With many large businesses frantically installing AMR devices to secure early advantage credits for the Carbon Reduction Commitment (CRC Energy Efficiency) there’s much talk of AMR but also smart meters. Often these names are either overlapped or confused. So whats the difference?

AMR stands for Automated Meter Reader and essentially provides Half Hourly data to meter points whereby Half Hourly data is not yet available. These can be Gas, Water  or (Non Half Hourly) NHH Electricity Meters. Note: By installing AMR to NHH Electricity meters provides Half Hourly data but does not mean you become a half hourly customer.

Smart Meters provide information beyond AMR.  Generally Smart Meters are a domestic product aimed at educating the home owner of how much energy they have used, what the cost has been and where they can save.

AMR devices for businesses are often then connected to Monitoring and Targeting systems, GAIA offers one of these alongside our Training Programmes. These systems can then educate and inform the use on energy usages within their businesses.

GAIA

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Switch it Off week 2009 – starts Monday 9 November

The Big Switch Off On Friday 13 November 4.30-6.30pm.

Warwickshire County Council and the Warwickshire Climate Change Partnership are asking all businesses/organisations/schools in thier region take part in ‘Switch it Off’ (SIO) week to save on energy costs and reduce your carbon footprint.

The campaign, which is taking place across Warwickshire, Coventry and Worcestershire, is encouraging public bodies, businesses, communities, schools and residents to ‘Switch Off’ non essential appliances which are left on when they’re not needed.

Want to keep saving next week?

With many local and regional initiatives designed to encourage greater energy efficiency the challenge for many organisations is to sustain the savings once the initiative ends.

Long term energy efficiencies offer significant financial savings with every £ saving adding to your bottom line year after year. So it pays not to lose the progress made.

With GAIA we can help you drive further saving and keep it that way with a live energy monitoring system and training. Call us today to see how we can help you save more : 02476 236446.

Request a Free Energy Healthcheck of your site today.

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Sustainable business experts Envirowise are calling on Britain’s bosses to disclose gas, electricity, water and recycling bills with employees to encourage them to take more responsibility for reducing company outgoings and lessen their environmental impact.

Envirowise says that the more transparent businesses are about the effect rising utility costs are having on the bottom line, the more staff will be encouraged to take a proactive stance towards waste minimisation and adopt the same approach to cost cutting in the workplace as they do at home.

As much as this is good intentioned you have to ask how powerful this message would be? If I am a call centre member on a large business and I am told the company spends ‘X’ millions per year on energy how can I see my part in this consumption? If the company wants me to behave better and save energy how can I or my department demonstrate improvement and be recognised for it? And of course energy costs have risen but how much of this is down to prices and how much due to wastage?  Theres more to it then telling staff energy is expensive.

The elements key to success:

• 1)  Find a compelling message to rouse your staff to support your energy saving aims.
• 2) Talk consumption of energy not cost. After all staff influence usage not cost.
• 3) Monitor progress to feeback to staff. Monitoring usage at each meter by half hourly intervals is ideal.

Not sure how to do this? Call 02476 236446

More tips here:

Envirowise article:

http://www.envirowise.gov.uk/uk/Press-Office/Press-Releases/UK-Press-Releases/Its-good-to-share-Britains-bosses-urged-to-disclose-bills-to-save-thousands.html

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aM&T is not enough- Energy Conservation at Work

Automated Monitoring & Targeting (aM&T) services that look at your energy data are great tools to demonstrate and educate the business in energy consumption usage. But the great challenge is using the data. Too many companies buy systems and software but fail to see how it will be applied.

Consider this?

How likely can an energy manager in Stirling be able to motivate a Store Manager in Cardiff to save energy and keep it that way.  Will an MD be able to drive staff to listen to his/her messages about saving energy without cynicism to their intentions?

Energy saving starts with your employees.

GAIA is an energy management service with people at the heart of the process. We can motivate and support your store manager in Cardiff and the energy manager in Sterling. For the MD we can help him/her to get the staff on board and keep it that way. We are beyond just aM&T.

