Elizabeth Leigh
A new Government Business Council/Siemens poll has found that senior federal employees looking to become more energy efficient at work feel their goals will be better achieved by having greater freedom and better tools to access and interpret real-time data.
Thirty percent of 321 respondents to the GBC survey say they are sure their agencies will be able to reduce energy use to White House-acceptable levels by October 2015, GBC said Tuesday.
Sixty-nine percent believe smart technologies would give the government a boost in realizing its energy targets, it added.
Tthe September survey found 7 percent have access to their agency’s energy data through open dashboards, and 9 percent have been asked to set personal energy efficiency performance goals.
Zoe Grotophorst, manager of research and strategic insights at GBC, suggested that workforce engagement at the individual level could help interpret government-wide objectives into more doable, achievable challenges.
“Putting energy performance data in the hands of the federal workforce in real time could be a solution [to improve agency energy efficiency and cut costs], but first, agencies will need the ability to collect, integrate and share that data,” she said.
Barbara Humpton, senior vice president of business development, Siemens Government Technologies, added, “Access to better data and the ability to integrate that data into this new infrastructure and technology will be essential for federal agencies to build on their progress and meet their energy efficiency and energy security missions.”
