Data is the lifeblood of all modern organisations. Information is created from data; and clear, timely, information supports decision-making, performance evaluation and continuous improvement. Reliable data can make the invisible visible, especially in real estate.
We all know the saying “garbage in, garbage out.” But it’s one thing to understand the concept, and another to be able to distinguish “good quality” data inputs from “garbage” data inputs. This is especially true in environmental and sustainability reporting, where multiple machine-to-machine processes may occur before a human even gets a look at the output. When the user is evaluating the information and assessments that come out of a reporting or analytics platform, they generally have to trust the quality of the data that went in.
Introduction to the Data Health tool
As an organisation that building owners and operators rely on to help them optimise the operational performance of their assets, Buildings Alive is intimately aware of the value of data, and the consequences of poor data quality.
That is why we recently released technology designed to ensure accurate, timely, and complete data sits behind all our analysis and reporting, as well as the automated data feeds that we provide to third party reporting platforms and control systems.
As the following screenshot illustrates, the fully configurable platform provides a portfolio view of the overall health of data supplies, including flags for instances of missing or substitute data, possible “estimates” or errors, incompleteness and timeliness (i.e. whether it is being received according to service agreements). Higher level summaries of these data are also presented. This can be viewed by portfolio, building, or for each individual data provider / vendor system.
If an issue is identified with a building’s data for any of its monitored utilities or sources, then the user has the option to click on the relevant measure and drill in to understand the performance and quality of data coming from the particular meter.
Issues are flagged as they arise and corrective actions are also recorded. This gives a complete picture of how accurate and reliable each building’s data is, and also when and to what extent corrections are made with the goal being complete, reliable, and auditable data sets down to the finest grained detail.
Until this service was developed, building owners and operators could not confidently assess the quality of their data or the diligence of their data service providers. Furthermore, it was not uncommon for meters to go offline or to report substitute data for extended periods unbeknownst to the building owner, which can lead to misbilling and hinder performance assessments like NABERS and Energy Star ratings.
We built this new tool to support the ecosystem of technologies and services that owners and operators typically need to optimise their assets’ performance and report results with confidence. Please contact us if you would like to know more!