When energy saving is not a priority for commercial companies

I read an article in the trade press last week about North London football club Tottenham Hotspur cutting its carbon emissions by 400 tonnes in a single year and at the same time implementing energy saving methods that resulted in the club being around 25% cheaper to run. It got me thinking: much as businesses (and business owners in particular) like to be ethical, it’s that last bit – the 25% cost saving – that spurs (pardon the pun) them on to take energy saving seriously.

But is it possible, as commercial organisation, to maintain high standards of quality and customer service while saving energy? This is a special dilemma for power protection customers whose primary need is to provide a continuous source of critical power and ensure business continuity in the face of potential power cuts and power problems. Can energy saving really become a priority for them?

The Premiere League club has been working in conjunction with the 10:10 scheme, an organisation set up by film director Franny Armstrong in 2009 after making the iconic climate change film, starring the late, great Pete Postlethwaite as a man living in the devastated future of 2055, looking back at old footage from our time and asking: why didn’t we stop climate change when we had the chance?

10:10’s premise, rather than aiming at staggering targets favoured by ambitious policy-makers of 80% carbon cuts by 2050, is to try and get everyone to aim for 10% carbon reductions per year?

Tottenham employs high-powered sun lamps to keep the turf at its White Heart Lane ground in premier league condition all year round. Giant banks of flood lamps are also used to illuminate the on-pitch action on gloomy winter days or evenings. The club reduced its hefty electric bill by firstly replacing 136 high-powered lights with energy efficient models and although it worked out as a six-figure investment, it is this that has enabled the 25% reduction in running costs.

New lighting controls, including time switches and motion sensors have also helped save on energy. Heating controls on training ground washing machines were deployed, alongside push taps to help save energy and water. The club also analysed and revised its transportation needs to lessen its carbon footprint and now directors take public transport to away games instead of private jets. Fans are playing their part to: after a big publicity push, the majority arrive at matches by public transport rather than private car.

Working alongside The Carbon Trust, 10:10 has developed an Energy Saving checklist offering simple tips to business such as:

• Make someone within your organization responsible for energy saving initiatives and ask them to draw up an action plan.

• Measure, log and analyse how much energy you are using and where it is being guzzled. Energy bills may not give you enough information and you may want to look into some form of energy management.

• Conduct an energy walk round, which will not only confirm the second point but give you a visual picture of where energy is being used in your business.

• Upgrade business critical equipment – old equipment is much less energy efficient and will guzzle far more power than new or modern appliances.

• Switch off lights once there is enough daylight to work by, or in rooms or areas that are not being used. This may seem obvious but you’d be surprised at how many lights stay on in empty toilet cubicles all day!

There are ten tips in all and I won’t include them all but this one is a particular favourite:

• do not locate photocopiers in air-conditioned areas as the heat it will produce will make the air-conditioning work harder and user more electricity.

So, the answer to my earlier question (it would seem) is a resounding “Yes”. If you would like information about energy saving eco UPS, visit our website.

Where can you get help in choosing the one that’s right for you?

If you are in the market for UPS power protection – and this is the first time you have thought about it – trawling the internet for information can be frustrating and you could end up more confused than ever. It’s a big subject, and a specialist one.

UPS manufacturers are a great source of information but much of it is either technical (geared towards electrical engineers rather than end users) or biased towards a certain type of technology.

If you’ve already got a UPS installed, you’ll have a good idea (based on past experience) of what to look for when it comes to upgrading or replacing it. However, in the past few years the power protection industry has undergone an evolutionary process of change and development of UPS products, solutions and services, driven largely by the desire for greater energy efficiency and lower lifetime costs of UPS systems overall. Advances in technology and manufacturing have resulted in smaller, more powerful products with fewer component parts and which are more reliable and sophisticated than their forebears.

Which UPS should I choose and where can I go for objective information?

Sadly, there are few places you can get information like this for free. UPS specialist resellers and manufacturers are running businesses from which they need to make a profit and they usually either charge for consulting advice or give it for free if they can then sell you their products. You may not be at the stage where you are ready to choose your UPS manufacturer or their products so, what can you do?

