The City Council has always had a strong commitment to managing its use of energy resources, appointing its first full-time Energy Manager in the 1970s, in response to the global energy crisis arising in the Middle East. In the 1980s environmental concerns over global warming became widespread and the Council published its first Energy Policy, indicating its intention to reduce harmful atmospheric emissions from burning fossil fuels.
Since then, there have been a number of notable initiatives, particularly in 1990 when the Energy Action Plan signalled the Council's intention to reduce its own energy consumption by half by the year 2025.
In 1999 this ambitious goal was incorporated into the Council's overall EMAS targets, together with a commitment to provide 20% of all its energy requirements from renewable sources by the year 2020.
Responsibility for delivering these improvements is held by the Energy Management Section, which is based at the Energy Efficiency Advice Centre in Market Place South. The Centre is also home to the Leicester Energy Agency which gives practical assistance to small businesses on energy related matters.
Leicester City Council spends over £8 million a year on energy and water requirements for its own premises and this cost is predicted to increase as the energy prices increase.
Our building stock is extremely varied and includes swimming pools, schools, offices, libraries, museums and district heating for housing estates. The Energy Management Team administers more than 3,000 individual energy accounts. Close monitoring of these resources is absolutely essential if costs and consumption are to be controlled properly. Monitoring and target setting represents a very low cost method of saving energy and yields a very high rate of success.
The Team uses a STARK Energy Accounting System to help in this vital work. Essentially this is a large database for storing, processing and analysing all of the billing information.
From this it is possible to identify very quickly an exception in cost or consumption at any building, and take corrective action before it becomes too expensive. The use of energy is also normalised for variations in weather and floor areas from year to year.
The system enables targets to be set very accurately, which helps in planning budgets and forecasting expenditure. It is also very helpful in evaluating the savings from investment projects. The Team obtains capital funding and manages a wide variety of energy reduction projects including control systems, Combined Heat and Power (CHP) and renewable energy.
Computerised Building Energy Management Systems (BEMS) provide sophisticated on-line monitoring of selected remote sites to provide up-to the-minute reports of consumption and operating status.
Besides monitoring the use of energy and introducing energy saving projects the Team also designs and presents its own training programmes to raise energy awareness for staff and the general public.
Highly trained and qualified staff also visit buildings regularly to perform surveys and prepare energy audits. The reports can be used as the basis for an Action Plan for helping to improve a building's overall energy and environmental performance.
The Team is responsible for ensuring that the Council obtains all of its fuel supplies in the privatised energy market at the most competitive price and under the best possible conditions.
The Energy Management Team has a wealth of expertise which has been recognised both at national and international levels, with several prestigious awards presented to the team.
Current Case Studies of Energy Management in the Council
Councils for Climate Protection Greenhouse Gas Emissions Software. Leicester City Council is one of 24 local authorities participating in this project.
The Climate Change Strategy builds on the original 1994 Leicester Energy Strategy and discusses progress over the last 10 years in reducing CO2 emissions in the city and takes forward the Government’s aspiration for increased public debate about energy and climate change.
Combined Heat And Power is a very efficient method for producing electricity and heat together from a single source.
Leicester's Energy Education Project aims to support schools involved in energy education. It provides an introduction to some of the key issues in energy and aims to raise awareness of these issues as well as developing attitudes and value for sustainable lifestyles.
An intelligent metering system which captures data on energy consumption in real time, rather than waiting for billing from utility companies.
Close monitoring of energy use is absolutely essential if costs and consumption are to be controlled.
Leicester City Council is currently supplied with electricity sourced from good quality Combined Heat and Power (CHP) units which produce 30% less carbon emissions than standard 'brown' electricity. Up until 2006 the council was supplied with 100% green electricity but could not conitue after this point due to large price increases.
Leicester City Council’s Energy Group sits on the Leicester Environment Partnership, which brings together community and business representatives and people from organisations such as the City Council, Health and Police.
