Identifying the lack of energy-conscious behaviour in clinical and non-clinical settings: an NHS case study

Taha, A. , Hopthrow, T., Wu, R., Adams, N., Brown, J., Zoha, A. , Abbasi, Q. H., , Imran, M. A. and Krabicka, J. (2021) Identifying the lack of energy-conscious behaviour in clinical and non-clinical settings: an NHS case study. Electronics, 10(20), 2468. (doi: 10.3390/electronics10202468)

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Abstract

The race against climate change has been a great challenge for years, and the UK government has taken serious steps towards achieving the net-zero carbon target by 2050. Technology is leading the way and innovation is believed to be a key solution. Nevertheless, tackling the issue, by attempting to limit the waste in energy, due to negative energy usage behaviour, has proven to be a successful approach that is capable of complementing other technology-based initiatives. The first step towards this is to promote energy-conscious behaviour and pinpoint where savings can be made. Thereby, this paper contributes to the existing literature, by presenting a new methodology to identify potential energy waste and negative energy usage behaviour in an NHS hospital. The paper presents an analysis of electricity consumption vs occupancy during minimal consumption periods (i.e, bank holidays and weekends) and it presents a log of equipment left switched on outside of working hours, in order to highlight the level of energy-conscious behaviour. The results revealed that the proposed technique is not only able to identify negative energy usage behaviour amongst the hospital staff but helps identify areas where immediate energy savings can be made, with potential savings of more than 30,000 pounds, if action is taken.

Item Type:Articles
Status:Published
Refereed:Yes
Glasgow Author(s) Enlighten ID:Zoha, Dr Ahmed and Taha, Dr Ahmad and Abbasi, Professor Qammer and Imran, Professor Muhammad
Creator Roles:
Taha, A.Conceptualization, Data curation, Formal analysis, Funding acquisition, Investigation, Methodology, Project administration, Software, Validation, Visualization, Writing – original draft, Writing – review and editing
Zoha, A.Writing – review and editing
Abbasi, Q. H.Writing – review and editing
Imran, M. A.Writing – review and editing
Authors: Taha, A., Hopthrow, T., Wu, R., Adams, N., Brown, J., Zoha, A., Abbasi, Q. H.,, Imran, M. A., and Krabicka, J.
College/School:College of Science and Engineering > School of Engineering > Electronics and Nanoscale Engineering
College of Science and Engineering > School of Engineering > Systems Power and Energy
Journal Name:Electronics
Publisher:MDPI
ISSN:2079-9292
ISSN (Online):2079-9292
Published Online:11 October 2021
Copyright Holders:Copyright © 2021 The Authors
First Published:First published in Electronics 10(20): 2468
Publisher Policy:Reproduced under a Creative Commons licence

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Project CodeAward NoProject NamePrincipal InvestigatorFunder's NameFunder RefLead Dept
312561EPSRC DTP 2020/21Christopher PearceEngineering and Physical Sciences Research Council (EPSRC)EP/T517896/1Research and Innovation Services