For the past 18 months, Point Advisory has been working with the NSW Office of Environment and Heritage (OEH) to develop and pilot an Energy Management Assessment Tool for energy intensive businesses. Once the pilots are completed, the tool is scheduled for public release in the second half of 2019. The tool helps businesses understand how their approach to energy management compares to ‘best practice’, and then provides an action plan to help them make necessary improvements to remedy any deficiencies.
When it is publicly released, OEH will be offering up to $30,000 in funding to eligible businesses in NSW to implement the recommended improvements.
How does the Energy Management Diagnostic Tool and workshop work?
The Energy Management Assessment Tool is used as part of a facilitated 2-hour workshop with an energy expert. During the workshop, client representatives are asked a series of questions about their energy management practices. After the workshop an action plan is produced to help your organisation move towards best practice energy management.
OEH is providing free workshops and up to $30,000 in implementation funding to eligible businesses.
Who will be eligible for OEH support?
The free workshops and $30,000 implementation funding are available to energy-intensive businesses with manufacturing operations in NSW.
A few other key points:
- The workshop itself is completely free and there is no obligation to undertake implementation activities.
- Businesses wishing to proceed with implementation will be offered an incentive whereby the government would provide up to $30,000 in funding to implement key actions.
- The funding is provided on an 80:20 basis, so the energy user would need to fund up to $6,000
- The money cannot be used for capital expenditure and is intended to be used for improving energy management practices (e.g. by developing an energy policy, monitoring and analysing energy data, developing energy efficiency procurement guidelines, etc.).
- Workshops are held at one of the business’ NSW facilities and take around 2 hours. Staff from energy and related roles are encouraged to attend – e.g. finance, procurement, operations, safety, health, environment and quality.
- The workshop would involve your team collaboratively answering several questions about energy management practices in place. They would not need to prepare for the session.
*Note that this program is subject to change prior to its official launch.
How can the Energy Management Diagnostic Tool and workshop help?
The diagnostic tool will help you develop a self-sustaining Energy Management System (EnMS) that will help your business energy and money over time. It will also be useful in comparing your energy management performance relative to other businesses in the same sector.
Many companies already track energy usage on some level, and undertake projects intermittently to improve energy efficiency, however there is no unifying strategy. Development of an effective EnMS is a bespoke affair, with some companies needing to start from scratch, while other companies have existing environmental policies and systems requiring integration. Regardless, integrating an energy management system into an organisation is extremely beneficial because it requires the development of suitable systems to identify, capture, and verify energy savings and crucially, to drive continual improvement in energy performance.
This article was written by Ross Tunmer, Senior Manager in Energy & Climate Change at Point Advisory.