The Queen arrived with the Duke of Edinburgh, who was given the Freedom of the City, on the final day of her week-long residence in Scotland. Perth became Scotland’s seventh city when it was granted the status earlier this year as part of the Diamond Jubilee celebrations.

The Queen toured Perth College, University of the Highlands and Islands, where she was greeted by a number of dignitaries including Tanya Ewing, co-founder of Tayeco and inventor of Ewgeco, who had been selected to represent the University as former alumni of the college.

Tanya discussed how the award winning Ewgeco live energy displays were part of the University’s investment in green technology to significantly reduce their energy bills. Her Royal Highness the Queen was pleased to hear that Ewgeco’s were manufactured in the UK.

The day’s events included visiting lunch at Scone Palace, where Ewgeco live energy displays are also installed as part of the Palace’s energy reduction programme.

The Scottish Government, SSE, SEPA and Microsoft have launched a national competition to create a software application that helps Scotland’s SMEs respond to these ambitious climate change goals by measuring, managing and reducing their carbon emissions. By 2020, Scotland has committed to reduce carbon emissions by 42%. “This is a great example of Scotland’s public and private sectors working together to develop creative, practical and effective solutions for reducing greenhouse gas emissions” Stewart Stevenson MSP – Environment and Climate Change Minister for Scotland. http://www.smeenviroapp.com/2/63/460/Finalists-Announced!.aspx

With its reputation for innovation in the environmental technology space, Ewgeco hopes to win with its mobile platform application.

“This government’s energy policies are a timebomb,” according to Barry Gardiner (MP and special envoy for climate change and the environment to the leader of the opposition) and furthermore he highlights the genuine fear and expectation that energy bills are just going to keep on rising, in part because of lack of investment from the present government but also that the government is not doing enough to stimulate private enterprise investment.

In this timely article in the Guardian newspaper’s environmental section, http://www.guardian.co.uk/environment/blog/2012/jul/12/osborne-government-energy-policies he talks openly about the fear that there may not actually be enough energy to go around and highlights 2018 or shortly thereafter, when the UK will experience an energy crisis. Electricity supply will not be enough to meet demand. When this happens, people will look back to 2012 and the disastrous policy decisions taken by the UK such as the publication of the draft bill on electricity market reform. The second is the imminent decision to cut potentially as much as 25% from onshore windfarm subsidies.

Because of this it is even more important than ever for homes and businesses alike to seriously focus on reducing their energy consumption.

That not enough social housing has been provisioned is a problem that has been with us for a long time. Are we about to see things turn around? There are a couple of important news pieces that Ewgeco (suppliers of the housing industry’s in home energy display of choice) has heard in recent weeks.

The first bit of good news that should see a major impact on house building in Scotland centres on some major investment.

Carduus has secured significant investment from leading sustainable growth investment company Bridges Ventures. Carduus is a Scottish company founded in 2011, with the objective of becoming the leading provider of finance to Housing Associations or Registered Social Landlords (RSLs) in the country.

Rory Maw, Partner at Bridges, said: “There is clearly a pressing need for new housing in Scotland and the Carduus team has been working very closely with Scottish RSLs to develop innovative financing solutions, which can play an important role in driving growth across the sector. They have already made good progress in all fronts and we see them having a real impact on new house building in Scotland.”

More information about the investment can be found on the Scotsman’s website, where the story was originally reported. http://www.scotsman.com/scotland-on-sunday/business/bridges-backs-carduus-venture-1-2359356

Further good news for the industry came from the government, which has lowered the threshold for sites applying for the Get Britain Building Fund to 15 homes, down from 25, giving smaller builders across the UK the chance to bid. The programme, for developers facing difficulties accessing development finance, is designed to unlock 16,000 homes by March 2015. The threshold has been lowered because over £100 million has remained unclaimed. A new round of bidding is open and expressions of interest must be submitted by noon on July 25^th 2012. More information can be found on the Homes and Communities Agency website – www.homesandcommunities.co.uk/get-britain-building

http://www.bridgesventures.com/our-firm

http://www.carduus.org/index.html

Edinburgh-based Ewgeco has struck a substantial deal with one of the UK’s leading facilities management organisations resulting in a 100 per cent increase in its workforce.

MITIE Group PLC – experts in the provision of energy management services to leading blue-chip companies across the UK – will now include Ewgeco’s range of products in the energy reduction service packages it offers to clients.

