Looking at just 15 apartments buildings our energy audits identified a range of energy saving opportunities that could reduce the combined electricity usage by 48%. These savings could be easily achieved by standard energy saving measures such as upgrading lighting and ventilation systems.

The energy savings are cost effective too, with a payback on investment of only 2 years. The energy savings would save a total of $112k per year and reduce greenhouse emissions by 487 tCO2, equivalent to taking 160 cars off the road.

Click here to read a fact sheet outlining a summary of our initial findings.

All 15 sites have bee paying too much for electricity due to sub-optimal retail rates, network tariffs and metering configurations. Just by moving onto better market contracts $28,000 could be saved a year in total for all sites.

Energy usage and energy costs are high in the strata sector.

Our findings show just how easy it can be for apartment buildings to reduce their energy usage and costs.

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Gareth Huxham, director of Energy Smart Strata, joined an expert panel of speakers and presented an introduction to energy efficiency in apartment buildings. For a copy of the presentation please click the following link which will open a pdf in a new window.

PDF: Energy Smart Strata North Sydney Green Apartment Presentation

Julien Freed, expert lighting consultant provided an entertaining and very informative information session on lighting upgrades and it was great to hear from Allan Hoy about Hyde Park Plaza’s experiences, and successes in reducing its electricity consumption through lighting upgrades.

We would like to thank North Sydney council for putting on the night, there was lots of positive feedback from the community and we are sure the Green Apartment program will be a big success.

Click here for more information on North Sydney Council’s Green Apartment Program

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We have now conducted energy audits of 15 apartment buildings.

We would like to thank all the owners, strata managers and other groups who have participated in and assisted our study so far.

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Unofficially the program has been running since Septmeber 2012. During this period we have been in consultation with a number of stake holders to develop and refine the scope of the project. We have also been working with a number of strata management groups and have already audited 7 participating sites. The feedback we have recieved so far is very encouraging, with apartment buildings able to take advantge of low-cost energy audits and discover how easy it can be reduce energy costs and consumption.

We still have a long way to go. We are aiming to assess over 50 apartment buildings across the Greater Sydney Region. The more apartment buildings who participate in our study the greater the statistical significance of our data and the greater the scope and detail of our study. Places in the study are filling up fast so we encourage sites to register their interest in participating in the study to avoid missing out.

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This website has been developed to launch the Energy Smart Research Research Initiative, an exciting project aimed at promoting energy efficiency in the strata sector.

We believe by conducting quality, independent research and sharing our knowledge we can help apartment buildings to better understand how to reduce enery usage and costs. We will be updating this website regularly posting facts sheets covering a range of issues important to apartment buildings such as options to upgrade fluorescent lights, information on energy saving measures for pools and spas, and facts about electricity tariffs and recent price increases.

We will also be posting a number of case studies that highlight how other sites have saved energy and reduced costs.

We would like to thank Leigh Gittoes at Crash Bang Creative for his help building this site. Where possible we prefer to work with companies who share our vision for a greener, cleaner future. When Leigh is not working as a graphic designer he is active in the sustainable building industry and travels NSW with his dog Jet building eco-friendly hay bale houses.

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