Energy-savings program leads to co-op award

Heather Weberg has won the 2008 Business Co-op Student of the Year Award for her co-op work with Jawl Properties, where she was hired to design and implement an energy awareness program for the company’s more than 60 public and private sector tenants.

Weberg built the program around education and awareness and worked with tenant champions to change behaviours and attitudes about energy consumption.

“The biggest thing I tried to get across was that every little bit makes a big difference,” says Weberg. “It all adds up even if just one person turns off the lights when they leave a room.”

Weberg’s Tenant Energy Awareness Program focused on energy conservation and included components on transportation demand management, waste reduction and water conservation. It featured email tips, newsletters and posters, sample workstation audits, suggestion boxes, a practical how-to program, and luncheon speakers.

“While it is hard to quantify the exact amount of energy savings as a result of Heather’s program, we estimate it is in the range of three to five per cent of energy consumption in our buildings,” says Weberg’s supervisor, Karen Jawl (BCom ’03). Through physical upgrades and the energy awareness program, the company met its goal of reducing energy use by 200 tonnes of greenhouse gas in 2008. Weberg’s work also helped to earn a Building Owners and Managers Association (BOMA) of Canada certification for Jawl buildings.

One of Weberg’s biggest challenges was to avoid making assumptions about the level of tenant awareness. Weberg, who says she grew up with the sustainability message, learned that not everyone is as eco-literate as she. “I really had to work hard to ensure that I included all the information necessary, not just assume that people knew the ins and outs of recycling.”

What’s next for Weberg? Her co-op experience has led her to consider a career in sustainable property development and valuation of green buildings.

“I used the co-op position to learn more about real estate development and to learn new skills. I feel very fortunate that I was able to take a project management role and had so much autonomy.”

The Business Co-op Student of the Year Award, along with $1,000, is given to an outstanding co-op student who has an above-average academic standing and an excellent performance on a work term, and has also played an active role in the UVic and local community.

Weberg has already put the money to use; she has enrolled in the UBC/AIC post-graduate certificate program in real property valuation, and she just accepted a position with the Sea to Sky Office of the BC Assessment Authority.

She is currently apartment hunting and looking forward to working in pre-Olympic Vancouver and hoping to contribute to climate action initiatives under way at the assessment authority.

“I had a great experience with the co-op program and feel very fortunate it has led to this career opportunity,” she says.