CPG Building Upgrade Diagnostic
Developed by CPG Corporation for building owners, this diagnostic considers your existing building's priorities, current performance visibility and implementation needs to provide a high-level strategy outcome for more informed sustainability and upgrade planning. You may receive a high-level strategy outcome without providing identifiable information. Additional details will only be requested if you choose to explore your building's opportunities further. (*indicates essential questions.)
Section 1: Strategic Priorities
1. What best describes your role?
Asset Owner
Asset Manager
Investor/ Fund Manager
Other
2. What type of building are you assessing?
Office
Retail / Mixed Use
Hospitality
Industrial / Logistics
Institution
Other
3. What are your current priorities for this building? (Select up to 3)
*
Reduce operating costs
Meet regulations (e.g. MEI)
Obtain Green Certification (e.g. Green Mark)
Improve tenant attractiveness / retention
Improve asset value or future marketability
Align with investor / ESG expectations
Extend asset lifespan
Improve occupant wellbeing / comfort
Not sure / Still exploring
Question 3 score
Section 2: Operational Control & Readiness
4. Which best describes your building occupancy profile?
*
Mostly owner-occupied
Single tenant
Multi-tenant
Not sure
4a. Do your tenant leases include sustainability (“green lease”) clauses?
Yes, most leases include green clauses
No, leases do not include green clauses
Not sure
5. What level of disruption can your building accommodate during upgrade works?
*
Minimal disruption only
Minor phased upgrades acceptable
Moderate phased upgrades acceptable
Major refurbishment possible
Not sure
Section 3: Visibility & Current Performance
6. How do you currently monitor your building’s energy performance?
Utility bills
Basic sub-metering for certain areas
Real-time monitoring / dashboard / BMS
We do not actively monitor
Not sure
7. Do you track carbon emissions?
Basic (Scope 1 & 2 or Operational Carbon)
Advanced (Scope 1-3, Whole Life Carbon Accounting)
No / Not sure
8. Do you currently have sufficient visibility into your building’s systems and performance to support upgrade planning?
*
Yes
Partially
No / Not Sure
8a. Which systems are you most concerned about?
*
Air-conditioning / chiller systems
Ventilation / fans
Lighting
Controls / BMS
Water systems
Indoor environmental quality
Not sure
8b. How would you describe the overall condition of your building’s main systems?
*
Recently upgraded / efficient
Generally functional
Some ageing systems
Significant ageing or maintenance concerns
Not sure
8c. Approximately when were the major air-conditioning system last upgraded?
Less than 10 years
10-20 years
more than 20 years
Not sure
8d. Type of Air-Conditioning System
Centralised system (e.g. chiller plant)
Decentralised units (e.g. condensing units / DX)
A mix of both
Not sure
8e. Have smaller-scale building systems (e.g. lighting, ventilation fans, controls) been upgraded in the last 5 years?
Yes, most systems have been upgraded
Some systems have been upgraded
No major upgrades yet
Not sure
Total Q8 Score
Section 4: Investment & Planning Horizon
9. What is your anticipated holding horizon for this asset?
*
Less than 3 years
3-7 years
8-20 years
Long-term core asset
Not sure
10. Which best describes your current investment approach toward upgrades?
*
Prefer low-cost operational improvements first
Open to phased capital upgrades
Willing to consider major retrofit investment
Evaluating options case-by-case
Not sure
Total Q3 & Q8 score
Total Q4+Q5+Q9+Q10
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Your Recommended Upgrade Strategy Below:
Strategy 1 — Visibility & Operational Optimisation Based on your responses, your building may benefit most from understanding current performance and optimising what you already have before committing to larger upgrades. Better visibility into energy use, building systems and operational performance can help uncover where costs and inefficiencies are occurring, whether issues are operational or equipment-related, and where improvement efforts should focus. The initial priority is therefore to identify practical, lower-disruption opportunities to improve performance, while building a stronger baseline for future investment decisions. Where to Focus First: A building performance review and targeted monitoring can help identify opportunities such as: • improving visibility through energy dashboards, submetering or energy-efficient monitoring systems • optimising air-conditioning schedules, setpoints and operational settings • reviewing chiller, ventilation and controls performance • upgrading lighting and introducing smart lighting controls where appropriate • upgrading smaller systems such as ventilation fans, controls or smart plug-load management • improving occupant comfort through operational tuning and occupant-responsive controls • strengthening carbon tracking and ESG reporting readiness What This Could Mean for Your Building: A performance review can help uncover operational quick wins and identify where existing systems could perform better, often with relatively limited capital intervention. By establishing a clearer performance baseline, you can separate operational issues from equipment limitations and better prioritise where further investment is needed. This could reduce operating costs and improve current performance, while giving you a stronger basis for future upgrade and investment decisions.
