Just over a decade ago, there were parts of the building industry, particularly in Sydney, that could be described as “primitive”.
Before the building commissioner arrived in town, embedded network provider Arc Energy had already begun stepping in to save the foundations of new projects, resulting in millions of dollars in savings.
Arc Energy now has 50,000 apartments on its books, which began in Sydney and spread across the east coast. It also has more than 100 projects in the pipeline.
Arc Energy founder and current sales director Fred Faker said the group was formed because the industry needed better methods and was lacking proper review and implementation, especially for basic utilities like electricity and hot water.
“It was pretty primitive—there was so much waste and occupants were left waiting more than two minutes for a decent stream of hot water. Plumbers were just coming and doing their job; there was no real advice or proper guidance to help the appointed contractors reduce hot water delays because of dead legs or overcome overly engineered, inefficient designs,” Faker said.
“Before the building commissioner David Chandler’s reforms, Arc Energy began its improved delivery methods, investigating buildings with prior issues to hydraulic layouts to determine essential elements, visiting older troublesome buildings to understand better functions of basic components and hundreds of hours invested, liaising with relevant consultants implementing proper applications to make sure we had taken out all the bugs.
“We were involved at the early consulting stage and worked with the hydraulic engineers to work out a better method to get hot water to an apartment faster and sooner.
“There are cost savings in doing that, we could save the water that was being wasted, the copper and materials used in the build, and we could reduce energy consumption and the cost to owners.”
But it was more than getting quick, reliable hot showers and fewer repairs in the long run.
Arc Energy managing director Luke Pelich said once they started, savings for developers before and during construction, and in operation, became apparent.
“There’s a benefit certainly during construction where we are project managing all these things, we’re ensuring hydraulic design is followed, Basix and Green Star ratings are optimised, including removing administrative burden, and so on,” Pelich said.
“Then, when we look at the energy transition, there’s no better lead into this process.
“With an embedded network, you might have 500 apartments, but you’ve got one market-facing connection point to benefit all building occupants with significant energy discounts.
“When we implement solar and batteries in these buildings now and in the future, they’re best placed to continue to carry this forward."
“Our research and development division's focus on efficient products has provided us with several patented components that help reduce waste and impact the buildings Arc Energy manage” Frankly speaking, our buildings overall are more efficient and cost less to people living in them."
Faker said once a development was complete, service was paramount, if there was an outage to a residential multi-level building or they were without hot water for hours it could be quite frustrating for those involved, but Arc did not follow the trend of offshore call centres, instead choosing to be located in Victoria and NSW to make it easier to manage customer enquiries.
“We are used by strata managers as well, so they don’t get excessive invoices for callouts, because we cover the cost to keep these systems running,” Faker said.
The landscape has now changed, we reshaped the industry. In the past several years Arc Energy has always outperformed the big retailers and other embedded network providers.
Faker said that when they started 11 years ago, the market was lacking delivery points.
“Luke and I are very grounded, and we really hate to disappoint, I think we wear our heart on our sleeves, we are compelled to pursue a higher standard and both challenge the status quo,” Faker said.
“A great indication of that is that 99 per cent of our developers are still in business today.
“That’s a testimony that we choose well and that our clients are reputable enough that they know how to deal with a company like Arc Energy and that we’re going to deliver what we promise.
“We’ve helped our clients push past industry challenges that would normally lead them to falter, and we’ve been there in the good times and bad.”
Pelich said the market has seen massive changes by leading embedded networks providers delivering renewable solar technology, electric vehicles and EV charging stations to help meet government policy and fast-track rollout.
“It has helped developers and builders to refine quality and efficiency and reduce greenhouse footprint.
“Because of Arc Energy’s simple design specifications and peer reviews, our buildings tend to run 20 to 30 per cent more efficiently than others.”
Arc Energy Group said it was Australia’s fastest-growing managed network provider, dedicated to making energy innovative, sustainable and affordable.
The Australian owned and operated group powers thousands of homes while reducing carbon footprints and helping developers, builders and occupants save money.
Arc Energy improves efficiencies in designs to utilities during construction, then provides lower utility rates, improves building adaptability for future green tech while reducing a building’s carbon footprint.
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