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Big buying power saves apartment owners in electricity costs

Announcement posted by BCS Strata Management 04 Jun 2013

New South Wales – 4 June 2013

With electricity prices more than doubling over the last five years, according to the NSW Independent Pricing and Regulatory Tribunal (IPART), many people are desperate to find ways to reduce their energy costs so they can pay their bills. A number are facing having their electricity cut off as numbers of disconnections soared last year by 25 percent over the year before.

But some apartment owners are getting great deals and saving on their energy costs thanks to their sheer numbers and savvy strata managers.

PICA Group CEO Greg Haywood said that in the first initiative of its kind, BCS Strata Management and Carbon and Energy Reductions (CER) had teamed up to provide apartment owners with some initiatives that would save thousands off their electricity bills by reducing their energy consumption.

First up CER is able to provide BCS’s strata schemes with electricity supplies at lower than retail rates.

“Soon we will be able to provide a discount, unconditional offer on electricity for common areas. There are no locked in contracts and this is a deal that is not available on the open market,” Mr Haywood explained.

“It is because of our numbers that we have the buying power to purchase electricity in bulk as if each of our strata schemes was the retailer buying from the wholesaler – they are then not paying marked up prices for their electricity consumption in common areas for lighting, lifts, pool pumps, electric garage doors and so on.”

In New South Wales, CER is registered for the Government’s Light Replacement Project and is about to embark on a program of replacing energy consuming down lights and halogen tubes with more efficient ones and all for free.

“The new 7 watt LED down lights being offered are re-engineered to CER’s standards and have a 50,000 hour life span and a 5 year warranty. The down lights give up to a 90% reduction in energy consumption producing the same amount of light as the metal halides they replace. The LED tubes last 3 times as long as fluorescent tubes and give the same light output while reducing energy consumption by up to 60%,” Mr Haywood said

“CER is also auditing some apartment buildings we manage to map their energy consumption. Of the first 20 buildings they completed reports for, nearly $250,000.00 worth of energy and maintenance savings will be realised in the first year if they proceed with the scheme we are putting in place.”

The most exciting offer though, involves solar power and does not require strata schemes to lift a finger or spend a cent, which will be magic to the ears of many executive committees.

“The biggest problem with solar power for commercial properties is it’s a huge investment that takes many years to generate a return,” Mr Haywood said.

“As an alternative, CER has created its Solar Power Purchase Agreements program. This program allows them to sell solar generated electricity to strata schemes. This means having solar panels on the roof of the building but CER owns, installs, insures and maintains them.

“They then sell the energy to strata scheme for their common area needs at up to 20 percent off their current rate and annual increases will be no more than CPI or 2.1%.”

With electricity prices increasing at around 16 percent each year for the past 6 to 7 years this equates to an impressive saving. The savings over the contract period involve absolutely no capital outlay for the strata scheme.

Once the contract is over the solar generation units, which have at least another 5 to 10 years of life, are transferred to the strata scheme to give free electricity for the years that remain.