The festive season is a time to be joyful, but it can also be an expensive time of year, especially for businesses.
To avoid a holiday headache, reduce your energy use over the festive period to save on your electricity bills.
Adjust energy usage
Many businesses may have fewer employees in the office during the holiday period.
If this is the case for your business, it’s important to reduce energy usage to suit your changed occupancy. If you only have a small group of employees in the office during the holiday period, you don’t necessarily need to be using the same amount of energy.
Businesses can benefit by shutting down all non-essential equipment. With fewer people in the office, you likely don’t need all computers, lights, kitchen appliances and printers turned on.
A computer or monitor left on all day uses up a lot of energy, and if you have quite a few screens in your office, this can be extremely costly. Ensure employees switch off their personal equipment, such as computers, printers, and scanners, before leaving for the holidays.
Keep cooling to a minimum if your office is at reduced capacity, and perhaps even consider simply using fans instead to keep employees cool, as fans use much less energy. Also if you have your heating and cooling, or even lighting, set to automatic timers, make sure these are not left on over the holidays when everyone has left.
If you are closed over the holiday period, you may also want to consider whether you should turn off your refrigerator. If your business is only closed for a few days but your fridge is empty, fill it with water bottles or jugs, as an empty fridge uses up more energy (thermal mass keeps the fridge from having to work all the time).
Use energy efficient lights
Adding fun lights to your business can bring cheer and festive vibes to the workplace, however they can also use up a lot of energy and add a significant amount to your bills.
You can still enjoy lights and decorations in the workplace without sending your energy bills soaring, you’ll just need to be more considerate in your choices, and choose more energy efficient options.
Switch to LED festive lights. These use less than half the amount of electricity compared to standard light globes. LED lights are also longer lasting, and don’t emit as much heat as regular bulbs, making them safer and more energy efficient.
Limit the time the lights are on, and avoid having them on all day or overnight. Invest in timers to ensure they turn on and off at a set time each day. Also, don’t have all your office lights on at the same time. If you have festive lights on, maybe you can turn some other lights off to reduce energy use.
Try not to go overboard when putting up festive lights and decorations in the workplace, and buy quality lights and decorations that you can use year after year, for further savings.
We hope you all have a safe and happy holiday season, and for more insights into how you can save your business money on energy, check out our recent blogs.