The deal signals a rapid growth for the Scottish company with staff numbers set to double from 11 to 22 by the end of 2013 to cope with the increased demand from the contract.

Ewgeco, which has a portfolio of innovative award winning energy monitoring products and services – including ‘In Premises Display’ (IPD) – will now form an integral part of the MITIE offering, extending the FTSE 250 business’s market reach across public and private sectors.

The IPD system takes energy management to the heart of the organisation, using intuitive live energy displays installed in the hub of business activity. The display enables employees to clearly see how their actions impact energy use and encourages effective behavioural change.

Commenting on Ewgeco’s significant new business collaboration, George McGhee chief executive of Ewgeco, said: “Energy management remains high on the business agenda, with organisations realising just how much can be saved by implementing energy management strategies and using the right products to monitor and control usage.

“In our experience, IPDs can save businesses around 10 per cent by informing staff and encouraging building managers to adopt energy-saving measures, such as energy efficient lighting or voltage optimisation, to resolve areas of high usage.

“MITIE clearly understands the needs of its wide customer base across the UK and we are delighted Ewgeco’s product fits seamlessly into MITIE’s Carbon Care portfolio.”

The relationship between the entrepreneurial Scottish company and MITIE (which stands for Management Incentive Through Investment Equity) has been cultivated by Ewgeco’s founder, Tanya Ewing.

Designing the prototype back in 2006 after receiving an unexpectedly high gas bill which she found impossible to decipher, Ewing has continued to grow the business and recently was invited by the Rt Hon Vince Cable MP and Secretary of State for Business, Innovation and Skills to join the Entrepreneurs’ Forum along with other entrepreneurs such as James Caan of Dragon’s Den.

Martin Holt from MITIE said: “From our experience in energy management, we know the impact behavioural change can have in reducing energy consumption. Savings of as much as 10 per cent are possible with very little investment.

“Ewgeco technology provides the key for people to see just how their actions are directly affecting energy use, stimulating them to rethink, switch off and use less. It’s a great tool to have at our disposal.”

MITIE has an annual turnover of £2 billion and provides Carbon Care, a comprehensive portfolio of energy management services, as part of a wider range of facility management services.

The live energy displays by Ewgeco result in at least a 10 per cent saving on electricity bills. This includes buildings where other energy saving technologies or activities are already active. Ewgeco is an employee engagement tool, which focuses on behavioural change – targeting all users of a building, not just the building or facilities manager.

Using highly visible, easy to understand language and jargon free information building users can clearly see the true cost of energy being used and amend behaviour to significantly reduce unnecessary energy consumption.

Ends                                                                                                   12 June 2012

Issued on behalf of Ewgeco by Weber Shandwick. For more information, please contact:

• Paula Mc Nulty on 0141 333 0557/07770 886924/ pmcnulty@webershandwick.com
• Bill Ranatunga on 0141 333 0557/07770 886950 / branatunga@webershandwick.com

Notes to Editors:

Ewgeco

Ewgeco is the creator of world-leading display systems allowing the monitoring of any energy source in homes and businesses.

The unique range of products all feature an award-winning, patented traffic-light display which brings consumption data out of the utility cupboard and into the sight of users, giving them control.

Ewgeco systems offer immediate, real-time data through the traffic light display and detailed graphical analysis through the MyEwgeco data portal.

Ewgeco monitors are currently being rolled out in businesses, educational facilities and housing developments and associations, across the UK and overseas. www.ewgeco.com

What is MITIE?

We’re the strategic outsourcing and energy services company. What does that mean in practice? We manage facilities, energy and properties for our clients across the UK and beyond.

We work with our clients in three ways; some take full advantage of our whole range of expertise, others may only need one aspect of what we do:

• Strategy and consultancy
• Facilities and energy management
• Service delivery

Our strategic input can add value at the highest level by helping clients to manage their assets, while our practical management expertise can save customers money and reduce their carbon emissions.  We work with a vast number of clients in every industry across both the public and private sectors and deliver the broadest range of services that can be found in one place: from integrated facilities management to engineering maintenance to lifecycle energy management and much more.

There’s a lot more to MITIE than you probably think. We’re a big company with big ambitions – a leading FTSE 250 support services business, with more than 61,000 people, revenues of £1.9bn, and a reputation for being the best.

Visit us at www.mitie.com