The NSW Government introduced the Government Energy Management Policy (GEMP) in 1998 to reduce greenhouse gas emissions and provide significant energy cost savings for NSW government agencies. The GEMP covers all energy use in NSW public sector agencies, including buildings, infrastructure, transport and motor vehicles, plant, equipment, goods and services.
The GEMP commits the RTA to two specific building energy reduction targets: a 15 per cent reduction by 2001–02 and a 25 per cent reduction by 2005–06 (compared to a 1995–96 baseline year).
The RTA’s performance in implementing the GEMP can be found in the RTA environment report (see box below).
However, in summary, the RTA reduced building energy use in 2002-03 by around 15 per cent from the 1995-96 baseline data. Overall greenhouse gas emissions for the RTA increased over the year. The increased overall greenhouse gas emissions are primarily due to increased diesel consumption and greater traffic signal energy use. Measures to address this include:
- Completing energy audits at 15 of the largest RTA buildings, which together consume approximately 40 per cent of the RTA’s total building energy. An plan has been agreed for identifying and implementing feasible audit recommendations.
- Review of air conditioning plant in major owned buildings to ensure maximum efficiency of the systems.
- Purchasing 6 per cent Green Power for traffic signals.
- The RTA has increased its fleet of petrol-electric hybrid vehicles to nine during the year, an increase of four cars during 2002-03. Orders for another seven hybrid cars are expected.
- Assessment of the viability of changing any older incandescent traffic signal technology to modern and more energy efficient Light Emitting Diode technology, which is expected to offer significant operational cost savings, reduce greenhouse gas emissions and reduce outages.
For more information visit www.deus.nsw.gov.au/eeg/
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