October is National Energy Awareness Month

  • Published
  • By Larry Stevens
  • 2d Civil Engineer Squadron
BARKSDALE AIR FORCE BASE, La. --  Barksdale's greatest utility cost is electricity at nearly $5 million annually. We can reduce waste without effecting mission readiness. Examples of waste include allowing night lighting to operate during daylight, allowing lighting to operate in tool rooms, storage areas, work rooms, and break areas when daylight provides sufficient light through windows or doors.

Likewise we can avoid waste by switching lights off when areas are unoccupied for minutes, hours or all weekend. To do otherwise is wasteful. Take the lead and turn off the lights when you are the last one to exit a room and encourage others to do the same. When you leave an area and others still occupy the room, remind them that the last one out should turn off the lights.

Establish nightly and weekend checklists for switching off un-necessary lighting in your facility.

Take the lead, set the standard, and encourage others. Soon everybody will develop the habit of conservation and cost savings.

Why should you endeavor to conserve energy?

The Department of Defense has challenged each military base to reduce utility costs and we must implement action plans to reduce energy usage. Daily opportunities to reduce energy wastefulness abound at duty facilities.

Each of us can and should identify opportunities and take actions to reduce waste. Also we should encourage others to take specific actions to minimize wasting energy. An estimated 20 percent of America's total electrical usage is wasted.

Barksdale is challenged to reduce our energy usage by 3 percent each year. Waste reduction is an effective method for achieving that goal in the next year.

We need to do our part to eliminate wasting precious resources. Utility costs and be reduced by using energy efficient devices and simply de-energizing energy consuming devices when not being used.

Our actions will likely ease cost increases for home energy and preserve valuable resources for our heirs.