Role of Effective Energy Management in Sustainable Development of Organisations: Case Study of UK Production Industry

1.      Introduction:

In the modern age, the competition in the markets has become robust and organisations around the globe are using different strategies to gain maximum advantages. Since the significant growth in marketing and customer attraction strategies has been observed, the industries around the globe have evolved where UK’s production sector is the key factor of evolution. This shows a need to be explicit about exactly what is meant by the environmental dilemmas. The increasing issues include the intense use of resources which causes environmental pollution, rapidly increasing population and climate changes (Sarkodie and Adams, 2018). Most of these problems are human-made, which arise from the increased consumption of resources to produce something valuable. According to the Office for National Stats (2018), the revenue of the UK production industry revolves around $4 billion. Critics have also argued that it not only posses a great threat to mankind but also results in economic fluctuations around the globe (Craig and Feng, 2017). Due to intense usage, the price of different resources often goes high. Even after the major threats, which high resource consumption poses around the globe, the area lacks research (Figge et al., 2018). Although different authors have provided detailed analysis of the problem but teaching business how to use the resources effectively has become a major area of concern. The effective use of resources can reduce the energy bills significantly and position a business comparatively better in both global and domestic market (Nghiem and Figueira, 2016). The money saved from the effective use of energy can be invested in different departments such as marketing, R&D, Human resource and finance. The effective use of energy saves the monetary cost of an organisation which contributes significantly to the sustainable development of an organisation (Farley et al., 2015). Therefore, the effective use of energy has become a necessity of many organisations, and the study seeks to provide a detailed game plan to use of the energy effectively.

1.1 Rationale:

In this era, there is a tough competition in almost every industry, and sustainability has become an increasingly important area to focus on. Many organisations do not know the importance of saving cost and re-investing it in the more essential parts of the organisations (Fawkes, 2017). Cost prevention strategies play a very important role in the sustainable development of organisations. Companies that are dominating the global or domestic market do understand the importance of lowering the cost, and they are adopting different strategies to use the resources effectively (Corvellec and Ek., 2018). However, the companies striving to save energy cannot save 30% of the energy with calculated measures of monitoring and using resources. Hence, it is essential to conduct a detailed study that gives direction to entrepreneurs and organisations on how to use the resources effectively.

1.2 Aims and Objectives

Effective use of energy helps the organisation to gain a competitive advantage over the competitors and save monetary costs (Guo and Wei, 2016). Since the manufacturing industry of the UK has evolved heavily and organisations are using different strategies to gain maximum benefits, the resource consumption has grown heavily. Therefore, the current study aims at providing critical insight on how different strategies can be used for effective resource management.

1.3 Research Questions:

• What are the factors preventing the effective use of energy in manufacturing industry?
• What are the impacts of increasing consumption of energy resources on the sustainable development of the manufacturing organisations?
• What energy efficient activities can lead to better management of energy-related sources in UK organisations?
• How the manufacturing organisations can save the resources?

2.      Literature Review:

Energy is a basic factor which allows many industries to produce desirable commodities. Change in the lifestyle and needs of the targeted market have led to the intense use of resources (Schroede, 2015). Intense use of resources poses different threats to mankind.

2.1 Factors Preventing the Effective use of energy:

Many critiques have argued that there are several factors that prevents the organisation from using the resources effectively. Schmidt and Cheein (2019) stated that the machinery used in production organisation holds significant importance in the production of the commodities. Turbines are the most common and most used machinery in electricity production which costs millions of dollars. Furthermore, turbines use huge resources including coals, electricity and natural gas. According to OECD (2019), over time, the machinery tends to use more resources in the process of production. However, there is an inconsistency with the argument as PersonalEms (2019), stated that the efficiency of energy is highly affected by the type of energy used in the production. PersonalEMs (2019) further stated that the use of electricity provides more efficiency and less optimisation of resources than coal or oil. The extent to utilise these sources of energy determine the level of energy required to continue the process of production.

2.2 Impact of Energy Resources on Sustainable Development:

Welford (2016) stated that most of the organisations that are dominating the domestic or global market make different strategies to limit the use of resource consumption. The increasing consumption of resources results in high monetary costs. Furthermore, the increased consumption of energy also has a significant impact on the environment (Pablo-Romero and De, 2016). According to research, approximately more than 35% energy around the globe is used by different industries in the process of production (Bahramara, Moghaddam and Haghifam, 2016). Production sector around the globe uses huge machinery including turbines, cutting machinery, packaging machines and styling machines which results in high energy consumption. Customers tend to show significant interest in the organisation which strives to provide a minimum threat to the environment (Montabon, Pagell and Wu, 2016). Considering the huge shift of interest towards the environment friendly organisations, many organisations have made different strategies to provide maximum benefits to the environment and the society and gain competitive advantage over the competitors. Efficient use of resources allows an organisation to save monetary cost that can be re-invested into different activities of the organisation (Figge et al., 2018). Thus, it can be interpreted that the effective use of resource consumption results in the sustainable development of the organisation. Since employees are attracted to the organisations which strive to save the environment, organisations can capture most of the market. To reduce the consumption of resources, organisations don’t need to invest heavily to save resources

