Every year businesses face tough challenges during the coldest months of the year. Our experts have taken the time to list 7 ways your office/business can save on their energy bills.
In most industries, wholesale energy prices will rise over time. This means that suppliers will raise prices. However, if you are careful about your energy usage your electric bills will not continue to rise.
What is Insulation?
After the temperature drops, the utility bills for businesses are what go through the roof if the building is not insulated properly. If you're renting your building and not the owner, your landlord should be able to tell you if there has been any insulation installed.
Insulation is usually a thick material in floors, walls, or roofs to stop the heat from escaping your building. Through the process of insulation, heat is trapped inside your building. This will require you to use less energy to keep your building heated.
Insulation also reduces the chances of your building being affected by external damage such as wind and weather.
Therefore, as a start to make sure your building is equipped for winter, make sure your building has insulation to reduce wasted energy.
Could heat pumps save energy?
Heat pumps are another great alternative to gas-powered heating and cooling systems. They are a lot more energy efficient and could save you a lot of money on your gas bills.
Heat pumps are a great replacement to traditional gas quick boilers, rollers, hydronic systems, heaters, and other boiler systems you may have in your business. They not only work for warm air for your building but can also be used for hot water.
Read our in- depth guide on heat pumps here.
What is a smart thermostat?
We know that keeping your building warm and comfortable through the Winter can be important. Leaving the heating on all day seems like your only option but a smart thermostat could help you.
A smart thermostat can be set at any temperature and it will keep your building acclimated to this all day. This will allow the heating to go on in intervals rather than be on all day.
This could save your business a huge amount of money on its gas bills.
Why you shouldn't leave electric equipment on
Leaving electric equipment on can often be a business’s biggest waste of energy. Often monitors, computers and lights can be left on. This means you are paying for electricity that you’re not using outside of working hours. Switching equipment off each day could ensure these machines use 75% less electricity.
Encourage employees to be more energy efficient
Make saving energy this Winter a team effort. If your employees are not on board with changes, then it is going to be pretty difficult to implement across the business. Introducing new energy infrastructure could be difficult for people to understand. You should ensure training is given to employees where needed.
Getting people to comply at first could be difficult as they may forget or not care. Here is some way that you can remind your employees of this:
- Send email reminders to employees
- Make sure they know why this is important for the whole business
- Ask for their input on other ways you can increase energy efficiency
- Offer a reward for the most energy-efficient employee or department.
What is an energy audit?
If your business is struggling to save money on your energy bills you could get a professional to conduct an energy audit for you. You could also perform a commercial energy audit yourself.
A commercial energy audit will identify areas where you could become more energy efficient. An auditor will consider all areas of your business and give insights on energy saving strategies that you could implement that would be unique to your business.
This could lead to you being able to reduce your energy usage and therefore your energy bills.
What energy tariff should my business be on this Winter?
With government energy support for businesses being available this year, it is important to be on the right energy contract. Last month the government introduced the Energy Bill Relief Scheme. With this support businesses receive a discount on their wholesale gas and electricity prices.
If you're on a deemed rate tariff or your fixed rate tariff is ending, we suggest sticking with a fixed rate tariff for your next contract. This will let you take full advantage of the government's energy price cap. All non-domestic customers on fixed rate tariffs signed after December 2021 are eligible for the cap, which is set at 21.1p/kWh for electricity and 7.5 p/kWh for gas.
If you want to switch to a fixed-rate contract to ensure you are paying the lowest possible prices over the next six months, then get in touch with us today. You can also request a free quote from us here.
