Energy Tips for Commercial/Office Facilities
Being Green Reduces Cost and Improves Our Environment.
Please do Your Part.
- Shut off lights - Where possible, turn off the lights in offices, conference rooms, rest rooms, and storage areas when not in use. This includes desktop cubicle lighting, which can remain on around the clock if not properly controlled.
- Unplug it - Unplug unnecessary equipment, including cell phone and device chargers, when they are not being used to prevent energy consumption even when they are idle.
- Turn it off - Turn off PCs, printers, etc. when not in use; especially nights and weekends.
- Reduce number of appliances - Don’t use appliances like toasters, microwave ovens, refrigerators, and space heaters, in your individual workspace. Cooking appliances should be located in break rooms and shared by employees.
- Use proper temperature settings – If possible, building temperature should generally be set no higher than 68F for heating and no lower than 78F for cooling. These settings may require adjustment, however, depending on humidity level.
- Dress appropriately - Because temperature variations often occur within a building, depending on various factors, keep a sweater in your office during winter months.
- Use window blinds to your advantage - Use window blinds or shades, if present, to help control your workspace comfort levels. This can be achieved by opening them to allow more sunlight in during winter months and closing them slightly to deflect excess heat during the summer.
- Ditch the screen saver - Check your computer display settings to ensure the screensaver is set to “blank”. This uses less energy than “active” screensavers.
- Manage pc power settings - Check your desktop computer power settings to ensure the display and hard drives power down after a reasonable period of inactivity. Check copier settings too.
- Reuse it - To reduce waste you should Use, Reuse, and then Recycle. For example, consider reusing paper if there is a blank side, before recycling it.
- Recycle it - Recycle paper, junk mail, magazines, newspapers, cardboard, post-it notes and other office paper. Also recycle plastic, glass, and cans following appropriate procedures for your building. The easiest way to do this is to keep a small recycling container in your workspace, which can be emptied periodically into the larger recycling containers.
- Print double-sided – If possible, printers should be configured to print on both sides of the paper, as the default printing option. This can reduce your paper consumption by 50%.
