Wicks wants energy efficiency
Former Energy Minister Malcolm Wicks has told the Government to get tough on energy efficiency in buildings.
In a report to the Prime Minister he urged "progressively tighter regulatory requirements" to force businesses to cut their energy use. He also says the Government should take a "bold lead" by slashing energy consumption in all of its departments and improving the carbon footprint of its buildings.
"This must not be regarded as some kind of soft option or nice-to-have, but rather a rigorous and vigorous action programme to substantially reduce the country's demand for energy," said Mr Wicks in his report, 'Energy Security: A national challenge in a changing world'.
CIBSE President Mike Simpson has also called for major behavioural change from building occupants to cut energy use. Speaking at the launch of the Institution's latest 100 Hours of Carbon Clean-up campaign he said: "We don't need to force new technologies through the door, we need to use the existing ones better."
Mr Simpson said it was staggering that the industry was being pilloried in the media for phasing out 100 watt lightbulbs: "This is a 120-year-old technology and removing these bulbs will save millions of tonnes of carbon."
Andy Stanton, Transport for London's head of sustainable building, told the CIBSE launch that 25 per cent of energy savings across TfL's large property portfolio would come from behavioural change. He added that Display Energy Certificates were a "powerful tool" to drive that change.
However, Tom Whitehouse of Carbon International said that onsite renewables would play an increasingly important part in the strategy to de-carbonise buildings. He said that buildings were the "easiest wins" as major energy cuts in the commercial building sector would be far cheaper to achieve than emissions reductions from transport, power generation and agriculture.
"Climate change used to be a PR issue, now it is a financial issue and businesses face major penalties if they fail to report their climate change measures," he said. "We need a shift to a low carbon culture and engineers have the authority and credibility to spread the word."