Strategy 2 — Targeted Systems Upgrade & Capital Enhancement Based on your responses, your building may be ready to move beyond operational optimisation and invest selectively in systems or spaces with greater improvement potential. Rather than upgrading everything at once, a targeted technical and performance assessment can help identify where capital investment could deliver the strongest benefits, whether through lower energy and maintenance costs, improved system reliability, better occupant experience or enhanced building quality. The priority is to focus investment where there is a clear case for improvement, and plan upgrades around your building's condition, operational needs and investment priorities. Where to Focus First: Depending on your building's systems, condition and priorities, opportunities may include: • upgrading ageing air-conditioning or chiller systems • improving controls integration, BMS optimisation and system monitoring • upgrading ventilation systems, EC fans, pumps and other higher-efficiency equipment • improving air distribution and ventilation based on actual occupancy and cooling loads • introducing energy recovery or dedicated outdoor air systems where suitable • implementing higher-efficiency lighting and smart lighting controls • improving indoor environmental quality and occupant comfort • strengthening submetering, sensors and performance analytics • improving carbon tracking and operational reporting capabilities • undertaking targeted façade, shading or solar heat gain improvements • upgrading common areas or occupant-facing spaces What This Could Mean for Your Building: A targeted assessment can help identify and compare upgrade opportunities based on their performance impact, cost and wider building benefits, giving you a clearer basis to prioritise investment. This can help you focus capital where it could create the greatest value, build a stronger case for each upgrade and avoid investing in improvements with limited impact. The result could be lower energy and operating costs, reduced maintenance risks and better building performance, while supporting your building's longer-term sustainability, attractiveness and competitiveness.
Strategy 3 — Transformational Retrofit & Long-Term Asset Repositioning Based on your responses, your building may be ready for a broader transformation that goes beyond individual system upgrades. Where ageing infrastructure, changing operational needs, higher sustainability ambitions or plans to reposition the asset for future users and market needs require more significant intervention, a whole-building assessment can help explore how systems, infrastructure and spaces could be transformed together. The priority is to define what you want your building to achieve and how it should be positioned for the future, then identify the major interventions and investment needed to move towards that outcome. Transformation may happen through a major retrofit or carefully planned phases, depending on your building and investment priorities. Where to Focus First: Depending on your building's current condition, systems and future priorities, opportunities may include: • major air-conditioning or chiller plant renewal and alternative cooling strategies • large-scale M&E and electrical infrastructure renewal • deep energy retrofit and whole-building optimisation • mixed-mode, hybrid or alternative cooling approaches where suitable • major façade enhancement, high-performance glazing or envelope renewal • electrification and future-ready infrastructure upgrades • advanced smart building, analytics and integrated control systems • renewable energy and advanced solar integration • pursuing Green Mark Super Low Energy or Zero Energy ambitions • enhancing occupant and tenant-facing spaces and the overall building experience • broader repositioning initiatives to support future use and market relevance What This Could Mean for Your Building: A multidisciplinary assessment can help you look beyond individual replacement needs and identify how major interventions could collectively transform your building. By evaluating technical performance alongside operational needs, sustainability ambitions and building experience, you can develop a clearer transformation case and prioritise the investments needed to achieve it. This could help you use major capital more purposefully, addressing ageing infrastructure while improving performance, experience and your building's long-term relevance, competitiveness and value
Operationally Phased Upgrade Approach Based on your responses, your building may benefit from dividing upgrade works into clearly defined zones, systems or intervention periods. This can help you progress with improvements while limiting disruption to ongoing operations. How You Could Approach It: 1. Divide your building into upgrade zones Identify floors, common areas, back-of-house spaces or lower-occupancy zones that can be upgraded independently. An operational and site review can help identify where works could start with the least disruption. 2. Separate central systems from occupied areas Consider upgrades to chiller plants, pumps, central ventilation, BMS or common-area systems separately from works requiring access to occupied spaces. This may allow some improvements to progress without waiting for wider building access. 3. Use natural windows for intervention Align works with planned shutdowns, vacant floors, tenant fit-out or reinstatement, lease transitions and refurbishment periods. Where possible, combine upgrades with works that already require access or disruption. 4. Pilot before wider rollout Test selected solutions on a representative floor, zone or system before expanding building-wide. Establish clear performance measures to assess the results and refine the approach before scaling up. For Multi-Tenant Buildings: Map lease expiries, fit-out periods and planned upgrades over the next 3 to 5 years to identify suitable intervention windows. Use new lease and renewal cycles to progressively introduce green lease clauses that support energy data sharing, access for upgrade works and retrofit coordination. The Value of This Approach: By planning around zones, systems and intervention windows, you can create a more practical upgrade sequence that reflects how your building actually operates, while keeping larger future improvements within view.
