ENERGY AND UTILITY MANAGEMENT PLANS

CarbonEES® can help organisations develop and formulate an energy and utility management plan. An energy and utility plan is a strategic document that supports the organisational business imperatives and rational to managing energy and utility consumption. 

 

The very first items that need to be addressed have to involve senior management; ideally the Chief Executive so that the following can be formulated:

 

• The establishment of a policy within an organisation for improving the management of energy and utilities that should ultimately be aimed at achieving best practice, for example: “Meet all legislative requirements that apply to our business and adopt   appropriate economic, environmental, cultural and social standards in all areas of our operations.  Minimise our environmental impact through the adoption of best practice energy and utility management in all aspects of our business”.

• To achieve sign off of the policy by the organisation’s senior management with a mandate to develop a practical plan for achieving best practice.

 

An Energy and Utility Management plan will have the following main components:

• A copy of the policy and aims and objectives of the organisation;

• Resources and responsibility for the development and implementation of the plan;

• Details of existing total consumption of energy and utilities for the organisation and indexing that against total staff numbers and/or other key measurables;

• Details of individual business units annual energy and utility consumption linked to levels of service or key deliverables, i.e. measures of energy intensity;

• Targets for each business unit to meet in terms of aiming towards best practice, i.e. 10% improvement per year – in kWh, $$$ or m3 depending on the utility source;

• Details of actions that will see the targets realised.  This may include no cost items, low to medium cost or capital programmes.  Each project should have details of budget, timelines, responsibility and priority;

• Details of the mechanism that is to be used to determine if the objectives are being met and the hierarchy business structure that progress reports are to follow, i.e. how senior management are to be kept informed of progress.

• Details of additional organisational policies that might need to be developed, harmonised, integrated and implemented to support the energy and utility management plan.

 

Example Plan

Examples of these are likely to include:

• Waste minimisation policy (recycling, biomass, etc.);

• Construction and refurbishment standards and whether to aim for NZGBC ratings;

• Communication and training policy to ensure staff and community participation;

• Outsourcing policy to ensure all contractors implement the organisations policies and meet the required objectives when conducting business as agents of the organisation;

• Any others applicable to the organisation or market sector.