[Equest-users] Demand Rate Modeling in Mexico

Sun Oct 2 11:19:35 PDT 2016

Hi Coles - that is a tricky one!

It's been awhile since I've revisited the capabilities of the DD wizards for handling complex rate structures, and I'm pleasantly surprised to find some improvements in the native capabilities.  (screengrabs follow).  That is in fact a pretty wacky structure from my personal experience, but while it appears you can define/map up to 5 billing periods per day and then assign those to specific week days / holidays, I don't think you can do monthly maximum checks between each period to accurately determine billable demand within the eQUEST interface - some degree of post-processing seems unavoidable to me.
[cid:image001.png at 01D21B4B.37F50F70][cid:image002.png at 01D21B4E.05DA5740]

2 major thoughts:

1.       If it were me, I'd still keep an eye/ear out for a more promising contribution/reply, but in the meantime I'd just push forward with post processing your hourly outputs with excel to determine costs.  If you've done this before, this oddball formula doesn't pose a terribly difficult challenge to implement (all the needed hourly outputs & month/day/hour flags are conveniently packaged in the default "... - Hourly Results.csv" reporting block borne from wizard-generated projects).  Since I've moved into the performance contracting world (and had to puzzle with with getting complex rate tariffs *right* on the regular) - I've come to embrace, even enjoy, the absolute flexibility that comes with determining costs outside of the eQUEST, even with the relative pains that come with needing to use a separate process to figure out where the dollars/cents lie during development.

2.       On close inspection of that formula I notice something interesting... for each month:
if(The peak peak demand > the peak interim demand)  .AND. (peak interim demand > peak base demand))
  then the billable demand is simply the monthly peak (i.e. the rest of the formula zeroes itself out)!
  else see major thought #1 above - it was worth a check =(
endif

You might set up a couple checks for this at the top of whatever spreadsheet you use to number-crunch the hourly results.  If the above checks both turn out to be true for each month, you can simply use the eQuest's native monthly peaks/costs as reported as the billable demand, using a very simple single-TOU demand rate structure.
Best of luck - I hope you'll consider sharing whatever approach you land on (and everyone else dealing with Mexico)!  If there's a trick to be learned to handle this within eQUEST or commandline doe2, I'm certainly all ears!

~Nick

[cid:image003.png at 01D21B4B.37F50F70]
Nick Caton, P.E.
  Senior Energy Engineer
  Energy and Sustainability Services
  Schneider Electric

D  913.564.6361
M  785.410.3317
E  nicholas.caton at schneider-electric.com<mailto:nicholas.caton at schneider-electric.com>
F  913.564.6380

15200 Santa Fe Trail Drive
Suite 204
Lenexa, KS 66219
United States

[cid:image001.png at 01D189AB.58634A10]

From: Equest-users [mailto:equest-users-bounces at lists.onebuilding.org] On Behalf Of Coles Jennings via Equest-users
Sent: Thursday, September 29, 2016 2:38 PM
To: equest-users at lists.onebuilding.org
Subject: [Equest-users] Demand Rate Modeling in Mexico

Hello all,

I am trying to accurately model a tricky demand structure for a project in Mexico. The utility uses a complex way to bill demand (see item 7 in link here: http://app.cfe.gob.mx/Aplicaciones/CCFE/Tarifas/Tarifas/tarifas_negocio.asp?Tarifa=HM). Here's a snip of the translated text:

[cid:image005.png at 01D21B4B.37F50F70]
(In the table above, the middle column is FRI and the right column is FRB)

In summary, the day is broken into three periods (peak, intermediate, and base). Demand charges are in three parts, summed together for the total charge for the month:

1.       They charge for the max kW within the peak period

2.       For the intermediate period, you are charged for the difference between the peak period demand and the intermediate period demand, times a reduction factor of 30%.

3.       For the base period, you are charged for the demand of the base period less the max demand of the peak and intermediate periods, times a reduction factor of 15%.

I'm sure I'm not the first to stare at this rate structure and scratch my head as to how to model in eQUEST, since it applies nationally in Mexico. Has anyone had luck modeling a demand rate like this? I'm able to model time-of-day demand, but am struggling for a way to subtract the demands from each other to get accurate values for intermediate and base period charges.

Post-processing in Excel is always an option, but not desired.

Thanks,

Coles Jennings, PE, BEMP, LEED AP BD+C
Sr. Energy Engineer, Building Sciences Manager | Mason & Hanger (formerly Hankins & Anderson)
A Day & Zimmermann Company
D 804.521.7045 | O 804.285.4171 | F 804.217.8520
4880 Sadler Road, Suite 300 | Glen Allen, VA 23060
ha-inc.com<http://www.ha-inc.com/> (soon to be masonandhanger.com)
We do what we say.(r)

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