Run a campaign to switch off electrical equipment overnight

Widcombe Infant School, Thursday, 17 October 2024
30 Change-maker KS1, KS2, KS3

What you did

We regularly discuss how as a school we can be more energy efficient in whole school assemblies and School Council meetings. The children share their ideas of the ways we can all work together to ensure devices are switched off when not in use. They have also discussed how we can conserve warmth in the school by ensuring when it is cooler, doors and windows are kept shut. 
We always ensure that Smartboards are turned off during break times, lights are not left on in the classrooms / kitchen if the rooms are not in use. All staff are encourage to switch all plugs off at the wall before leaving the room for the day. The Head and Deputy Head always check every room before locking the school each day to ensure all devices are switched off. The only devices left on over night are the medical fridge and fridge-freezer. All lighting in the school is now LED. 

We have moved to cloud storage for our IT network so no longer need a server. This has supported our reduction in energy use.

Activity description

Your school should only use a small amount of electricity overnight for items such as fridges, freezers and servers. It is likely though that your school is leaving other items on overnight. An out-of-hours survey will help you identify these items so they can be switched off.  This is your baseload.

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  1. Undertake a detailed survey of all school rooms - 
    • Don’t forget the boiler room, services rooms and outside. Identify electrical items left on unnecessarily, looking particularly at exterior lighting, IT equipment, electric hot water heaters, pumps and other plant room equipment. 
    • Make a list for each room of the electrical equipment and apply a coloured sticker to the switch of each device. A traffic light coding system should be used for the stickers as follows:
      •  Green indicates equipment should be switched off when not in use (e.g. PCs, lighting). 
      • Amber indicates equipment should be switched off after ensuring no-one is using it. 
      • Red Do not touch. Equipment should not be switched off (e.g. fridges, freezers and network servers). 
  2. Note: shapes can be used with the colours to assist those that may be colour blind. 
  3. Switch off all equipment labelled with a green or amber sticker. 
  4. Measure your reduced energy use – After switching off all unnecessary electricity users, it is good to check the savings. Use the Energy Sparks charts to compare your school's energy use  across the day before and after the switch off campaign.
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  5. Repeat these checks regularly to check your overnight load does not start to rise above the ‘best practice’ level you measured above. 
  6. Make extra checks when you close up for the school holidays – leaving equipment on over the holidays will use a lot of unnecessary electricity. 

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