The volume of energy consumed by buildings and the importance of energy efficiency in reducing that consumption are both now well-established elements of today’s green power movement. At the point where the two converge, building commissioning services are about to take a spin.

According to a recent report from Pike Research, demand for building commissioning services is accelerating worldwide. The report, “Building Optimization and Commissioning Services,” examines the global market. It looks at various forms of commissioning, including initial commissioning when a building is designed and constructed, recommissioning, retrocommissioning lighting and other systems when an initial commissioning was never conducted, and continuous commissioning, which monitors and provides fault detection within a portfolio of buildings.

Pike Research finds that a surge in growth in energy-efficient building design and the increased complexity of construction projects are combining to increase demand for building commissioning services. According to Eric Bloom, senior research analyst at Pike Research, lack of awareness and concerns about costs have kept the practice of commissioning “relatively rare,” but he added that, as green building certification and other high-performance building standards become more commonplace, “the barriers to building commissioning services will fall.”

In particular, Pike Research expects the market to be transformed by software-­based continuous commissioning services, which tap into the streams of data now being generated by buildings, allowing building owners to monitor performance in real time.

With all of these favorable forces behind it, Pike Research projects the worldwide market for building commissioning services to generate $28.8 billion in total revenue over the period from 2012 to 2020. Of that total, North America will lead the global market with nearly half or $13.8 billion.