No matter if your company has a small workforce in a small facility or has a large number of employees in different locations, knowing how to use gas and electricity is important when you are looking for ways to save money on your company’s electricity and gas bills.
Decreasing your energy consumption can have several advantages for your company, such as:
- Save money on your business gas and electricity bills
- Boost your revenue
- Help save the ecosystem
The good news is that many of these savings can be achieved through very simple changes to your daily work.
Some easy ways to help your business save energy today
So how can your company save money and become more aware of your energy habits? Read the following energy saving tips to find out.
- Assess when you need to heat your property
Consider when you use the most electricity and gas in your company, and evaluate whether you really need to heat your property at that time.
Many entrepreneurs pay a standard price to heat their premises, but find that the building heats up at night or when the rooms are empty. This can be a huge waste of money and you can save hours of energy just by heating the building during the day or while the rooms are being used. If you need to heat your building at night, say you have changed in the building, it may be worth considering an hourly rate that offers cheaper rates at certain hours.
Another simple but effective energy saver for companies is to lower your heating.
You probably don’t even notice this small temperature difference, but what you do notice is the savings on your business energy bill. If you set the thermostat a little lower, you can quickly start saving. This small action lasts only a few seconds and can reduce your heating costs by up to 10-12 per cent.
- Turn off the machines and gadgets
Do you tend to put your devices to sleep instead of turning them off completely? We’ve all done it, accidentally or intentionally, and it doesn’t seem like a big deal.
However, when devices are stopped, they continue to consume power. If you don’t even use the device, you’re basically wasting energy and money, the money you could use for some other productive work.
Turning off appliances when you’re done with them is a great way to lower your gas and electricity bills. The next time you’re done working, turn off computer screens, lights, and other devices you don’t use.
- Watch the weather
Another way to save energy is to look more closely at your commercial thermostats and adapt them to external weather conditions. If it’s hot and you don’t need to heat the rooms, turn off the thermostat and you’ll save money soon.
During the summer months, private and commercial energy consumption generally decreases. This is because it is warmer and less heat is needed at all hours of the day. Just knowing what the weather is like outside and adjusting your thermostat accordingly can help ensure it is more cost-effective.
- Install a smart meter to save
Smart meters are a great way to keep track of your company’s utility bills, especially since they help you see where and when your gas and electricity is being used.
With a smart meter, you can see how much energy you are using and it can slow down your consumption. Talk to a CUS energy expert to find out how a smart meter can help you save your business gas and electricity.
- Don’t forget the cost of water.
60°-65°C is the optimum temperature for hot water. Therefore, using hotter water can cause problems.
First of all, running water with a temperature higher than the above mentioned temperature can be very dangerous for you, your employees or anyone who uses the facilities; A trip to the emergency room to treat burned personnel is not good for everyone. On the injury side, it can also expose you to expensive business insurance.
You’re also wasting energy, 60 – 65 degrees Celsius is enough and you can lower your company’s energy costs at the same time. You can also consider installing free faucets in the toilets so that you can use the water more sparingly.
- Turn off the light when not in use or set the light sensors
Another simple way to save energy is to turn off the lights every time you leave a room. It may seem obvious, but sometimes we don’t even realize that leaving the lights on can blow up our energy bills.
We forget the little things. Simply, telling you staff to turn off the light when leaving an empty room and at the end of the day makes a difference.
You can also enjoy natural light during the day when the weather is nice, sunny in the morning or afternoon and the lighting in the upstairs office is not much different. Remove blinds and use the natural sunlight to light up your office during the daytime.
Many companies also choose to install light sensors in, for example, warehouses and laundries, as these are places where people are not around all day.
- Encourage all employees to be energy conscious
In the short and long term, we should all think about reducing our energy consumption. This not only reduces the negative effects of high energy consumption in our world but also helps to reduce the cost of your business energy budget, so carefully consider what you are spending and where.
A study published in the Energy News portal found that 67% of workers are now thinking more carefully about their energy use at work. But there is still a lot to do, so talk to your employees about energy saving initiatives and explain why it is so important. You can think of things like encouragement and rewards or words of appreciation to encourage them to really get involved in the energy saving activities.
- Draught-proof your office premises
By making sure your rooms are well insulated, you will have less expensive heating bills. An inexpensive but effective way to save money on business gas and business electricity bills is by draught proofing your windows and doors and limiting the amount of heat that escapes and keeping cold air out.
Making simple changes like these and taking the time to inspect your locations for gaps or cracks that can allow the cold air in will make a difference, and this will show up on your monthly utility bills and reflect a decrease in your commercial gas bills.
- Avoid paper as much as possible
Sometimes we don’t actively think about how many documents we print and how much paper we use per day. And we rarely think about the amount of electricity used to run the printer.
With more and more paperless businesses, you may be wondering if this option is a viable option for you too. Going paperless can be a great cost-effective solution if you can email digital receipts or read a document online instead of printing it.
- Request an energy audit
Energy audits can be very helpful and your current utility company can get you started. By participating in an energy audit, you know exactly where you use the most and how you can reduce it. This way you have full control over your expenses.
Many energy suppliers offer audits so that your company can see exactly where and how you can save energy. Just contact your current carrier for more information and to get started.
- Change energy supplier
As happy as you are with your current utility, it may not offer you the best deals, especially if you let a permanent contract expire without signing a new one. If you haven’t looked at alternative rates lately, you may not know that there are better options.
It is well worth looking at and comparing gas and electricity prices at different rates and with different suppliers. You can save that much money per month and reinvest in your business. If you’re looking to do a little more for the environment and save your business some good amount of money, it’s worth considering an energy consultant that can negotiate on your behalf and present you with the best energy deals with 100% renewable energy or even your business can implementing your own renewable energy technology.
For more information on how to save money for your small business on your business gas and electricity bills, call our CUS energy experts on +44 0203 9781422 and see how we can help. Or fill-up the form on our Business Energy page and we will call you back.