Staff housing complexes in the UAE should be able to achieve up to 20 per cent savings, representing an overall reduction valued at around Dh300,000 ($81,000) per annum, said an industry expert.

An average staff accommodation centre with 1,000 employees consumes 2,500 kWh energy and 51,000 litres of water costing Dh1.5 million ($408,330) annually, as well as producing 2,190 kg of carbon emissions (CO2), added Markus Oberlin, the CEO of Farnek , a leading UAE-based facilities management company.

Oberlin was commenting on a study conducted by Farnek at the company’s accommodation centre in Al Quoz, Dubai, which houses over 1,000 employees.

The study was completed using Farnek’s own patented internet-based benchmarking tool ‘Optimizer’.

“Before you can change anything, it has to be measured. Now that we have completed this first-of-its-kind study, we can benchmark this survey with future annual studies and identify where utility savings can - and indeed have already - been made,” said Oberlin.

“From a commercial perspective we can also now share this information with other companies looking to benchmark the water and energy consumption of their own staff housing complexes.”

To enable companies to reduce their carbon emissions, and therefore their utility bills, Farnek recommends installing A/C modules and energy-efficient A/C units, timers and LED lights, parking lights, roof insulation, waterless urinals, water tap aerators, reduced flow shower heads and employ economical car and van washes.

“By investing in some or all of these energy and water saving devices, the financial return can be seen in as little as 18 months,” said Oberlin. “Simple but effective awareness campaigns are also vital, such as encouraging staff to turn off lights when leaving a room and closing windows and doors when the A/C is running,” he added.

Farnek has also identified significant potential savings in terms of efficiencies in the area of staff accommodation cleaning, with training and awareness key to achieving those targets.

Additional team training also enables Farnek to further upgrade its employee skill set, enabling compliance with more of the 90 individual cleaning standards that the British Institute of Cleaning Science (BICSc) trains and assesses, putting it ahead of other companies in the region in terms of core competencies.

“More and more companies are now highlighting sustainability as well as international best practice in their tender documents as minimum specifications, conscious of the standards of cleanliness, hygiene and indeed sustainability demanded by their stakeholders,” said Oberlin.

Farnek has also benchmarked its staff transportation operation. Earlier this year it acquired its own garage to carry out transport maintenance for its 180 vehicles to reduce the amount of water and chemicals which were used to wash their vans.

It is also working hard to cut down on the 430 litres of fuel each vehicle consumes on average per year, resulting in annual CO2 emissions totalling 1,750 kg. – TradeArabia News Service