GAIA

We don’t sell energy, we save energy.

aM&T is not enough- Energy Conservation at Work Oct 08

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Ambitious goal but HOW exactly will we do it? – Energy Efficiency & Conservation at Work

Setting goals is only great as long as you know how you will achieve it, unless you’re the UK Government that is.

Today the Government has committed the UK to cut greenhouse gas emissions by 80% by the middle of this century. Climate Change and Energy Secretary Ed Miliband said the current 60% target would be replaced by a higher goal.

The UK is struggling to reduce our Carbon Emissions now so upping the targets is very ambitious and it begs the question why? Have the French and Germans just upped thier targets too, are we seeing catastrope greater than we imagined before that has gone unreported or are the UK Govenment just leading the world in media ‘headline grabbling’?

Such huge cuts will require enormous actions to the current structure of the UK economy. Just think every company cutting consumption by 40%/60% and getting 20/30% more energy it all from renewables.

Of course the wonders in Whitehall will have a statistical model somewhere and may have based our huge cuts on other factors. Namely that we no longer manufacture, have loads more nuclear than we has currently been suggested, simply offset our carbon and buy out our problem or we cut consumption like Russia in the 1990s by simply imploding our economy! 

I think the HOW is crying out to be told!

GAIA

Ambitious goal but HOW exactly will we do it? – Energy Efficiency & Conservation at Work

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If you want to save energy in your business or organisation start with involving your people.

When tasked with saving energy many ‘energy champions’ look to machinery, lighting or heating systems first in a pursuit to find some key defined area where they can make a change to bring a swift reward. This is as much to do with the individual working within their comfort zone, (IE they understand their production line/machinery/building structure)  as it is energy saving. Logically the energy champion may feel more in control of a bit of kit than the employees. The problem is if you find something you still have to get someone or something to manage the change and sustain it. So you either need to persuade someone to buy (often unneccessary) kit to turn off stuff, that staff could often do anyway, or get your staff on board to support you to behave as you wish.

The key is to reverse the process start by running a campaign to ‘include’ your staff in the process. Their inclusion will bring up many ideas you know about and many other ideas you don’t. Even if the ideas are ones you would guess it does not matter.  Why? because your staff will feel appreciated, involved and recognised for their ideas and will be much more likely to support your ongoing initiatives as you listened to them.

If you don’t know how or can’t do this, contact us for help

GAIA

Other useful tips: Read our 10 Top Tips to Saving energy in the workplace to get you started. http://www.gaiaactive.com/toptips.asp

Focus on the your people first – Energy Efficiency & Conservation at Work Oct 08

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Energy efficiency is now the number one cost-cutting priority for UK businesses looking to combat the impact of a potential economic slowdown, according to new research released today by the Carbon Trust.

 But with UK industry still wasting almost £7 million a day on poor energy efficiency, the Carbon Trust and business groups are urging businesses to seize the potential savings on offer.

Of business leaders surveyed by the Carbon Trust, twice as many say reducing carbon emissions has risen up their agenda in the last six months than those who say it has fallen down (20% vs. 9%). And they now rank energy efficiency ahead of recruitment freezes, redundancies, freezing salaries or giving below inflation pay rises as a potential cost-saving measure.

New statistical analysis by the Carbon Trust also highlights the scale and urgency of the issue, with estimates showing that UK businesses could collectively save nearly £2.5 billion during the next 12 months, simply by implementing cost effective energy efficiency measures. And the savings are not just the preserve of large energy-intensive companies: the potential savings for SMEs alone are around £1.3 billion.

 The staggering £2.5 billion figure is equivalent to:

• 13 per cent of UK companies’ energy bills

• The combined annual salaries of more than 100,000 employees on an average wages.

 With almost seven in ten (69 per cent) company bosses surveyed either actively cutting costs or considering doing so, the Carbon Trust is urging them to get in touch to seek help in reducing their energy bills and their carbon emissions.