As luck would have it, we’ve written a book: The Power Protection Guide – the design, installation and operation of uninterruptible power supplies, which was published in 2007. It’s available from Amazon, all good booksellers and our own estore. At 290 pages, it details all of the elements you need to think about in terms of UPS power protection – and although our publisher insists on a cover price of £28-95, it offers great value for money and may even save money for you in the long-term. Armed with knowledge, you will be in a better position to get what you need and negotiate a good price.

Covering such items as criticality, UPS topologies and designs, UPS sizing and selection, online UPS designs, building in UPS reliability and resilience, batteries and alternative UPS back up solutions, UPS and generators, UPS monitoring and remote control, UPS logistics and installation, UPS warranties, maintenance and service, the book provides a handy tool for anyone responsible for assuring the delivery of critical power supplies for the continuity of their business – whatever business that might be. We’ve purposely incorporated a detailed index to make it easy to reference and appended some useful forms and worked examples. It is illustrated throughout with clear diagrams, charts and graphs.

Electricity generated from renewable energy sources in the UK has increased 50% in the past year, according to statistics released by DECC (Department for Energy and Climate Change) in October 2011.

Electricity from renewables comprised 6.3% of the UK’s total energy consumption when the figures were announced in April 2010 and that figure rose to 9.6% this year, a healthy 50% increase.

Supplies from hydro and wind rose by 74.7% and 120% respectively but renewables still only supply around 10% of the UK’s total energy needs and that has got to change if we are to meet our carbon reduction targets alongside our growing energy needs.

However, the wind industry is making a tremendous contribution to the nations energy supply and is now providing enough power to supply nearly 3.25 million homes in the UK.

Electricity sourced from nuclear generation accounted for 21.3% of total according to DECC. So, despite the massive rises in low carbon energy and encouraging growth in the renewables industries, we are still relying on fossil fuels for two thirds of our energy needs.

As you know, here at Riello we are big fans of renewable energy and have developed our range of UPS and ancillary products to support renewable energy installations such as Solar (with our AROS solar inverters). We are continuing to bring products and solutions to market that support the drive towards renewables.

I read with interest a couple of articles this month in Marketing Week, entitled Studies Show it Pays to be Ethical and The Only Way is Ethics (nice pun).

Basically, recent studies carried out among consumers have established a link between business’s ethical credentials and the preferences of affluent, ethical consumers to buy their products. One study found that 91% of consumers take ethics into account when purchasing products.

A couple of other interesting pointers that grabbed my attention are that perception is just as important (or perhaps more so) than actual environmental performance. Top brands that scored higher on ethical perception than performance did rather better in consumers minds than other brands that are actually more ethical in their actions but not as vociferous.

Wealthy consumers of FMCG are happy to pay premium prices for goods and services they perceive to be ethical but I suspect it’s a little different in the business world. In business, cost is still king. Companies need to be seen to be ethical and environmentally sensitive but it cannot come at a cost. Products have to be ‘green’, ethical and cost less. The bottom line is as sacred as ever, especially in a struggling economy.

As a UPS manufacturer, we invest £thousands into researching how to make UPS more eco-friendly and in developing new products accordingly so that our customers genuinely use less energy and can be kinder to the environment at the same time. More details are available on our website.

SMEs should implement efficient UPS to achieve cost savings and reliable power protection

It’s been reported in an article on ELN (www.energylivenews.com) that Energy Minister Charles Hendry has been forced by his Shadow counterpart (Huw Irranca Davies) to concede that the Government’s energy policies could add as much as 43% to the average electricity price paid by small to medium businesses by 2020.

His revelation coincides with a predication by the Department for Energy and Climate Change (DECC) that SMEs will be lumbered with nearly a quarter increase (24%) on gas prices.

Just how far will the Government allow these prices hikes to go?

A month ago, Scottish Power became the first to inflict horrendous, double-digit price hikes on its customers and last week British Gas followed suit. It’s only a matter of time before the other four of the big six (E.ON, EDF, Scottish and Southern Energy) do the same. It will mean the average dual fuel bill will have risen by 50% since 2007 to nearly £1,500 per annum.

