Nevertheless, businesses are still wasting enormous sums of capital on energy.  In the U.S., it is estimated that just 14% of the energy we pay for gets used efficiently.  According to researchers working for the UK Government, businesses there are collectively wasting up to £7 million/$12 million USD each day on energy! [1] If we’re going to make progress in reducing carbon emissions and engineer a shift to cleaner, greener ways of sourcing power, it is clear that we need to look to energy efficiency first, with businesses leading the way.  Here’s how, courtesy of Secured Energy Bonds plc, the sponsors of this post.

Employees are Key to Saving Energy

  In the United Kingdom, the Carbon Trust – a leading global non-profit organisation dedicated to helping governments, businesses and the public sector speed up the transition towards a sustainable, low carbon economy – is calling for business managers to take control of bottom line waste.  How?  Tap their employees.  Research indicates that less than 25% of workers in the UK have been tasked with helping to save energy in the workplace and fewer than half are concerned about their employer’s energy spending.

 As a result, workplaces are missing out on annual savings of more than £300 million (almost $500 million USD) – savings which could be achieved simply by encouraging workers to adopt the type of behaviors that will lead to less energy consumption and greater efficiency.  Here are some typical savings:

·       Reduce business air travel by 5%: £128m/$213m & 1.5m tonnes CO₂

·       Reduce lighting by 10%: £55m/$92m & 164,000 tonnes CO₂

·       Reduce waste sent to landfill by 5%: £49m/$82m & 115,000 tonnes CO₂

·       Reduce small power use (e.g. kettles, photocopiers, monitors) by 10%: £39m/$65m & 190,000 tonnes CO₂

·       Reduce temperature by 1°C: £35m/$58m & 194,000 tonnes CO₂

 A survey of employees by the Carbon Trust has revealed that 60% of workers would be more likely to save energy at work if they were financially rewarded, and 58% would be more likely to do so if their actions were recognised. [2]

Surprisingly, only 22% of employees know what measures they could take to save energy, and a mere 16% are confident that they have the authority to do so.  Clearly, businesses need to embark on an employee engagement programme that explains what employees need to do, encourages them to look for opportunities to save energy, and rewards them for doing so.

 Any company that undertakes such a program will be richly rewarded in cost savings and increased employee engagement.  Furthermore, employees will feel good knowing they’re doing their part to help meet important goals in reducing the emission of carbon dioxide, a primary cause of climate change and global warming.  Britain is trying to reach its target of a 26% – 32% reduction in carbon emissions by 2020.  Greater efficiency through employee engagement is key to achieving this goal.

 Transition to Renewable Energy like Solar and Wind

 So, too, is transitioning to renewable energy sources.  The UK’s Climate Change Act calls for 15% of the nation’s energy to be derived from solar, wind power and other renewables by 2020.  Business and industry have a vital role to play in bringing about these reductions.  For example, Secured Energy Bonds plc recently announced a nationwide programme of rooftop solar projects in 22 English schools; the multi-site development will help reduce carbon emissions by around 560 metrics tonnes and will save the schools £1.4m/$1.7m in electricity bills.

 In most countries, meeting domestic needs accounts for less than half of all energy consumed.  That’s true in the UK too, where domestic energy consumption accounts for only 34% of energy used.  Business and industry consume the lion’s share at 43% while commercial and public premises account for another 18%.  Clearly, however much we adopt clean, green energy in our homes, targets to reduce carbon emissions and use energy more wisely are unlikely to be met unless the commercial and industrial sector joins in.

[1] http://www.theguardian.com/business/2008/jul/22/greenbusiness.energy?gusrc=rss&feed=environment

[2] http://www.carbontrust.com/about-us/press/2013/12/bosses-miss-out-on-300-million-energy-and-waste-reduction-opportunity

 NOTE: This post was sponsored by www.energybonds.co.uk/, a subsidiary of CBD Energy Limited.  Sponsorships enable us to provide expert content at no cost to you.  Our opinions remain our own.  Thank you.

The post What Can We Learn From UK Businesses About Wasting (and Saving) Energy? appeared first on Big Green Purse.

The nuclear meltdown in Japan and the recent oil disaster in the Gulf of Mexico may seem unrelated, but they’re not. Both catastrophes occurred because we’ve made three fundamental mistakes in the way we generate energy.

1) We have relied on centralized power plants that use dangerous fuels to meet energy demand. Most countries that can afford it build large power plants so they can centralize energy production. Big centralized power plants are easier to regulate than a bunch of smaller, dispersed facilities. And because they generate a lot of energy at once, big plants appear to streamline power production. But in addition to being outrageously expensive, centralized generating facilities require massive amounts of dangerous fuels to operate consistently. If that fuel is oil or coal, recovering it usually wrecks the physical environment (we saw that in spades during last year’s Gulf Oil disaster); burning it causes global warming and sickening air pollution. If the fuel is uranium, using it generates radioactive nuclear waste that must be stored for thousands of years.

Ironically, a significant percent of the energy these kinds of plants generate is lost because it’s distributed over old, inefficient powerlines that transport the energy far from the original generator, which means that the plants actually need to consume more fuel to meet demand. Centralized power stations are also highly susceptible to terrorism, human error, and natural disasters, like the Japanese tsunami that overwhelmed that country’s nuclear reactors. As long as we continue to rely on large centralized power generation stoked by fossil fuels or uranium, we should expect disasters like the current meltdown in Japan.

2) We depend on fuels whose devastating environmental and health impacts are overlooked because they generate so much money for the industries that control them.

Right now, oil costs almost $100 a barrel. Solar energy is free. And there’s the rub. Industries based on selling coal, oil, and uranium, the fuel that powers nuclear power plants, earn billions of dollars every year just selling the fuel, let alone the power it generates. They use the profits from those sales to lobby legislators and make huge campaign contributions that keep law makers beholden to the status quo rather than emboldened to support safer alternatives.

I’m not suggesting we figure out a way to charge for the sun’s rays. I’m suggesting we realize that, every time we use oil or coal or energy from a nuclear power plant, some portion of our dollars is being used to insure that we KEEP using oil and coal and nuclear energy, instead of cleaner, healthier options.

3) We have refused to embrace energy efficiency and renewable energy sources like solar and wind. Many people give “alternative energy” positive lip service. Most people think sun power sounds like a good idea. Just as many will acknowledge that they want to do more to save energy. Yet the majority who talk the talk don’t walk the walk. Municipal codes still allow homes and buildings to be built that leak energy like a sieve. Consumers are still buying far more gas-guzzling vehicles and appliances than their energy-efficient counterparts. As a nation, we subsidize the fossil fuel and nuclear industries by giving them substantial tax breaks, yet scrimp on providing essential research and development money to renewable alternatives. Each of us could probably reduce the amount of energy we consume by half while taking advantage of any programs our utilties offer to let us buy power that’s safely generated. Until we do, and governments and businesses follow suit, the situation won’t change.

There aren’t enough words to describe what’s happened in Japan. Horrible. Catastrophic. Terrible. Unimaginable.

But there are also words we shouldn’t use to describe what’s transpired: Unique. Isolated. Rare. Freak accident.

Let’s not kid ourselves. Disasters like the Japanese nuclear meltdown and the Gulf oil spill are going to become increasingly common unless we make a concerted global effort to change the way we all get and use energy.

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