Photo credit Senator Mark Warner

I have noticed several companies mention in their sustainability reports a shift to Daytime Cleaning and I wonder if this is a good thing.

On the face of it, daytime cleaning seems very obviously Green. The California EPA is saving $100,000 per year in energy costs by not having to light its headquarters by night for cleaning staff, for example.

However, by shifting cleaning services to daytime, you are also shifting the energy utilisation of the cleaning staff to the time of peak demand. At this time the electricity generation mix is at its dirtiest with all the fossil fuel generators in the mix. Adding demand during peak load is not a good thing.

During the evening/night however, energy demand falls and consequently at this time there is a higher percentage of renewables in the mix. As a result electricity consumed during off peak hours has a lower environmental impact.

It would depend from area to area and on the energy provider involved but shifting to daytime cleaning is not necessarily an environmentally sound practise and may, in fact do more harm than good.

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