FirstFuel Software is the building energy analytics company that helps utilities and government agencies deliver energy efficiency across commercial building portfolios.

The company has raised another funding round of $8.5 million, bringing its total funding to $20.9 million to date. The company's investors include utility giant E.ON and venture capitalists Nth Power, Rockport Capital and Battery Ventures.

The company has developed a breakthrough method for identifying, creating and tracking energy efficiency (EE) savings opportunities behind the meter in commercial buildings. Requiring only electric interval meter data and a building address, the company produces a remote set of building-specific performance benchmarks and custom recommendations that utilities and government agencies can provide to building operators – without the use of onsite assessments or device installations.

FirstFuel's analytics are interesting because they use data to remotely determine the energy information of a commercial building, like its energy consumption habits, and can give recommendations for how to make the building run more energy efficiently. The company does not use onsite hardware (like sensors) or onsite energy audits to get this data, but says its energy info and recommendations are as accurate and effective as if the building had used hardware or an audit.

One of the major groups of customers for such a service are utilities which want a cheaper and quicker way to figure out the energy information about their large commercial customers.

The company has been growing rapidly over the past year, and as of November, it's software has analyzed over 700 million square feet of total commercial building space. FirstFuel has deployed its analytics with government agencies, too, including the U.S. General Services Administration and the Washington D.C. Department of General Services.