Put the 'Opportunity' Back into ESOS with Actionable, Transparent Data
Contributed By: Agnes Motika, Sustainability Digital Consultant, Schneider Electric Energy & Sustainability Services
You should read this blog if you check any of these boxes:
- You are a UK company that either:
- Employs 250 or more people, or
- Has an annual turnover in excess of £50 million and an annual balance sheet total in excess of £43 million
- You are an overseas company with a UK registered establishment which has 250 or more UK employees (paying income tax in the UK)
If you're still reading, then you’re likely aware that the deadline for the second phase of the Energy Savings Opportunity Scheme (ESOS) is here – 5 December 2019 to be exact. And, once again, you’re faced with the yearly financial obligation of compliance. But what if, instead of viewing the compliance scheme as a burden, you could embrace it as an opportunity? One where companies use the compliance deadline to implement energy efficiency throughout their operations, cutting costs and taking advantage of opportunities identified throughout the process of reporting.
Unfortunately, some companies overlook the many benefits ESOS can drive for a business. Common complaints are that it’s too expensive to report to ESOS and that it doesn’t come with direct, visible benefits. However, this is a misconception; ‘opportunity’ is literally in the name of ESOS. Companies that report to ESOS should view it as an opportunity to gain a better understanding of their energy use, therefore enabling them to take action on data insights and drive change within their organization.
The Opportunity Behind ESOS
Plain and simple, energy audits are expensive. By prioritizing ESOS recommendations, businesses can regain value in the report feedback. These reports contain energy saving guidance, which bring the potential for serious financial savings as well.
Why is it then, that despite energy audits being so useful, most recommendations land in the bottom drawer and no action is ever taken? If a company invests a significant amount for an energy audit, but the outcomes are never investigated further or used to drive action, it is indeed a very expensive piece of legislation. How can companies make sure this doesn’t happen to them and get the most out of opportunities within ESOS?
The solution is avoiding the loss of information. Keeping everyone informed by sharing knowledge in a central place is key but can be a major challenge in a large organization. EcoStruxureTMResource Advisor offers a solution not only to store the results of an energy audit (to be viewed by any user in the organization) but also to keep track of energy consumption and performance against ESOS reporting. By keeping information in a central place, all stakeholders have access it – from site level engineers to the CEO (who will have to sign off the ESOS recommendations) to auditors and partners.
If all energy related data lives within one central platform, why not keep sustainability compliance packages here as well? With the help of a specialized ESOS application within Resource Advisor, companies can analyze data and see how to best target 90% of its energy for an ESOS audit.
And this benefit lends itself to other compliance schemes as well, such as ISO50001 and CDP. The application is interactive, so with a click of a button, companies can view data in different time periods, commodities or activities and set exemptions at a site level. They can view each facility on a map, compare them with other sites based on consumption, find outliers and much more.
Resource Advisor gets automatically updated as new energy consumption data is available. As companies use data from audits to drive action, they can track in real time the outcomes of energy efficiency initiatives implemented during phase 1 of ESOS. Combined with technology like Resource Advisor, companies can embrace and see the results from the opportunities within ESOS reporting.