By Kieran Byrne, Architect & Engineering Manager
With continued volatility in global markets, there seems to be no end to the energy crisis. Even businesses with capped price plans face bills 40% higher in 2025 than they did in early 2022[1], protections from the UK’s Energy Bill Discount Scheme have now ended, and rising expenses elsewhere only magnify the impact of energy costs on an already fragile bottom line.
Reducing energy consumption is not only a means of maintaining profitability; it’s an ever-more vital part of meeting a growing number of environmental goals and sustainability strategies. Initiatives such as the UK’s Energy Saving Opportunity Scheme (ESOS) encourage and even mandate action. They can’t be ignored.
With prices trending higher and regulations ever stricter, businesses must consider every action to reduce energy consumption within their walls – and this begins by prioritising non-negotiable, continuously running equipment. Surveillance technology should be a key focus, because there are savings to be had.
Unlocking power savings in surveillance
A surveillance system is the sum of many parts, each one of which compounds its energy costs, both in the moment and over its lifetime. Even minor variations in power usage per device become substantial when multiplied across the considerable number of devices employed as part of a typical surveillance network.
Consider this: running a 5W camera costs approximately £12.54 annually per unit, while a 10W camera doubles the cost to £25.07. For a network of 1,000 cameras, this results in a £62,700 vs. £125,350 cost difference over five years. A network of 1,000 10W cameras would require 1,948 trees to offset its carbon footprint; at 5W, this drops to 974 trees.
Beyond immediate cost savings, it is essential to also evaluate the total cost of ownership (TCO) of a surveillance system over its lifetime. The initial upfront costs of system hardware and installation typically account for just 30% of the total; 70% of the expense comes after the system has been installed in the form of maintenance, energy consumption and eventual decommissioning.
Improved efficiency without performance loss
Devices that perform, which are resilient enough to require minimal maintenance, which draw less energy as they run – that’s the path to energy savings and cost reduction. But we must remember that these devices operate as part of a wider deployment. If a business can reduce the volume of hardware in a surveillance network, there are further energy savings to be made.
Axis new ARTPEC-9 is the best of both worlds, a powerful system-on-chip (SoC) architecture with low power overheads. It allows traditionally server-dependent workloads to be offloaded to the network edge. Moving tasks like AI-powered analytics and object recognition onto the camera can help lower energy requirements elsewhere and increase the responsiveness of the overall security network at the same time.
The higher resolution of newer network cameras also offers an opportunity for a single unit to replace multiple older cameras. The output of a single wide-angle sensor could be split into areas of interest for security personnel; an advanced PTZ camera could patrol an area; or the multiple sensors of the P37 Panoramic Camera can cover an area that might otherwise require several devices. Logical deployment leads to fewer cameras, cutting deployment costs, TCO, and energy consumption at once.
Reducing secondary costs
Think outside equipment which might be traditionally considered part of the security domain - lighting, for example: it’s a heavy contributor to rising business energy costs, even as the switch to more efficient LED solutions continues. But does the level of illumination need to be what it is?
High-performance camera sensors can operate in far lower light conditions than was once the case. AXIS Lightfinder allows our cameras to produce full-colour, high-resolution imagery without a requirement for bright lighting in unoccupied or peripheral areas. Lowering energy use is not about making sacrifices or diminishing performance – it’s a case of making smart choices with foresight.
[1] https://commonslibrary.parliament.uk/research-briefings/cbp-9714/#:~:text=Unit%20prices%20for%20gas%20will,than%20in%20winter%202021%2F22.
