Sembawang saves by reducing usage, wastage and doing bulk-buying
Serene Luo, Straits Times 20 Oct 08;
THE lights in every other staircase landing in blocks of flats looked after by the Sembawang Town Council will be turned off after midnight to save electricity.
It will leave the landings bright enough to deter crime, and help keep the town council's power bills down.
With electricity tariffs having jumped 20 per cent recently, the town council is also replacing 630 fluorescent-illuminated block signs with more energy-efficient light-emitting diode ones.
And 5,000 outdoor mercury and sodium lamps will make way for energy-efficient 'eco-bulbs'.
The savings will go towards defraying the swelling bill for manpower, construction and maintenance, town council general manager Soon Min Sin said yesterday when unveiling its Green Plan.
Already, by using energy-efficient light bulbs along the corridors in 90 per cent of the over 1,200 blocks under its care, the town council has so far shaved $2 million off its $17 million annual bill.
The savings mean that the 113,000 households in estates such as Woodlands, Marsiling and Chong Pang will likely not have to pay more in conservancy fees, which range from $19 to $77 per month, any time soon, said Mr Soon.
Besides the recent hike in electricity tariffs, town councils have also faced rises in wages and the prices of building materials like concrete and steel.
As it is, recent cleaning contracts have cost 15 per cent more, noted Dr Teo Ho Pin, the coordinating chairman of all the People's Action Party town councils.
Though the 14 of them decided this year to freeze service and conservancy fees for the year, their bills still have to be paid, one way or another.
They have thus banded together to impose energy-saving and water-saving measures; they also aggregate their bulk orders for light bulbs, which drives the price down, said Dr Teo.
The staff of the town councils meet every few months and often share new ways to shave costs.
Two moves implemented, for example, save water and thus keep water bills down: Taps in common areas can be used only with a special key, which prevents people from stealing or wasting water; mechanisms in roof-top tanks alert town councils to faults or overflows.
Dr Teo, who is also mayor of the North West District, is also advising a task force that will look into keeping lift maintenance costs affordable.
This is one item on town councils' expenditure list that is set to become pricier, now that more HDB lifts stop on every floor and move faster, which makes for more wear and tear.
The spare parts cost more too.
Separately, anti-social behaviour such as vandalism, littering and urinating in lifts has also pushed the Sembawang Town Council to install closed-circuit television (CCTV) sets in all of them.
It will spend $700,000 to fit almost 1,800 lifts with CCTVs by March.
The project was announced by Law Minister and Second Minister for Home Affairs K. Shanmugam at a community event yesterday.
The CCTVs will also go some way towards preventing crimes, said Mr Shanmugam, a Member of Parliament for Sembawang GRC.
Sembawang spreads green message
Teo Xuanwei, Today Online 20 Oct 08;
IT HAS implemented various schemes to instil a “green” mindset in its residents. Now, Sembawang Town Council is embarking on another to weed out the bad eggs whose socially irresponsible actions negate its conservation efforts.
By March next year, 1,791 lifts in the town, some 75 per cent of the total number, will be fitted with closed-circuit television (CCTV) as part of its drive to tackle anti-social behaviour, such as urinating, smoking, littering and vandalism. The remaining25 per cent are in blocks undergoing the Lift Upgrading Programme and will be fitted with CCTVs over the next two years.
“Caring for the environment is not just about what we should do, but also what we should not do,” Law Minister and Second Minister for Home Affairs K Shanmugam said yesterday at the launch of Sembawang Town Council’s Green Plan.
The entire project, which will entail only some lifts having live cameras and digital video recorders to balance costs, will amount to $700,000 and will affect about 113,000 households in areas such as Woodlands, Sembawang and Nee Soon Central.
The Town Council is also cutting down on energy consumption.
At a time when electricity tariffs are rising, it is replacing conventional fluorescent lamps in common areas with energy-efficient ones.
All 1,211 residential blocks in the area will have environmentally-friendly lighting by 2011, which will translate to savings of about $1.8 million each year.
The Town Council’s use of technology has cut down energy consumption by up to 61 per cent so far, leading to savings of $1.9 million.
A “Green Award Scheme” was also launched yesterday to recognise and reward Residents’ Committees who excel in spreading the “green message”.
