Industry in Britain is set to waste half a billion pounds over the winter months as it emits 7.4 million tonnes of unnecessary C02, new research has shown.
Vickers Energy Group, who carried out the research, is calling for British businesses to make immediate operational changes to increase efficiency and reduce unnecessary carbon emissions during the cold winter months.
The savings that could be achieved by UK business would be enough to fund 18,868 jobs, power 866,551 homes for a year or the cost of building a new hospital.
As the cold weather is set to continue well into the New Year businesses will consume an increased amount of energy, of which much is totally unnecessary.
David Hilton from Vickers said: “As a nation we are not proficient at looking at where we can reduce our energy consumption. UK industry could save itself £1.2bn pounds every year if only it addressed the issue and reduced its carbon emissions. The situation cannot just continue without any monitoring and we are calling on UK businesses and the government to ensure that there are regulations in place to stop money haemorrhaging out of the economy every day. Just imagine what could be done with the money that is saved.”
Vickers saves its customers over £75m per year – on average it saves its customers £18,000 per year.
The wastage figures were calculated on the amount of savings that Vickers energy has made for its customers over the past ten years. The results clearly show heating, particularly in the UK, is not being managed in the correct way, and is operating at too high a temperature to ensure efficiency across the business.
The UK’s most well-known orchid nursery, Burnham Nurseries, has invested in its environmental policy and reduced its energy consumption by 27%, saving over £5,500 in the process.
It has joined forces with Vickers Energy Group to install its energy management system which control the gas heaters throughout the Devon-based nursery after the company decided it wanted to control the rising cost of its energy bills and increase the priority of environmental issues within the business.
The advanced energy management system regulates and monitors the temperature throughout the various buildings at the nursery by using highly accurate digital air sensors, which ensures the heaters work to their optimum efficiency.
Sara Rittershausen from Burnham Nurseries said: “As an orchid nursery, the issues we face in our greenhouses to protect the orchids are quite complex and tackling winter bills can be a daunting prospect. Energy consumption can become a low priority in many businesses but we decided to ‘bite the bullet’ and address the constantly rising costs. An energy management system has been a huge help as it is low maintenance and has cut consumption by 27%.”