For business energy users, now is the time to fix a price with energy suppliers and/or switch to another, more competitive tariff. Energy Secretary, Chris Huhne is fighting to open up the energy market to smaller players and make it more competitive. Quoted in an article in the Telegraph earlier this week, he said: “The energy market has been too cosy for too long and it is madness that 99% of people get their energy from large firms.”

But what does this mean for UPS (uninterruptible power supply) customers?

Older UPS equipment is not as energy efficient as newer models. Any system between 5-10 years should be considered old in terms of energy efficiency.

Since 2007, UPS manufacturers have been introducing new products designed around energy efficiency and reducing TCO (total cost of ownership). Older UPS could be responsible for consuming 18% of the total energy used in a typical data centre. And when you consider the average data centre can consume as much as 2MW of energy per hour, it’s a considerable amount.

Modern UPS waste less energy in the conversion process and can be as much as 40% more efficient than their older counterparts (depending upon various load and operating criteria). Many UPS are as much as 96% efficient in online mode, a rating that can rise to 99% when running in certain other economy modes.

Efficiency is not just about energy use it takes into account maintenance, floor space, scalability, flexibility and TCO. Modern UPS incorporate microprocessor technology that enables smarter, intuitive management and allows remote interrogation by users giving them more control over operation, and thus, the ability to proactively manage and influence efficiency.

Today’s UPS are smaller in size and lighter in weight, which reduces building and installation costs. They leave room for easy serviceability and maintenance – key to reducing lifetime costs. How a UPS draws energy from the mains (termed Input Power Factor) can influence energy efficiency. It should be rated high (0.99). The higher the input power factor, the lower the reactive power (wasted energy). How a UPS utilises energy while protecting loads also influences efficiency, as does how they deal with Total Harmonic Distortion (THDi) to produce a pure sinewave input current that reduces energy wastage. The management of consumables (such as batteries, fans and capacitors) so that they are replaced less often serves to reduce operating costs overall.

Return on investment on new UPS can be as low as 2-3 years. Upgrading to new UPS models equates to an investment in equipment designed for more reliability, that meets the latest regulations and standards, offers more features, better performance, increased power protection, higher efficiency and lowest TCO. For sure, the best antidote to the dilemma of rising energy costs coupled with the need for greater power protection.

According to new research by the Carbon Trust, and reported in MarketingWeek, nearly half of consumers said they would shun brands that aren’t taking steps to reduce their carbon footprint. More than a fifth (21%) said they would pay more for brands that label their products with their carbon impact. 47% of respondents stated that they are likely to choose low carbon labelled goods over non-labelled.

The Carbon Trust says the findings underline the need for corporate leadership on carbon reduction. They also point out that only 59% of FTSE 100 companies have clear targets to cut carbon footprints.

I think it’s great when companies show a real interest in environmental issues but I have to say, I’m a little sceptical about such research. Firstly, the article was in MarketingWeek, which is a magazine dedicated to the marketing industry and focused on marketing messaging.

Actions speak louder than words and to me there’s a vast difference between a company or business purporting, through marketing verbiage, to be taking action on carbon change and actually doing it. Look no further than certain high-street clothing retailers recently claiming to be ‘ethical’ and yet unwittingly buying into child labour. It demonstrates how easy it is to say one thing and yet without proper controls in place to actually be doing another. Marketing messages are shallow but consumers are savvy and less likely to be taken in, in my view. It doesn’t take much to label a product green and broadcast a low carbon footprint without doing much to actually reduce your carbon footprint.

Over the last decade, we’ve invested a great deal in product design with energy efficiency, lowering total cost of ownership, and increasing performance and reliability across all our range. Our UPS use less energy, take up less space and are easier to maintain. We’re also at the forefront of new developments such as renewable energy (solar) and flywheel/rotary UPS that doesn’t require batteries. Equipment is lighter in weight, so cheaper to transport, smaller in size so it doesn’t occupy so much space and contains fewer component parts so over its lifetime it will cost less to run and create less waste. Of course, it gives us some really useful marketing messages but more than that it makes our carbon claims tangible – and it helps our customers in their efforts to minimise their carbon footprints. And that, to me, is what it should be about – not paying lip service to environmental issues.