Assessment of the first day of energy saving

Yesterday many shops and restaurants started to apply the measures of the new energy saving decree-law. Today, the first results of these measures are already being published, which, as we have seen, have not been equally complied with. According to Red Eléctrica España, the demand for energy consumption, compared to the previous day, has experienced a drop of 0.15 %. It should be noted that there has been very uneven compliance with the new energy saving regulations.

During the first night with these new measures we went around the centre of Palma to see which establishments were complying with the regulations and we experienced a very uneven trend. After 22:00 at night, many shops in Jaume III and Passeig d’es Born turned off their shop windows. But they were not the vast majority. Other shops in the same area kept their lights on, disobeying the new rules. In other main arteries of the city of Palma, such as Calle 31 de Diciembre, many establishments kept their shop window lights on past 22:40 at night, as one local resident declared, “On my way home from work, I pass this street every day, and I haven’t seen any difference. Almost everything was still on”.

As for the public buildings, the Government Delegation and Cort were still lighting up their façades at half-voltage after 23:00 at night. According to the Government Delegation in the Balearic Islands, it was due to a technical fault in the timer that has already been solved. Esbaluard also continued to illuminate its walls with some of the decorative lights that illuminate the museum.

As for limiting the air-conditioning temperature to 27 degrees Celsius, we found that not many shops complied with it. In addition, many establishments still did not have a mechanism to keep the doors closed or kept them open. It should be noted that some bars and restaurants also did not follow the measure of keeping the door closed, especially those with terrace service, which kept the doors open for the waiters to enter and exit.

On the political front, the vice-presidency of the Balearic Government met this morning at a round table to monitor the royal decree law on energy saving in order to resolve the doubts of traders. The aim of this meeting was to inform the representatives of all the sector’s employers’ associations of the content dealt with at the Sector Conference last Monday, as well as to answer the questions raised by the new regulations in this sector. The Director General of Commerce, Miquel Piñol, pointed out that “there is no punitive attitude on the part of the government” and also insisted that it is “a flexible, common-sense regulation”.

On the other hand, Piñol recalled that the adoption of energy saving measures makes it possible to implement alternatives that are efficient and guarantee the thermal insulation of establishments.