Monday, August 06, 2007 DOE, CCCI push for businesses to adopt energy efficient system
Keeping old air conditioning units may mean more costs than savings, Cebu City Mayor Tomas Osmeña said.
Old air conditioning units consume more energy to cool a room so maintaining it would result in higher electricity consumption, said Osmeña during a seminar on energy efficiency last Friday.
He said building owners should change old aircon-ditioning units to achieve energy efficiency and cut down electricity consumption costs.
Air conditioning units consume 60 percent of a building’s electricity bill while lighting eats up only 40 percent, he added.
He said if an air conditioner operates 10 hours a day, the building’s annual electricity bill could reach about P24,000.
Building owners think they can save money by keeping old airconditioning units “but what they do not realize is, old air-cons can waste much energy,” said Osmeña, adding that a building’s electricity bill in six months could easily reach P15,000, the cost of a new air conditioner.
Change
He said City Hall is planning to change old aircon-ditioning units with new ones that use a certain technology that will make City Hall cut off its electricity bill by half.
Since the new air conditioning units cool more efficiently, City Hall can even lessen the number of airconditioners it will acquire, said Osmeña during the same seminar.
The seminar was conducted by the Cebu Chamber of Commerce and Industry (CCCI) and the Department of Energy under the “Palit Ilaw” program of the Philippine Efficient Lighting Market Transformation Project (PELMATP).
Carlos Co, CCCI Power Core Group president, said the seminar was meant to promote the use of energy efficient lighting systems.
Co said the five-year program will make the business sector realize that “energy efficient practices is a form of investment.”
He said promoting energy efficiency is also part of the CCCI’s corporate social responsibility agenda.
Palit Ilaw, which is also one of the government’s programs under the National Energy Efficiency and Conservation Program, aims to encourage consumers to change incandescent bulbs with “cheaper and good quality” compact fluorescent lamps (CFLs).
Incandescent bulbs are said to use only 20 percent of the energy it consumes while 80 percent is wasted on giving out heat.
Conventional light bulbs also have shorter life span compared to CFLs, which could last for more than two years.
Since CFLs consume less electricity, a building’s power bill can decrease by at least 50 percent. (TEP)
