The Carbon Trust launches a new tool today in an attempt to help more staff across the UK become greener in the way they work.
If the new Empower tool is a success it could potentially save the UK economy £500 million a year by making workplaces more energy and waste efficient.
Companies who want their employees to make use of this new initiative will be able to download the tool free of charge.
The idea behind it is to educate staff into the best practices for saving energy and the small and big changes they can make in order to cut the amount of energy they waste.
Part of the programme involves a virtual tour of a typical office space, giving examples of where energy use can be reduced, as well as thinking about the environmental implications of things such as unnecessary corporate travel.
Video conferencing is a great way to cut down on such travel, as the benefits of a face-to-face meeting can be achieved through recent advances in technology without having to spend, time, money and fuel in travelling across London or the country.
Managers and employees can also use an app on the new tool in order to set and monitor personal goals to help them reduce energy usage.
If you take shared offices as an example, then the Carbon Trust has calculated that a ten storey office with 30,000 square metres of office space and 2,500 members of staff could cut their carbon emissions by 500 tonnes of carbon dioxide a year.
What this equates to is a saving of £150,000, which shared between all of the businesses occupying the office space is still a significant amount and not to be sniffed at during such difficult economic times for companies.
The Carbon Trust works to try and make the economy as low carbon as possible and is a not-for-profit company without political leanings.
Richard Rugg, director of Carbon Trust Programmes, said: “Part of the problem employers face is making actions practical, fun and sustained. By creating a virtual tour entirely from an employee’s viewpoint, every aspect of Empower has been designed with the end-user in mind.”