 Hugh Jones, Solutions Director at the Carbon Trust, said: “Our research shows that energy efficiency measures, not job cuts or salary freezes, are the cost-cutting steps businesses are considering first during this economically challenging time. It’s an encouraging sign that wise companies are realising that cutting carbon and being green is the easiest way to make a business lean.

 “Our new statistics provide stark evidence that if companies are starting to feel the bite from the economic downturn, the first place to look for cost savings should be their energy bill. There are literally millions of pounds going out of the window every day, across the UK.

 “We’re talking about money that could be saved by making quick and easy changes such as encouraging staff to turn off computers and lights, turning down the heating, or maintaining equipment properly.

Posted in Automated Monitoring & Targeting (aM&T), Energy Saving and Efficiency at School or College, Energy Saving and Efficiency at Work, Energy Saving and Efficiency at Work - Hotels, Energy Saving and Efficiency at Work - Manufacturers, Energy Saving and Efficiency at Work - Offices, Forum - HAVE YOUR SAY!, Smart Metering and Monitoring | No Comments »

Over the last few weeks I have had the benefit of using arange of gizmos to help people manage energy better.  Some range from simple timer plugs to mini energy screens for the home educating me 24/7 on live energy usage.

The problem I see with these gizmo’s is they lack two key benefits:

1) I have to manage these devices to do something or ensure they continue to work. 

2) They don’t tell me when I need to do something. I have to work it out for myself.

These two missing elements are core to the benefits GAIA provides businesses. Companies cannot afford to fiddle around with equipment or spend time analysing data on consumption to spot irregularities. So GAIA tells you when you have a problem. You run your business we will monitor your energy.

GAIA
www.gaiaactive.com

Posted in Automated Monitoring & Targeting (aM&T), Energy Saving and Efficiency at School or College, Energy Saving and Efficiency at Work, Energy Saving and Efficiency at Work - Hotels, Energy Saving and Efficiency at Work - Manufacturers, Energy Saving and Efficiency at Work - Offices, Smart Metering and Monitoring | No Comments »

top-hat-profile

There are obviously many energy profiles depending on the operations of your business. In this blog segment I will talk about the typical office profile and where companies should focus their attention.

Offices have what is commonly described as a ‘Top Hat’ profile rising in the morning to peak before lunch than falling later in the day resting at thier base consumption referred to as ‘base load’.

There are three areas to focus attention:

1) Base Load what is on when your not at work. Studies have shown 40% of electricity lighting consumption is used in unoccupied buildings.

2) Peak demand – it is often surprising how far offices peak and for such a short period. Air conditioning could be a main factor but managing and understanding your peak is essential to making savings (GAIA subscribers should refer to Step 1 of the Gaia ‘3 Steps to Saving’ Pack to download the enegy usage checklist.

3) End of day – this is where energy consumption decline often does not match employees departing. The key to success here rests on good energy saving behaviours. (GAIA users refer to Step 2 of the Gaia ‘3 Steps to Saving’ Pack to download the energy saving pack.  

GAIA
www.gaiaactive.com

Posted in Automated Monitoring & Targeting (aM&T), Energy Saving and Efficiency at Work - Offices, Smart Metering and Monitoring | No Comments »

One of the common questions I am asked by companies is ‘how can energy monitoring help me to control businesses consumption’. The answer is, energy monitoring is not a tool in controlling you business it is a tool to help control your people in your business.

The dilemma with energy, unlike raw material costs or salaries, is the quantity of consumption is determined by your employees. Your purchasing team can only influence the price on the contract not the amount the businesses is using.

It is the same whether your energy is consumed by machinery of direct people contact (ie PCs etc). Each of these kits is managed by a person. If a operator is happy to turn on machines early and leave them on all day is this a machinery problem or a person problem?. 

This missing element of what you are using and when, with information fast so your are able to react is the core strength of GAIA.

GAIA
www.gaiaactive.com

Posted in Automated Monitoring & Targeting (aM&T), Energy Saving Tips, Forum - HAVE YOUR SAY!, Smart Metering and Monitoring | No Comments »