Groan….At first I was pretty excited regarding the business opportunity. A large school district wanted us to help them decrease their energy consumption. It was a large opportunity (15 – 20 schools) and on the surface would be a fantastic endeavor. Not only would it supply our company a good bit of business, was for a local project so we were personally motivated.

Unfortunately, we had to tell them we were not the right company to help them.

Why did we pass up the project? Mainly because they were setting up the project for failure. All industrial energy efficiency measures needed to be based on behavioral changes. They would not consider any commercial energy efficiency measures that required equipment alterations or upgrades.

Don’t get me wrong, successful energy management involves buy in from senior management, and if you can actually transform the culture of a company to be energy conscious, it will surely have a profound outcome. The challenge is that if you only evaluate behavioral changes, human nature gets in the way. In fact, I usually recommend that companies and organizations automate whenever possible to remove the human factor. It isn’t that most employees are incompetent or they love wasting energy. They solely rapidly forget to shut down lights when they leave the room. When they work late they forget to turn up the thermostat before they are going home. In their run to get to their lunch or smoke break, they forget to turn off their equipment.

In other words, they focus on what they get paid for…doing their job!

Actually, studies have been done on energy conservation and how long the savings last. What they find is that almost all of the energy savings are lost within three years unless measures are put in place (for example, power management systems, hiring a VP of Sustainability, etc…).

For this reason I cringe when I see organizations ask for a business energy audit without allowing capital projects, equipment upgrades, or equipment installation.

Don’t get me wrong, behavioral changes are valuable.

I’m a firm believer that successful energy management necessitates executive support and leadership. I believe firmly in getting everybody in a company involved in their commercial energy efficiency programs. But companies desire workers who are good at their jobs, not workers that are environmentally conscious!

Companies tend to be better off investing in automation that removes the human factor than on educational or other behavioral programs.

So why do some organizations eliminate capitol initiatives, equipment changes, etc…from consideration?

In my experience it comes down to 2 reasons:
1) They are doing this for philosophical reasons. They don’t want to reduce the energy consumption of the company, they want to teach their staff and make them superior citizens. The issue with this is that the purpose of an organization is to be profitable, not enact social change. It is great if they can do good while being profitable, but their chief purpose needs to focus on maximizing profits.
2) They don’t want to spend any cash. Yep, they’re either broke or stingy. Ok, that was a bit harsh and over the top. You must evaluate projects and make decisions based on risk and reward. It is definitely crucial that you schedule projects according to available cash. But first-rate businesses then liberally spend money when it makes sense (high ROI and low risk).

Successful business energy audit and successful energy management call for capitol projects, equipment upgrades, and behavioral changes. It is like a three legged stool: in the event you remove any leg (ie…requiring only commercial energy efficiency measures) the stool collapses.

Industrial Energy Audit Services are industry leaders in industrial energy efficiency. Our decades of experience will make your business energy audits fast, effective, and affordable. We are so confident that we will save you money, that we guarantee that we will save you 15% or more on your energy bills.

If you would like more information on commercial energy audits or would like a quote please contact us at www.industrialenergyaudit.com.

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