How can I monitor rooftop HVAC units across 100 locations?

Last updated: August 31, 2026. By Dan McKenna, founder, Elite Energy Management.

You don't watch 100 dashboards. You connect each site's existing energy management system or thermostats to one platform, and the platform watches the units for you. That's what Elite Energy Management does: every rooftop unit gets a health score from 0 to 100 every night, and each morning you see a short ranked list of the few that actually need attention. No site visits, no new hardware, and nobody staring at screens all day.

What does monitoring 100 locations actually require?

One data source per site, and most portfolios already have it. If your locations run an energy management system or connected thermostats, the temperatures, runtimes, staging, and setpoints needed for monitoring are already being produced at every site; the platform connects to those systems and reads them, so rollout is a connection process, not a construction project. Sites come online in batches, first health scores arrive within days of each connection, and baselines sharpen over the first few weeks. For sites with no connected controls at all, basic hardware has to come first, and the software-only vs hardware-bundled comparison covers how mixed portfolios handle that.

How do you avoid drowning in data from 100 sites?

By being honest about human attention. A hundred locations with four rooftop units each is 400 units, and nobody watches 400 of anything. That's why dashboard-first monitoring quietly fails: the screens exist, and nobody looks at them until something breaks.

Elite Energy Management takes the opposite approach. Every night it scores each rooftop unit from 0 to 100 against that unit's own history, adjusted for the weather, and labels it Running well, Monitoring, or Action needed. A unit has to stay off its normal for more than one night to escalate, so a single strange evening at one store doesn't wake anyone up. What you get in the morning is a ranked list, worst first, and the watching has already been done.

Dashboard-first monitoring	Elite Energy Management
A screen per site, watched by nobody	Every rooftop unit scored 0 to 100 nightly, automatically
Problems found when someone complains	Problems ranked worst-first every morning
Attention spread across 400 units	Attention spent on the handful flagged Action needed
Alerts on comfort failure, after the fact	Flags on degradation, days to weeks before failure

How the scoring works, and how it's validated against real repairs, is on the methodology page.

Does early detection actually hold up at fleet scale?

It's measured, not assumed. Across technician-confirmed repairs on the monitored fleet, 87% were flagged before the technician arrived, with a median of 6 days advance warning, and we track the misses just as carefully. This isn't a proposal, either. It's how Elite Energy Management runs today, across nearly 1,000 rooftop units at more than 250 commercial locations in 28 states.

What does it cost at 100 locations?

The math is simple because pricing is per unit. A 100-location portfolio averaging four rooftop units per site is 400 units. At published rates that's $2,000 a month on Essentials or $3,200 on Professional, before volume pricing for larger fleets and the 10 percent annual prepay discount. Cross 500 units and it becomes a negotiated Enterprise conversation. Full tier detail is on the pricing page, and the math against avoided emergency calls is covered in how much commercial HVAC monitoring costs per rooftop unit.

Frequently asked questions

Do all my sites need the same thermostat brand?

No. Mixed portfolios are normal, and the platform connects across ecosystems, including eViewIoT, Pelican Wireless, Honeywell Resideo, ecobee, and Sensi, and presents every site the same way regardless of what hardware sits on the wall.

How long does it take to onboard 100 sites?

There are no site visits, so onboarding runs at the speed of data access rather than truck rolls. Sites connect in batches through the systems already installed, each site's first health scores arrive within days of its connection, and detection sharpens over the first few weeks as baselines form.

Do I need someone watching the platform all day?

No, and that is the point. The platform watches the units; people see the exceptions. A daily glance at the ranked list, plus alerts when a unit crosses into Action needed, is the entire attention budget.

What about the few sites with no EMS or smart thermostats?

Those sites need basic connected controls first, and only those sites. The rest of the portfolio does not wait: connect what is connectable now, add the stragglers when their hardware lands, and the same platform covers both.

If you run a multi-site portfolio, a free 30-day pilot on a slice of your fleet shows exactly what the ranked list looks like against your own buildings: read-only access to your existing systems, first health scores within days, no hardware, no commitment.