I’ve been looking over these figures for a good hour now, and they’re still not adding up. Maybe I should give it a rest and come back to it later. Or I could hire an assistant, but isn’t the whole point of this exercise to cut costs, not add new ones? That said, if I’d spent this past hour working on higher-value stuff, I’d probably be ahead of where I am now even if I was paying someone.
It’s the power bills that are putting the spanner in the works; that much I can work out. I’ve known this for ages, though. I don’t need a spreadsheet to confirm it. The question is, where is all that power going? An energy monitoring system would be helpful here, although I can’t help suspect that lighting is a significant factor in the mix. Even I can see that this building’s lighting system is inefficient, and I don’t know a T8 LED tube light from my elbow.
It’s probably time I gave some thought to Tina’s proposal about commercial solar panels. Sydney businesses seem to be embracing them; maybe now’s the time to ride the wave. I’ve just been putting off the idea because it’s hard to get my head around financially. I mean, of course it’s going to save money on bills, because we won’t be buying all our power from the grid. That much is obvious. But what about paying off the cost of the system, not to mention having it installed and maintained?
I need to know how that stacks up against our current expenditure, because we’re only just covering that. I know Tina said she’d worked it out and that the repayments would be roughly the same as what we’re currently paying for energy – possibly even less – but I need her to walk me through it again. I definitely tuned out when she showed me, which I’m slightly sheepish about.
It’s just that, faced with a screen full of numbers, I can’t keep my focus. My vision blurs and my mind starts to wander, usually towards what I’m having for lunch.