LIGHTING ENERGY EFFICIENCY DOESN’T COST THE EARTH
If the capital expenditure required for major energy efficiency measures is prohibitive, why not aim for the low-hanging fruit first? Brendon Airey, Energy
Manager at Cloudfm, explains that there are plenty of lower-budget opportunities that can make an impact, and the resulting savings can be put aside for re- investment in more significant projects.
A company’s energy bill is often looked at as a fixed cost – or at least, an overhead that will inevitably go up year-on-year. But savvy businesses would
do well to focus on reducing energy usage, since this won’t affect revenue streams in the same way that other cost-cutting measures might (for example, squeezing wages, negotiating prices down with suppliers, or holding back a refurb programme). Doing nothing just isn’t a sensible option – why waste money?
The simplest step is to renegotiate your energy deal. Many companies have ended up on ‘rollover’ contracts after their fixed-term deal ended, and so are paying over the odds, especially in the light of falling wholesale energy prices. It’s not uncommon to find that there are cheaper tariffs available, and the only thing this will cost you is time (and maybe a commission if you use an intermediary, though this should be more than offset by the saving).
Next on the list is LED lighting. It’s a fairly straightforward project to convert from halogen, fluorescent or incandescent lighting to the much lower-energy LED, and the results can be significant, with consumption savings of up to 60% promised by manufacturers.
A carefully considered LED roll-out can be achieved with only a small capital expenditure. If you begin with the most inefficient areas first, to benefit from the largest savings, you can then use these saved funds
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to reinvest in other areas, and so on, until the whole estate has been completely transitioned to LED. Of course, once the programme has been completed, the OpEx savings will mount up even more, and can be reinvested into other energy efficiency measures (though it’s best to keep back a proportion of funds to reinvest in lighting further down the line).
It’s worth saying something about quality; cost and value are not the same thing, so be sure to compare products properly, and don’t just go on payback period. A cheap luminaire, with a one-year payback and one- year warranty, might seem attractive – but because of the short warranty the same capital expenditure may be required year after year. In contrast, a higher-quality product with a 10- year warranty might boast a three- year payback – which sounds less appealing initially, until you realise it would deliver a seven-year period of true savings.
Of course, lighting can be subjective – what’s right for one environment isn’t right for another, so this should be considered when making the switch, since CapEx vs OpEx savings isn’t the only financial consideration. Lighting may impact on productivity or on sales, both of which can reduce revenue. This is why it’s best to work with an independent consultant who will take time to plan the right scheme for your business needs, rather than rely upon the design services of sales teams – you’ll find the fee worth every penny, and of course it will be offset by the fact that maximum savings will be achieved.
While light fittings are the easiest win in terms of reducing energy consumption, you can squeeze another 60% out with an intelligent control system. That said, good localised controls can be almost as effective as an all-singing all-dancing, fully-automated system, and obviously will offer a lower CapEx option. Simple occupancy sensors and switches can do a great job of ensuring that only the required lighting will be consuming energy at any time.
On a related note, behaviour change is a good low-cost way of reducing energy consumption – no, it’s not technically free as many assume, since it takes time and stakeholder investment. You’ll need to have staff members who will help people to engage with the programme, and manage it through, publicising the ways in which every employee can help cut the business’s energy bill (such as turning off lights when they are the last one out of a room).
Controlling the cost of facilities maintenance through a close partnership with your FM provider is also a savvy choice. Cloud-based systems can give you an element of control, as centralised data allows easy analysis to give you an overview of where money is being spent.
When you consider that a first visit fix is much more efficient than multiple visits, linking your energy consumers to your FM system may give you the data you need to identify trends in the estate. If there are elements that are big users of both energy and FM resources, then it might be time to look at the life
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