Pure and simple, energy management is good for business, and good for the planet.
When it’s done right, you’ll find yourselves saving money, energy, and emissions. It also happens to be something we’re pretty good at. (So you’d hope.) So we’ve put together six steps that every big business can follow to get more efficient with energy, ditch the reporting headache, and form part of a carbon reduction plan.
1. Start monitoring your energy use
As with anything, we can’t manage what we don’t measure. So this first step is about getting the right monitoring system in place.
We can help with that. Our dashboarding and graphing tools can help understand and analyse how you’re using and paying for power. Our expert team are here to show you the ropes if you need it – or, leave it to your in-house energy whiz. Whatever works for you.
2. Get to work on your metering set up
Good metering is key to understanding where and when power is being used. Loads of businesses just use the building’s original meter – but that’s not always helpful. As building uses change and more equipment and technology is installed, the original meter is often not enough to dive into the detail and frequency of data.
That’s where half-hourly metering data comes in handy. It’ll help you get in to the nitty gritty of your energy use, and find any anomalies that could turn into energy efficiency opportunities. If you’ve got any sites without half hour meters, give our Corporate Team a call and we’ll get them installed.
3. Look over your business energy strategy
The goal here is to design a clear roadmap that creates lasting change for your business. This means understanding how energy fits into the wider business plan, and any current or planned carbon-cutting targets. It should cover all elements of your current energy practice and set out clear areas for improvement.
4. The energy audit
Building on the energy data you’ve gathered, energy audits will help identify how much you can save, and in what ways. It will also shed light on discrepancies between monitoring systems and outputs which could be impacting your energy consumption.
You might be able to have an energy audit conducted remotely – but in general, you’ll get a better gauge of your energy use through a site visit and survey. We’ve got relationships with EECA -accredited energy auditors, so we can facilitate the audit as well as help you take advantage of any relevant EECA grants to cover some of the cost.
5. Make changes
Once your audit’s done, you’ll likely have a list of things to tackle. They might be technological or appliance improvements, or behavioural change initiatives which involve taking your team on the journey. If you need to take a technical route, this might involve feasibility studies and business cases so you can get the necessary support and funding from within your business.
If you’ve got your list but you’re not sure where to start, drop us a line. We can work with you to get the wheels in motion.
6. Continual review
An effective energy management programme isn’t a one-off check-box exercise. Your business and its ambitions will change as fast as new technologies and best practices do.
It’s really important to regularly monitor, measure and report on your energy use to make sure you're hitting targets and creating new ones. We can help you stay ahead of the game with personalised reports to get you the information you need straight to your inbox, right when you need it. Plus, you can access these at any time through our self-service portal.
Taking it a step further
Reducing energy use is a great way to lower your spend, and your Scope 2 electricity emissions. But of course, you can only reduce so much.
With our Certified Renewable Energy product, you can match your consumption to Meridian’s 100% renewable generation and report those emissions as zero. So if you’re currently paying to offset, you can stop that – and if you’re not, Certified means you won’t need to start.