Power outages caused by the country’s dire energy situation are affecting the commercial and industrial sectors, which have calculated lost hours of work and lost revenue – about $439 million – these days due to power outages that began last year. October 27. However, from the manufacturing sector, this situation has also created initiatives for citizens to save energy.

This is the case of the Chamber of Industry of Guayaquil (CIG), which on November 3 started the campaign ‘Ecuador shines to save energy’, a communication initiative that started on social networks, by email and plans to continue scaling on other platforms, which requires investment.. The campaign is based on messages, tips and advice to people on how to reduce electricity consumption.

Productive sectors accumulate 22 hours of power outages and estimate losses of $439 million

Tips like: ‘Turn off the lights when you don’t need them’, ‘use the sunlight’ or ‘use the kitchen efficiently’ are some of the messages posted on trade union networks that also explain how to put these tips into practice. For example, in the case of efficient use of the kitchen, it is recommended to cook in pots and pans that have a lid to retain heat. In another tip: ‘turn them off when not in use to save money’, when talking about mobile phone chargers, the Chamber’s post explains that device chargers consume energy even when they are idle.

The goal of the campaign is to reach 726,000 views

Francisco Jarrín, president of CIG, explains that the campaign wants to make visible that savings can be generated from everyday life and be part of the solution and indicates that the initiative was born as an awareness campaign, but will be part of the camera’s sustainability vision. He adds that since it is a network campaign (Facebook, Instagram, Linkedin, Twitter), the investment is relatively small, and the goal is to reach approximately 726,000 views.

“Within the Chamber of Industry of Guayaquil, we believe that we can achieve savings of at least 5% of current consumption. in addition to what is generated by the rationing schedule,” Jarrín calculates.

And he adds: “For example, the national demand for electricity (power) is 4,500 MW, at least 5% means 225 MW of savings, which is 35% (225 MW / 650 MW) of the current production deficit. But that is if all users (residential, industrial, commercial) come together, recognizing that said demand is not linear, it depends on each user and time of day.”

This private sector campaign joins those also launched by the Government in the quest to save energy. Days before the start of the blackout, when the measure was not yet known, but there was uncertainty about the blackout, the public company Corporación Nacional de Electricidad (CNEL) started a campaign on social networks to invite citizens to cooperate in order to Save energy: do not leave your electric devices on or off when not in use.

Industries have changed days and saved electricity

Meanwhile, the Chamber of Industry of Guayaquil also reports on other measures that the industrial sector is applying to help the government in this energy situation: productive days have been changed with the associated costs that this implies for the industry. In addition, some internal processes have been modified to save electricity.

Industries are creating a register of self-producing companies to identify possible contributions to the energy crisis

These measures add to a “complex” demand for self-generation and/or demand reduction that, to the extent possible, the union says more companies are considering joining.

In this sense, this week the president of the Federation of Ecuadorian Industry, María Paz Jervis, indicated that the country’s industries are conducting a registry of companies that are able to independently produce energy and save energy, so that after analyzing the feasibility and availability together, they can propose the number of megawatts (MW) which could contribute to overcoming the energy crisis. President Guillermo Lasso mentioned 100 MW that could provide its own production from the private sector.