Windsor Energy Initiative Honored with Award

STATE COLLEGE, Pa., July 18, 2016 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) -- The Ontario Chapter of the Municipal Information Systems Association (MISA) of Canada has awarded the City of Windsor its Excellence in Municipal Systems Award in recognition of an energy management system initiative.

A total of five awards were granted by the MISA Ontario Chapter at its Annual Conference and Trade Show in Blue Mountain, ON, in June. Winners were selected based on review of municipal applications by a MISA selection committee made up of senior managers and directors from various Ontario municipalities. Winners for 2016 were the City of Windsor (Energy Management System Initiative), City of Kingston (Police Information Check), York Region (Self-Serve Data Depot Initiative), Town of Newmarket (Digital Pen Initiative), and the Municipality of Chatham-Kent (Call Center Automization & Virtualization Initiative).

The winning energy management award was granted in recognition of a collaborative effort between the Windsor Energy Initiatives Unit of the Asset Planning Department and the City's Information Technology – Business Process Center of Excellence division. Together, the two teams coordinated implementation of EnergyCAP energy management software for the collection and management of all utility data represented by the City of Windsor's 200+ properties and a budget of $18 million in annual utility expenses.

According to Melissa Osborne, Senior Manager of Asset Planning for the City of Windsor, the implementation has enabled convenient compliance with the Ontario Regulation 397/11 Green Energy Act 2009, and has facilitated an unprecedented level of automation in utility billing and auditing. Data from primary utility vendors is now imported electronically into the City's energy management database, and time formerly spent on data collection and transfer is now being spent on analysis.

A business process assessment review performed by the City prior to the initiative revealed that approximately three-quarters of labor costs associated with utility bill management involved manual downloading, copying, assembling, and distributing utility bill information.

"With the new solution in place," Osborne said, "countless hours previously spent on dealing with manual processes have been eliminated. Those hours, which amount to nearly $72,000 in annual labor costs, have been redirected to actual consumption reduction and or revenue generating activities which are improving our environment and putting less demand on the tax base to fund energy related costs."

The City of Windsor software implementation was facilitated by EnergyCAP Canada.

About EnergyCAP, Inc.

EnergyCAP's purpose is to publish industry-leading software tools that help clients derive value from utility bills. For more than 30 years, the award-winning EnergyCAP software has helped 10,000 energy managers to track more than $25 billion in energy spending. EnergyCAP utility bill and energy management software helps users get value from their utility bills and meter data. Software features include bill entry (manual, spreadsheet import, and EDI), bill tracking, an optional AP/GL interface, customizable bill approval workflow, audits, rate schedules, interval and production data tracking, cost avoidance (M &V), issue tracking, submeter tracking, virtual meter formulas, re-billing, greenhouse gas tracking, 300+ reports, automated ENERGY STAR building data submittal, building benchmarking, and graphical PowerViews. Discover why EnergyCAP is America's #1 utility bill management software at http://www.energycap.com. Their Canadian representative is Gerald Rubenovitch at EnergyCAP Canada Inc., 416 362 8999, www.EnergyCAP.ca

About the City of Windsor

Windsor, Ontario is the southernmost city in Canada. It is located in Essex County on the southern shore of the Detroit River, directly across the river from Detroit, Michigan. Settled in 1794 and incorporated in 1854, the City now has a population of more than 200,000. Windsor's economy is primarily based on manufacturing, tourism, education, and government services. The city is home to major automobile manufacturers including FCA Canada and Ford Motor Company.