Coordinated Upgrade Approach Based on your responses, your building may have the flexibility to coordinate related upgrades across systems and spaces, rather than implementing each improvement separately. This approach looks for opportunities where improvements could work better together or be delivered through the same intervention. By coordinating these opportunities, you may be able to reduce repeated works and achieve a stronger overall outcome from your upgrade programme. How You Could Approach It: 1. Identify Where Upgrades Could Reinforce Each Other Review planned and potential improvements across your building to identify where combining interventions could create a stronger overall outcome than implementing them separately. For example, metering, controls and equipment optimisation can work together to identify, respond to and verify performance improvements. 2. Group Works Around Shared Intervention Opportunities Where works affect the same systems or spaces, consider whether they can be planned together. For example, a floor refurbishment could provide an opportunity to coordinate lighting, ventilation, controls and indoor environmental improvements. 3. Sequence Enabling Improvements First Identify upgrades that could improve or inform later investments. For example, review actual cooling loads and optimise air-side performance before finalising the capacity of a future chiller replacement. 4. Align with Planned Works Where It Adds Value Use refurbishment, maintenance or renewal cycles as opportunities to integrate improvements and reduce repeated works. Where the performance case is strong, upgrades may also be brought forward rather than waiting for end-of-life. For Multi-Tenant Buildings: Where tenant coordination is required, consider opportunities to align related upgrades across common systems and occupied spaces. Existing green lease or sustainability collaboration arrangements could also support data sharing, access and coordinated implementation. What This Could Mean for Your Building: An integrated approach can help you avoid isolated investments and repeated works, while identifying opportunities for related upgrades to deliver greater value together. By coordinating improvements around shared systems, spaces and intervention opportunities, you can create a stronger overall outcome from your upgrade programme.
Broad-Scale Retrofit Approach Based on your responses, your building may have the flexibility to undertake retrofit works across larger areas or multiple systems within the same intervention period. Where greater access or disruption can be accommodated, a broader retrofit approach could help you make fuller use of the intervention window, coordinate works more efficiently and avoid repeated disruption later. How You Could Approach It: 1. Look beyond the immediate retrofit scope Before works begin, a broader building assessment can help identify other improvement opportunities that could be more effectively or economically addressed as part of the same retrofit programme. 2. Prioritise what is hardest to revisit Technical and operational review can help identify works that would be costly or disruptive to return to later, such as those requiring ceiling access, shutdowns, major equipment access or temporary relocation. 3. Find opportunities across disciplines A multidisciplinary review can identify where architectural, M&E, digital and sustainability improvements share infrastructure, access or construction works, helping to reduce duplication and improve the overall retrofit outcome. 4. Test whether a broader scope creates better value Compare the cost and benefits of expanding the retrofit scope now against returning for separate works later. This can help identify where a wider intervention could improve implementation efficiency and overall investment value. For Multi-Tenant Buildings: Larger vacancy periods, major tenant transitions or multiple lease expiries can create rare opportunities for broader retrofit works. Early assessment and planning can help identify the right scope before spaces are reoccupied and future access becomes more constrained. The Value of This Approach: A Broad-Scale Retrofit Approach can help you make fuller use of periods when wider building access is available. By identifying opportunities upfront, comparing the value of a broader scope and coordinating works across disciplines, you can reduce repeated works, avoid missed retrofit opportunities and get greater value from each major intervention period.
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Next Step: Would you like a more detailed recommendation for your building?
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