Reducing carbon emissions from offices should be part of any organisation’s “net zero carbon” plan. But how do you do it? How do you know which parts of the building to upgrade first? Which interventions will have the most impact? How much does it cost? How much will it save?
And if the “net zero carbon” target wasn’t enough of an incentive to find all this out, then legislation in the form of Minimum Energy Efficiency Standards (MEES) may require some office owners to improve their properties.
We already help our clients work out their office carbon emissions, both for SHIFT and for SECR. To help get to the next level we have developed a tool which indicates best interventions and approximate costs to get to “net zero carbon”. The figures that we estimate will be indicative, so clients will have to get bespoke quotes for selected measures.
Until there is clearer direction from Government we interpret “net zero carbon” as 80% reduction compared to 1990 levels, with the suggestion to offset the remainder to achieve net zero carbon by 2050.
Here’s how our tool works. The first step is to establish your current baseline using your most recent energy bills (although we may need to look at older bills to take into account reduced occupancy during Covid times). We then work through a checklist to see what features you have in place already. Using a combination of typical energy splits for your office type, the checklist, potential energy savings and payback periods[1], we derive a list of interventions, potential savings, payback and investment costs. These will help you focus on what to do next.
We believe this work will give our clients indications on what they can do to improve the energy efficiency of their offices and to reap the environmental, wellbeing and financial benefits of improving energy efficiency. If you would like to find out more, please get in touch here.
[1] suggested payback periods in national non-domestic energy assessment standards
Photo by Austin Distel