2.3 Organisational Energy Efficient Activities:

Several activities can be used by organisations to save resources. According to Pothitou et al. (2016), change in behaviours is one of several factors that helps save energy. Most of the organisations have a heavy amount of bulb or tube lights that consume so much electricity. By having optimised availability of tube lights or bulbs can help an organisation to save a significant amount of energy (Montoya et al., 2017). Global companies which are dominating the market hire an energy audit company which analyses the use of resources in that particular company (Chiaroni et al., 2017). It becomes easy for organisations to reduce the consumption knowing what are the extra things using energy within an organisation. Aan organisation seeking to reduce the use of energy should use thermostat (Filson et al., 2016). A thermostat is a programmed device which sets the temperature of the workplace. Considering the individuals at the workplace thermostat manage the temperature. By using thermostat idol use of air-conditions can be prevented (Filson et al., 2016). As the air conditioner stops after maintaining a considerable temperature at the workplace. Through this way idol usage of most of the office equipment can be prevented and the money saved from the use of resources can be invested in some other processes such as marketing, human resource, employee training and development and finance.

Despite the growing interests of customers in the environmental factors and contribution of effective energy use to the sustainable development of the organisations, there are very few studies that incorporate which effective management strategies should organisations use to use the resources efficiently (Omotayo, 2015). However, the current study aims to focus on the growing issues and provide insight into the problem. This study will be very helpful for businesses and entrepreneurs as it identifies the area to focus.

3.      Methodology:

This section includes the research methodology which has been used in this research. This section includes research philosophy and research methods with a detailed explanation of why a particular method has been chosen to study.

3.1 Research Philosophy:

Interpretivism research philosophy has been chosen to be used in this research. Interpretivism research philosophy involves the interpretation of important elements of the study and integration of human interest in the study (Ryan, 2018). Interpretivism research philosophy includes a logical explanation of the elements of the study. Furthermore, it strives to connect the elements of the study with diverse approaches (Sullivan, 2016). The reason for not choosing the positivism research philosophy is the objective nature of the philosophy. With regards to the nature of the current study, positivism research philosophy does not sync. Therefore, interpretivism research philosophy has chosen to be used in this research.

3.2 Research Method:

The current study uses the qualitative research method. The concept behind choosing the qualitative research method is the nature of the study and the alignment with the research philosophy. Qualitative research method allows the researcher to get in-depth insight to the problem at hand (Silverman, 2016). Flexible nature of qualitative data collection allows the researcher to control the dynamics such as time, location and pace of the study. In qualitative data collection, the small sample size can provide a detailed orientation (Tracy, 2019). Using qualitative data collection in-depth details of the problem can be obtained, which was not possible by using the quantitative data collection. Furthermore, the qualitative data analysis aligns with the research philosophy. Therefore, qualitative data collection will be used in the current study.

3.3 Data Collection Method:

Generally, there are two types of data collection. One is primary, and another is secondary. Effective energy management has become an area of concern for many entrepreneurs and organisations (Victor, 2017). There are not many studies which provide essential details on how to use the resources effectively, to the organisations (Figge et al., 2018). However, governments and newspapers have provided critical attention to the resource consumption. Considering the problem at hand, the current study aims to use secondary data collection to collect information. Government reports, newspapers, reports, publications, articles and journals will be critically analysed and assessed to collect meaningful information. Since secondary data collection is comparatively easy and less time consuming, the current study will be relying on the secondary data collection.

3.4 Data Analysis:

The collected data will be analysed using the systematic literature review. The data was collected by studying different literature, studies and journals; therefore, a systematic literature review has been chosen to analyse the collected data.

3.5 Limitation of Research:

The major limitation of the current research is the up to date data collection. Different studies have been carried out to critically analyse the problem at hand. However, the information collected through different sources is considered not that much credible. Furthermore, the time scale is another issue of the current study. Critical analysis of the information takes time which serves as the major limitation.

3.6 Ethical Consideration:

In the current study, ethical standards have been given due importance. The data collected from different sources have been properly referenced and cited. It has also been ensured to authors, that they can contact if they feel any harm to their collected data.

3.7 GANTT Chart:

In the first month studies will be analysed critically. The second month will focus on the methodology section. In month third data will be critically analysed and the last month will critically discuss the data and conclude the study.

4.      Conclusion:

After analysing different aspects of effective resource management and sustainable development, the study concludes that effective resource management can contribute significantly to the sustainable development of the brand. Since the effective use of resources allows an organisation to save a significant amount of monetary cost, it can be re-invested in the essential process of the organisation. Furthermore, customers tend to be attracted to the organisation which considers the environmental factors. Therefore, investing in effective resource management has become a necessity for organisations. Organisations must invest in effective resource management to gain maximum market share and competitive advantages.

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