Order among the madness

In the last six months we have witnessed no end of domestic political and environmental upheaval. Mervyn Pilley examines how ESTA can adapt to the changing landscape

I have just passed the six-month mark as executive director of ESTA. So this is a good time to do a mini ‘state of the union’ look at where we are and what is potentially ahead.

After taking on and getting fully immersed into the role, the world and certainly the UK do seem to have gone slightly stir crazy. Greta Thunberg, Extinction Rebellion, the Climate Change Committee report, numerous climate emergencies being declared, a change of Prime Minister, a meltdown in the political traditions, just some of the events that have occurred in the last few months.

This should be the perfect time to showcase our members’ capabilities to provide a total energy efficiency solution platform and help me deliver on my promise to do everything I can to deliver work streams to our members. I say should be, as the political situation seems to be causing something of a paralysis in the business sector at the very moment that full-on action is needed. It is hardly surprising that many businesses, especially the SME sector, where I have been trying to engender some combined action, are more focused on staying in business after the end of October than in worrying about putting energy efficiency measures in place.

There has been a knock-on effect in other areas of our work with members struggling to find work where clients are not making any decisions until the economic outlook going forward looks clearer. The concerning thing is that on the 1st November, or indeed any alternative date to be discovered, no one is going to wave a magic wand and solve all of the problems that UK plc is going to encounter. I am constantly being reminded that membership of a trade association is a voluntary expense which means that I/we have to work harder than ever to keep members on board and engaged.

We are getting ready for our October conference that has the theme ‘2050 are we too late?’ We are aiming to get a very wide audience with as many end users as possible in the room. Everyone/every organisation seems to be focusing on different dates with varying degrees of urgency. At my age, 2050 seems far too far away especially when I have seen views that we only have 11 years left before we may need to book that flight to the moon. The key purpose of the conference is to look at ways that different groups are dealing with the emergencies and to see how our members can support all of those initiatives. We are continuing to work on our behaviour change programme – now known as the “Energy Conscious Organisation” – and the focus remains on gathering IPMVP verified case studies. Part of the conference will involve presentations of these case studies and we are developing a new website facility to house them. The behaviour change work is important to us and we continue to talk to BEIS to see how much support can be given. However, Government has been slow to accept that behaviour change can be a high-return, low-cost way of saving energy.

I am very aware that we mustn’t lose sight of the technical solutions offered by our members using both current technology and newly emerging technologies. It is interesting to see the recent Government announcement of huge sums of money going to scientists globally to further develop such solutions. It is debateable whether spending this money on existing solutions of all types would be far quicker in tackling the problem. However, it is also important to recognise that not everything in terms of saving our planet can be left up to the free market economy to solve. Direct Government involvement through joined-up policy and tax incentives and grant mechanisms are needed. It has been disappointing that at the very moment everyone is focusing on our futures many carrots have been taken away and many sticks have been introduced.

Going forward, we are working on new divisions for ESTA including Community Energy, Academic, Public and Third Sector, and Property Professionals. The aim of these divisions will be to ensure that our members will be fully involved with providing energy efficiency solutions wherever they are needed. We are also working on wider collaboration and looking internationally. One thing for certain is that the challenges are totally global in nature, Brexit or no Brexit! Membership benefits and enhanced communication methods are being implemented. New training accreditations and opportunities are being sought and created. Membership enquiries are growing although not surprisingly everyone is looking to defer their applications until the last quarter of 2019 and some into the first quarter of 2020.

Hopefully by the time the next edition hits your desks there will be a lot more clarity/answers for all. I continue to look forward to the challenges of making ESTA a leading light in the energy sector.

Mervyn Pilley is executive director of ESTA