Energy Efficiency & Intelligent Energy Management

Energy Efficiency Blog

2011-02-16T13:32:00.000+00:00

Blog about energy efficiency and energy economics:
http://energy-efficiency-economics.blogspot.com/

Benefits of energy management and energy efficiency projects

2010-10-05T13:42:00.000+01:00

In my opinion all the benefits of increased energy efficiency can be classified in two main categories:

1. DIRECT BENEFITS
- decreased energy consumption
- lower energy costs
- profit increase
- lower environmental impact etc.

2. INDIRECT BENEFITS
- less impact of energy prices increase
- better competitive advantage due to higher energy efficiency
- expressing social responsibility
- improving public image
- fulfilling low regulations and/or standards etc.

It is obvious that these are only some of the benefits and each company/individual has its own characteristics and possible benefits that could be achieved. Implementing energy management system and continuous improvement of energy efficiency is certainly a multi-benefit program.

Energy Importance

2010-09-23T10:38:00.000+01:00

Availability of energy when and where needed, at acceptable price is a prerequisite for operation and development of any company, economy and society in general. Energy is input for all human activities and all businesses and because of that all human and business activities create certain level of demand for energy. Total energy consumption as well as energy consumption per capita has been increasing continuously throughout history and modern civilization has been built on fossil fuels and consumption of enormous quantity of energy.

Many decisions that formed today's energy flows in companies and affect business activities have been made years ago in a situation very different from current. In periods when energy was much cheaper than nowadays decisions were made to buy machines that have been using and are still using lots of energy, good thermal insulation wasn't a priority because energy for cooling and heating was cheap and production plants were created in order to minimize total production costs and not the energy consumption. Many of these solutions are still in function although the conditions have dramatically changed. s

Continuous increase of energy consumption as a result of economic and technological development, together with ascending trend of energy prices, results in increasing importance of energy. As the impact of energy on business activities increases it becomes necessary to understand the energy as the investment which has to be managed systematically with effective and efficient use of this limited resource.

Energy Management Model - Summary

2010-09-14T12:48:00.002+01:00

Energy represents an input in every business activity these days and a prerequisite for economic development. Understanding energy as a key resource, which has to be managed, results in energy management which represents a process of systematic management and continuous evolution of company's energy system in order to achieve fundamental objectives which are:

optimization of energy consumption (increasing energy efficiency)

improving energy system reliability and energy supply

reducing negative impact on environment.

In that context, applying management control system, as an expert support to energy management, helps to use energy more effectively and efficiently.

Based on the explored elements of controlling and especially controlling instruments, energy and energy management, a model for efficient energy management has been developed. Application of suggested model and adapted instruments of strategic and operative controlling: SWOT analysis, benchmarking, deviation analysis, ABC analysis, energy indicators system and reward system, enables fulfilling energy management fundamental objectives and achieving many direct and indirect positive effects.