How a school can save $300 and 1.2 tonnes of CO2 this summer holidays

Schools waste a great deal of energy over the summer school holidays.

In 2005 CarbonetiX worked with the Victorian Department of Education and Training to produce a School Energy Shut Down Guide and then promoted its use to schools around Victoria, just before the summer holidays. When we followed up in February 2006, over forty schools sent their bills to us for analysis. How much had been saved? And the results were surprising, even to us.

Over the 6 week summer holiday period we calculated that improved switch off practices resulted in schools saving an average of $429 each!

Based on this experience I estimate that on average most Australian schools have the opportunity to save around $300 and 1.3 tonnes of greenhouse gas simply be getting better at turning things off before the summer holidays. This correlates to potential savings Australia wide of $2.8 million and 12,400 tonnes of greenhouse gas – equivalent to the annual emissions of 2,900 cars!

To make it easy for schools to realize these savings we have developed the online School Summer Energy Shut Down Blitz. It’s a simple, fast way to quickly come up with an action plan for your school, and shows you what you need to shut down before the holidays start. And it costs nothing to use.

You can access the blitz at www.blitz.schoolenergysavings.com.au.