5 Environmental Report (continued)

Energy

The Ministry for the Environment moved into its new head office on Kate Sheppard Place in July 2005. In Environment House, we now record and pay for heating, ventilation and air conditioning (HVAC). Previously, only one of the three Wellington offices, Plimmer Towers, and our Christchurch office had recorded HVAC. At that time, HVAC was paid as a fixed cost as part of the lease arrangements and therefore was not recorded as energy use. This year’s electricity use therefore cannot be benchmarked against previous years’ figures.

In future, the Ministry for the Environment looks forward to benchmarking its own performance, as in an independent audit, Environment House was rated a highly energy efficient office building.

This energy consumption has been kept low through a careful selection of building materials, roof insulation, sensor lights, smart systems for appliances and air conditioning. There is also a high awareness amongst staff to turn off the lights when they leave meeting rooms, turn off computers when they go home and use the stairs instead of the lifts.

Note that all figures for 2004–2006 exclude Auckland office energy figures. The figures for Auckland have been taken out of the 2003–2005 datasets so comparisons are relevant.

Table 3: Benchmarking our performance: Energy use

	2005/06	2004/05	2003/04	Low-typical usage benchmark*
Offices - with HVAC (KWh/m²)	110	112	128	200-280

* Energy Efficiency and Conservation Authority (EECA)

Key targets and commitments	Progress at 30 June 2006
Maintain offices energy performance within the low EECA benchmark.	Ongoing: Continue monitoring of energy use and measures to maximise energy efficiency.

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Report of the Ministry for the Environment for the year ended 30 June 2006

5 Environmental Report (continued)

Energy