Home

Publication

22nd April 2001, The Straits Times

$3.2b a year spent on energy

And aircons account for about 25% of that bill

By SHARMILPAL KAUR

SINGAPORE spends a whopping $3.2 billion a year on electricity, and 24 cents in every dollar is for air-conditioning.

This adds up to an air-conditioning bill of $768 million a year for homes and offices.

The rest of the energy bill for 1999 was taken up by lighting, ventilation, home and office appliances, like computers and refrigerators, manufacturing and industry. Figures for last year are not yet available.

Mr Abdul Rashid Ibrahim, senior energy efficiency manager with the Energy Market Authority, the new power regulator, said: 'If buildings want to make improvements in their energy use, these are potential savings, because in buildings, air-conditioning takes up to 70 per cent of the bill.'

To mark Earth Day today, The Sunday Times looks at energy use here and how much can be saved.

The good news is, the energy bill for the industrial and commercial sector, which amounts to about $1.18 billion, can be reduced by at least $118 million if more energy-saving steps are adopted, such as improving the efficiency of the airconditioners.

When the National University of Singapore checked the energy efficiency of buildings here, it found that three in four were wasting energy.

Associate Professor Lee Siew Eang, from the NUS School of Design and Environment, said landlords bore about 62 per cent of a building's energy bill and they, in turn, billed their tenants.

Using the example of a small building with an area of 20,000sq m, even if it was very energy efficient, the landlord would spend about $23,000 a month 'just on air-conditioning'.

But for buildings here of a similar size, one in four 'spend $75,000 a month on average', he said.

Much can be done to cut their air-conditioning bills, he said, but many do not even know the buildings are energy inefficient.

He said that one building owner kept inviting him to consider his building for the Asean Energy Efficiency Awards last year.

But that building, he said, wasted more than twice the amount of energy consumed by the most inefficient building surveyed.

He said the rising number of computers could mean bigger air-conditioning bills in future.

He strongly recommended that building owners benchmark their buildings against one another's to check energy efficiency.

The Building and Construction Authority is looking into setting up benchmarks for buildings.

Mr Wong Wai Ching, who heads its building plan and management division, said: "It is generally acknowledged that 30-per-cent energy savings can materialise from further improvements to existing buildings.'

Back to Main Publication Page

Designed By Cyber-IB.com Pte Ltd, Singapore. All rights reserved.