A chat about office lights turned into our first green win

I was going over the monthly bills at work and saw how high our electricity cost was. It hit me that our old fluorescent tubes were probably sucking up way more power than needed. I decided to speak up and suggest swapping them for LED bulbs to the management. They listened, and we got the whole floor updated in a weekend. The very next month, our power use dropped by a solid chunk, which saved cash too. Who would have thought such a simple fix could actually matter? Now my coworkers are talking about other small changes, like recycling paper properly. It just shows that starting with one thing can lead to more good steps.

2 comments

2 Comments

nancyj928d ago

You're so right about starting with one thing leading to more good steps. In my experience, we had a similar win with an old printer at my office. It was always humming and using tons of power, so we pushed to replace it with a sleep mode model. The drop in energy use was pretty clear on the next bill. That got my team talking about other easy fixes, like unplugging chargers overnight. Your mileage may vary, but I find that once people see that first win, they start looking for more. It really does build up from one small change.

the_sarah8d ago

That's awesome your bill dropped right away. Did management track how fast the savings paid for the new lights themselves? @nancyj92's printer story makes me wonder if companies see the payback period as the big sell for more changes.