Recent years have seen increasing public interest in issues related to energy saving and concern for the environment. It is important to highlight the work of public institutions in this respect. This was the motive that led the University of Valencia to finance a pilot project with the objective of studying useful initiatives for optimising energy consumption in accordance with the institution's needs as well as the incorporation of innovative and more efficient technologies. The approach was to consider various aspects ranging from the analysis of the current energy consumption and the state of the installations, through the substitution of some energy inefficient components, to the study of the possible installation of a photovoltaic solar powered electricity generation station connected to the network. Also purely technical questions on economic efficiency should not be forgotten as this could lead to a reduction in energy consumption and the optimisation of the current energy consuming equipment, since generally, it is this question that limits the possible energy saving actions. (C) 2003 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.