CASE STUDY
Severn Wye Energy Agency, Gloucestershire, UK
SWEA won a 2011 Ashden Award for its innovative programme that enables secondary pupils to survey energy use and cut carbon emissions in their schools.
Background A typical secondary school in the UK is responsible for 540 tonnes of CO2 emissions per year, equivalent to about 90 average homes. All county councils in the UK are included in the Carbon Reduction Commitment (CRC), and have to buy allowances for their CO2 emissions. Secondary schools account for 15 - 25% of these emissions, so represent an important opportunity to make reductions, but it has proved challenging to achieve this.
Many secondary school buildings are not very energy efficient, and even those that are may have high energy consumption because of the way they are used. The UK government has tried to encourage carbon saving by requiring all schools to have a Display Energy Certificate (DEC) which assesses energy performance and includes advice on how to improve this. However, this advice is often generic and does not provide the specific guidance that an individual school needs, so many schools do not take action.
In Gloucestershire, the Severn Wye Energy Agency (SWEA) has taken a different approach with its Young Energy People (YEP!) programme. YEP! trains secondary school pupils to carry out a detailed energy survey of their own school, present the results to the school management, engage other pupils and staff to reduce energy use through both technical and behavioural means, and monitor the progress of their school.
The organisation SWEA is a not-for-profit company and an educational charity, established in 1999, under the direction of Catrin Maby, with the support of the European Commission SAVE programme initiative to establish local and regional energy agencies. It offers a range of services focused on energy use, climate change and education, including the development and management of projects for third parties, delivering training and advice, running educational programmes and carrying out research. Through a range of projects SWEA supports communities, businesses, schools and other public sector organisations in improving energy efficiency and raising awareness on energy use and climate change. SWEA currently employs 43 people, and has an annual income of £2m.
The programme How does it work? SWEA first makes an agreement with the local authority to engage a school through YEP!. It then holds an assembly at the school, so the pupils and staff can hear about the programme. A key part of the programme is to set up a School Energy Management Team (SEMT), with defined roles for its members (such as Marketing Manager and Energy Team Manager), for which YEP! provides job descriptions. Schools choose which year groups to involve in the programme, usually prioritising Year 9 to Year 11 (age 13 to 16). Students are invited to apply for the different SEMT positions by completing an application form and attending an interview. The SEMT usually includes 25 pupils at the outset. All of the team, along with a staff member, attend a training day to learn how to carry out an energy survey of the school.
The first task for the SEMT after training is to survey all the school buildings to identify areas where energy use could be reduced. The survey outline provided by YEP! includes: – Reviewing energy bills and comparing usage to typical and best practice.
– Boiler rooms, including age, efficiency, heating system controls and pipe lagging.
– Temperatures and heating controls in all classrooms and corridors.
– Double glazing, insulation of walls and lofts, and draughtproofing.
– Number and types of lights. – Number of electrical appliances, their consumption and whether they are switched off when not in use.
Based on the results of the survey, the SEMT produces a report, using a template provided by YEP!. The report includes detailed recommendations on how the school could make changes to save energy and save money. It is presented to the school’s senior management team. As a result of the report, many schools have taken action such as increasing insulation, installing thermostats and new meters, and leaving thermometers in every room to allow ongoing monitoring of temperatures.
Following on from the survey, the SEMT uses a template provided by YEP! to set up an ‘energy diary’, in which readings from all electricity and gas meters are logged on a monthly basis. A copy of the energy diary is sent to the School Business Manager and SWEA once a month, so they can monitor the progress of the school and the effectiveness of the programme. The SEMT also starts a
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