Energy efficiency tips for community buildings – Our Magnificent Seven!

There are a number of measures you can install to make your community building more energy efficient. However a lot can be done without spending a penny.

Here we give you our top energy efficiency tips – all of which involve behavioural change and which could save you money without costing you any!

1. Turn down your thermostat by 1 degree Celsius and reduce your heating bills by approximately 10%!

2. 'Switch off' your appliances at the plug. In many community buildings, appliances such as televisions, videos, stereos and computers can often be unused for long periods of time. Make sure that all users of your building turn them off at the plug, rather than leaving them on 'standby', to avoid wasting energy.

3. Turn off lights that aren’t in use – and work with your users to make sure that everybody gets in the habit of doing so. Make stickers or posters and position them close to main exits and light switches to remind everybody.

4. Often community buildings are used for short ‘bursts’ of time by different groups across a variety of days and times. Try to bunch users of your building together so that they can benefit from a heated building one after the other.

5. If you have a boiler, use a timer switch so that you can control when you heat your building and its water supply – avoiding wasting energy by unnecessarily heating an empty building.

6. Remember not to set the thermostat too high on your water heater – 60 degrees Celsius is usually adequate.

7. When using catering facilities for food or refreshments, do not heat more water than you need. In a kettle, the water should be enough to cover the element if it has one. For cooking you should select a suitable size pan and the water should just cover the food.