Dubai, UAE: Proper guidelines on ESCOs, like those available in the Euro Zone and the United States, would go a long way in strengthening the building retrofit momentum in the GCC region, said Roosewalt Pereira, Business Development Manager at Gerab Energy Systems, which offers condenser control and cloud-based energy monitoring products.

Pointing to what he called an increase in retrofit projects, compared to a year ago, Pereira said that his company has done good business. For greater growth, however, it was important that private-sector property owners became more active. That could happen, he added, if ESCO-related laws were drilled into place. “Once those are set up, all private parties will come on board,” he said.

The laws, he said, were needed to safeguard the interests of investors. He added that there was no shortage of people with funds to invest in retrofit projects, but that they were sceptical about how to manage the whole thing. In his opinion, they were worried of the possibility that at the end of the day, the client might not pay, because he does not see any savings. That scenario might arise, because savings are something that can fluctuate, he added. “There is no fixed percentage or fixed consumption,” he said. “In that case, the laws should support and give proper guidelines.”

Overall, Pereira expressed optimism over the retrofit movement gathering steam. “There are products, and there is a need,” he said. “Awareness is also there now.”

(The writer is the Editor of Climate Control Middle East and the Editorial Director & Associate Publisher of CPI Industry.)