Australian businesses could save $100 million and 300,000 tonnes of carbon every year !
Author: News.com.au Date Posted:10 May 2016
By shifting to a “19 to 25 world” — no higher that 19 degrees in winter, and no lower than 25 degrees in summer — Australian businesses could save $100 million and 300,000 tonnes of carbon every year.
The problem is that temperature is completely arbitrary, says Tony Crabb, national head of research at real estate services firm Savills Australia.
“The built environment is heated and cooled to a fixed 22 degrees regardless of the temperature outside,” he said during a recent TEDx presentation, Life Out Of Balance.
“It turns out, that’s the thermal comfort level of a 44-year-old man. It was decided by the Americans in the 1950s, and it’s been that way ever since.”
While human beings adapt to heat or cold by wearing more or less clothes, we “don’t ask our buildings to adapt”. “The [22-degree setting] is so embedded in the psyche of the world that it’s legally written into leases,” he said.
“But why? The thermal comfort level of a human being depends on whether they’re male or female, what age they are, whether they’re tall, short, fat or skinny. There isn’t one-size-fits-all.”
That set-and-forget temperature setting is costing the economy billions of dollars and pumping hundreds of thousands of tonnes of unnecessary carbon into the atmosphere, he argues.
By shifting to a “19 to 25 world” — no higher that 19 degrees in winter, and no lower than 25 degrees in summer — Australian businesses could save $100 million and 300,000 tonnes of carbon every year.
