Energy Saving Tips for Your Office
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Owning your own business can be extremely rewarding and at times can be stressful. One area that business owners worry about is the financial cost and with the cost of electricity rising, we thought we could help reduce your energy costs by informing you of some easy ways you can save energy in your office and make your electricity bills a lot more affordable.
1. Lighting
- Change to energy efficient light globes such as Light Emitting Diodes (LED) or Compact Fluorescent Lamps (CFL). Older style incandescent globes are inefficient and cost a lot more to use.
- Install “dimmer lighting” where lighting can be manually adjusted depending on the brightness you need.
- Encourage all staff to turn off lights in areas that are not in use, seems simple but definitely worth mentioning.
- Take advantage of natural lighting by opening blinds in the morning and allow the sunlight to benefit you.
- Install light sensors in rooms not used as often, such as in meeting rooms, store rooms and kitchen areas.
- Install motion sensors and outdoor sensor lights, rather than leaving an outside security light permanently on.
2. Air Conditioners & Heaters
- Use thermostats and timers to adequately heat and cool rooms.
- If buying a new unit, buy an energy efficient model by looking for the energy star rating.
- Set temperatures to a reasonable level, between 20-23 degrees is considered a comfortable temperature for an office environment.
- Schedule regular maintenance, as professional servicing will improve the energy efficiency of your heater and air conditioner.
3. Equipment
- At the end of each day turn off computers, printers, scanners, photocopiers and any other electrical appliance not in use. Some items could even be unplugged if not required.
- Use and buy equipment with a high star energy rating.
- Use power save modes.
- Replace equipment that’s over 10 years old, as newer models are designed a lot more efficiently and can use less power. This can be a short term cost for a long term gain.
- Get professional “testing and tagging” done yearly to make certain all electronic equipment is working to the best of its ability.
- Remove screen savers from computers screens, as they may look nice, but use more power.
4. General Office Tips
- Install blinds to keep your office cooler in summer and warmer in winter.
- Install reflective window film to maintain lighting and reduce sun glare.
- Install automatic door closers to maintain room warmth or cooling.
- Insulating your office walls and ceiling will maintain room temperature and reduce energy costs.
- Look into installing solar panels, especially if you own your building. Long term savings can be worth the cost.
- Ask your employees for energy saving ideas, they can be more on board if they’re involved.
We hope these tips have given you a lot of great ideas for saving energy in your office. If you need heater or air conditioning maintenance, then please call us on 0490 333 461, our team at MakoAir have more than 20 years experience in commercial heater and air conditioning installation, repairs and servicing.