Do you leave your PC monitor on all night or forget to turn out the
lights when you are the last one to leave the office? If so, you
are contributing to the £150m worth of electricity that is wasted
each year by UK businesses
The fourth annual Energy Efficiency Week, which starts on 22
October, aims to raise awareness of just how important small
actions can be in saving resources.
Research carried out by the Energy Saving Trust reveals that office
workers who leave their computer monitors switched on while they
are on holiday waste enough electricity over a two-week period to
print the complete works of Shakespeare 16 times. In other words,
in two weeks a single computer monitor uses enough energy to print
20,000 sheets of A4 paper.
Further calculations show that offices in the UK use on average
165kWh of electricity per square metre of office space per year -
and 20% of this is unnecessary. This means that 33kWh is being
wasted every year - that is enough energy to make 1.6 billion cups
of tea every week.
"With the constant demand for new technology in the workplace,
office employees have a greater responsibility to ensure that
energy is not wasted needlessly," says Tim Curtis, director of
energy efficiency at the Energy Saving Trust. "The culprits are
Internet connections being left online all day, computers and
monitors that are kept on standby and photocopiers left on
overnight."
Curtis believes companies should encourage staff to take a
responsible attitude to energy, perhaps by introducing incentive
schemes. The IT department, with its understanding of how a firm's
technology is being used, can play a vital role in this - and
potentially save a fortune.
For more information and energy-saving tips call the Energy
Efficiency Hotline on 0845-727 7200 or go to
www.saveenergy.co.uk