Improving shut down at your workplace requires more than getting staff to remember to switch off equipment. It's important to check timers on air conditioners and lights because in our experience there's a 10% chance that they are not working correctly. Bring in measures to force items to shut down rather than relying on busy people to remember to turn them off. Focus on standby loads and have a purchasing policy that favours shut down-friendly products.

Give staff good reasons to switch off, such as the boss switches off and expects everyone else to do the same, and make people aware of the environmental implications of not shutting down. Share shut down savings with staff and demonstrate with a plug in power meter.

Provide reminders

• Placards
• Email
• Speaker announcements (eg before Christmas shut down)
• Last to leave checklist on exit door.

Have a regular shut down day/week

• Designate a day where people will be actively reminded to switch off
• Send out emails on the day and make announcements over the PA system.

Appoint switch off monitors

• A switch off monitor is someone who checks the office to make sure everything is switched off.
• Can typically be the last person to leave
• You can also give this job to cleaners or security staff. Mark with a red dot items not to be turned off - if it doesn't have a red dot then switch it off.
  

Example of a reminder to staff to switch off when they leave

Lights and air conditioners are often automatically timed to switch off - or so everyone thinks. But the timer circuit may not be working as intended.

• Verify time clock settings on air conditioners and lights
• Verify auto / manual / off position of controls (should be on auto)
• Verify correct operation of out of hours buttons
• Verify emergency and exit lighting circuits (may be mixed with general lighting, so that some or many of the building's normal lights are wired up as emergency lights)
• Set times to suit 95% of staff, with the 5% who come in extremely early or leave very late use out of hours switches
• Arrive at work at 5am one day to check that the controls on the air conditioner and lights are working correctly.

Identify and set up automatically timed items

Many items that people forget to switch off can be set up to turn off automatically.

Computers

• Get your IT staff to put a timed shut down program on your computers (XP, 3rd party software such as www.yasoft.km.ru)
• hibernate after 20 minutes of inactivity.

Car parks

• exhaust fans (put on a CO sensor)
• lights (occupancy sensor)

Tea and coffee boilers, water chillers, vending machines

• timers (many under-sink units have inbuilt timers).

Lifts

• only run one lift out of hours.

Toilet lights and fans:

• rest-room occupancy sensors or push button count-down timers on lights

Un-timed air conditioners & heaters:

• Push button count down timer. You push the button to start and a certain time later it automatically goes off.

Panel heaters

• Push button count down timer. You push the button to start and certain time later it automatically goes off.

Make it easy for standby loads to be switched off

• Many items such as computers will still draw power even when switched off. The only way to eliminate this is to switch off at the wall or unplug. Make it easy to do this, so that people don't have to crawl under desks
  
• Use power boards with switches
• If refitting specify power boards with switches in partitions
• Consider a power-genie or a USB controlled powerboard (only on when the USB port on a computer is powered up).

Buy items designed to shut down

It's much easier to manage energy use with shut down-friendly devices. Include operational efficiency, time control and standby specifications in buying guidelines.

• Make sure time controls are easy to use. Inbuilt push button countdown timers are recommended for air conditioners and heaters. Manual on – auto off is far better than auto on - auto off
• Require vendors to disclose standby performance
• Apply guidelines to computers, office equipment, air conditioners, tea and coffee boilers, plug packs, kitchen equipment, AV equipment, whiteboards, speakers, projectors and TVs.