Spotlight on: RETScreen Expert

MCW Connect champions the use of RETScreen Expert as the backbone for ongoing energy management programs. We use it to establish weather‑normalized baselines, perform portfolio‑wide energy and GHG analysis, model and verify savings, and support IPMVP‑aligned measurement and verification services. When properly integrated with utility data systems, BAS analytics, and fault detection platforms, RETScreen Expert becomes the baseline for decision‑grade Energy Information System that helps bridge the gap between analytics findings and methodical, cost-effective execution of a Monitoring-based Commissioning (MBCx) program.

RETScreen Expert, developed by Natural Resources Canada (NRCan), is becoming a compelling, value-focused offering for public (or private) sector Owners looking to get the best energy and emissions performance out of their buildings while maintaining sustainable operating costs.

Here’s how MCW supports RETScreen Expert deployment and usage with some of our clients:

MCW is using RETScreen Expert as the Energy Information System (EIS) for across several DND Portfolios, integrating building and utility data to support energy monitoring, benchmarking, ongoing commissioning, and Measurement & Verification (M&V). It provides standardized dashboards, portfolio-level analytics, emissions tracking, baseline development, and reporting, while helping track energy conservation measures and operational improvements implemented under parallel projects. RETScreen complements DND’s Smart Building Energy Management Systems (SBEMS) platform by turning collected facility data into actionable insights that supports decision-making on continuous energy performance optimization work undertaken in collaboration with MCW’s energy engineering team and technical services sub-contractors.

MCW Connect followed and contributed to recent NRCan publications on “Tuning Up: A Framework for Existing Building Commissioning” to help clients integrate software tools and change management practices into their operations. Identifying no or low-cost BAS measures has helped clients reduce electricity and thermal energy consumption in HVAC systems, in some cases by more than 50%.

MCW integrated RETScreen Expert into a centralized utility data management platform serving a large portfolio of facilities for a healthcare sector client. Automated data ingestion, validation, standardization, and storage processes developed by MCW created a single trusted source of utility information, while a RETScreen Connector developed in collaboration with NRCan enabled seamless portfolio-wide energy, cost, and emissions analysis, reporting, benchmarking, and long-term performance tracking without manual data handling.

This type of data collection and curation solution has led to time savings for reporting practices. Replacing past methods of utility bill collection and bespoke spreadsheets formulation with automated RETScreen dashboards has cut the time to utility report by more than half, allowing Energy Management teams to spend more time on providing prescriptive fixes instead of dedicating time to defining and measuring performance.

MCW has integrated RETScreen into our energy engineering workflow for developing energy retrofit and decarbonization projects, and into our Measurement & Verification workflow for tracking project savings performance.

Utilizing MCW’s contributions to the RETScreen “Connect” features, our partners and clients have also been able to automate Energy Star reporting. Proving once again the value of investing in onboarding portfolio data into RETScreen to create shared knowledge for your teams. With a few clicks Energy Star reporting data is updated to meet local reporting requirements and allow executives to gauge progress of their program against their Canadian peers. This work also helps to meet the requirements for obtaining both local and national energy and decarbonization incentives.