green
initiatives green fi ngers
Rob Lambe, MD of Willmott Dixon Re-Thinking, offers his advice to operators looking to boost their green credentials
Why should health clubs pay more attention to going green? The UK leisure sector is a massive consumer of water and energy – we spend around £700m on energy a year. That’s not good for the sector’s image, its bottom line or the planet. Over the last decade, the cost of gas has risen by 120 per cent in real terms while electricity has risen by 66 per cent. Leisure facilities are a heavy user of energy all year round, and with steeper increases expected over the next 10 years, operators need to address this or see their bottom line further eroded. There are many ways of tackling
energy efficiency, whether you want to make an existing building work better, invest in a refurbishment or build a new facility from scratch.
Where should businesses start if they want to cut bills in existing buildings? It’s important to make sure that you focus your efforts on areas where action will be most cost-effective. It therefore
makes sense to start by monitoring your water and energy use so you know what you’re using and where you’re using it. With energy, this typically involves
installing wireless meters to lighting, heating, cooling and power circuits covering the main areas of use. This data gives you a baseline of usage against which you can set targets to improve your performance. Initiatives to meet those targets could involve changes in behaviour, such as encouraging staff to switch off equipment, or operational changes such as installing new technology to help the building run more efficiently. The data collected will help make the business case for any costs you incur buying new technology such as timers or motion sensors; in fact, these actions will then be seen as a business imperative. Leisure facilities also have an
abundance of heat-producing equipment
– from lighting to gym equipment – that can be made more energy-efficient. Water consumption can be reduced significantly by installing reduced-
flow taps, showers and toilets, and remember that savings in hot water use will also help reduce your energy bill.
What lessons can the leisure sector learn from other sectors? The retail sector is starting to make huge strides in reducing carbon emissions and energy consumption, partly through a sense of corporate responsibility but also thanks to the need to address its cost base in the face of stiff competition. Cutting the cost of energy use in stores, often operating 24 hours a day, is not as much about being green as it is about sound business practice. We’re seeing new supermarkets being built that are lit entirely using LED lighting, which is maintenance-free for 50,000 hours. These companies are also using new refrigeration technology, typically a big energy consumer, and are adept at positioning new stores where solar panels can benefit from the most sunlight, as well as using roof windows to flood a store with natural daylight. Retail has similarities with leisure in
that stores are constantly working hard to attract and retain customers: our clients are demanding better-performing, more cost-effective buildings. It’s therefore important to pay attention to the cost of a building, not only on day one but over its whole lifetime. Many modern retail buildings have
highly integrated services – for example,
Swimming pools have large expanses of roof that could be covered with solar panels to generate energy for the centre 44 Read Health Club Management online at
healthclubmanagement.co.uk/digital september 2011 © cybertrek 2011
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