY 2009 baseline established as part of the City’s Green Communities Designation.