Driving factors

In energy monitoring and targeting, a driving factor is something recurrent and measurable whose variation explains variation in energy consumption. The term independent variable is sometimes used as a synonym.

One of the most common driving factors is the weather, expressed usually as heating or cooling degree days. In energy-intensive processes, production throughputs would usually be used. For electrical circuits feeding outdoor lighting, the number of hours of darkness can be employed. For a borehole pump, the quantity of water delivered would be used; and so on. What these examples all have in common is that on a weekly basis (say) numerical values can be recorded for each factor and one would expect particular streams of energy consumption to correlate with them either singly or in a multivariate model.

Correlation is arguably more important than causality. Variation in the driving factor merely has to explain variation in consumption; it does not necessarily have to cause it, although that will in most scenarios be the case.<ref>Forces Driving Inflation in the New EU10 Members. International Monetary Fund.</ref>

Driving factors differ from static factors, such as building floor areas, which determine energy consumption but change only rarely (if at all).