Now don’t get me wrong. I am very much in favour of the UK’s Energy Saving Week but its Commit Now! campaign to get people to cut personal energy consumption by 20 per cent completely fails to engage me.
Why?
Because a 20 per cent cut in personal energy consumption is extremely easy to achieve for seriously wasteful households with central heating set to 23C, four or five TVs, multiple games consoles, a plethora of electronic gadgets, and two or three cars.
The 20 per cent target is slightly more difficult to hit for households that have fewer electronic gadgets, few cars and central heating that’s kept to 20C or so.
But for households likes ours, there’s little point in committing to a 20% reduction in personal energy consumption as we’re genuinely at the point where we decide whether, on balance, it’s better to do without things altogether as the law of diminishing returns means further economies are not feasible.
To give a few examples from the Commit Now! website:
- Only boil as much water as I need - yes, we do that and often drink water in preference to a cup of tea or coffee.
- Turn my thermostat down by one degree - our central thermostat is set to 18C, the radiators all have thermostatic valves set to 18C, and we only run the heating for a couple of hours in the morning and a couple in the evening. If we turn the heating lower, then it actually uses more energy to bring the house up to temperature than it does to maintain the temperature.
- Turn appliances off standby - the video and the oven are the only two things left in standby mode as they provide our two clocks. On top of that, we only have one TV, two computers, a hi-fi separates system, and a mobile phone. All of which are turned off when not in use. We have no other electronic gadgets to be left on.
- Install cavity wall insulation - done where possible.
- Top up loft insulation to 270mm - easier said than done with bedrooms under the eaves and less than 60mm space to work with.
- Replace three light bulbs with energy saving ones - we only have a couple of non-energy saving bulbs in the whole house and they’re in fittings that won’t take energy saving ones.
- Wash laundry at 30C - we use cold wash most of the time.
- Not use the car for short journeys - I use the bike as I no longer have my own car.
I’m not being holier than thou, but the way the commitment is structured means it excludes contributions from people who have already made a serious, long-standing commitment to energy conservation.
And, of course, the commitment is aimed at the British middle-class professional who feels a little guilty about not doing something to “save the planet”, and wants to make a feel-good gesture.
There’s nothing wrong with that either as everyone needs a starting point.
I’d just like to see more advice or guidance to help people like us push the envelope further without going quite so far as total switch off - tempting as it may be to a few of us!
‘Top up loft insulation to 270mm - easier said than done with bedrooms under the eaves and less than 60mm space to work with.’
Ahhhh, we tried that one; and I still get a bedroom full of vermiculite every time it is windy. (it blows down between the beam and the plaster board)
A new roof is the only real answer, one day.
yup - have to agree with you Stoney - and I am nothing like as good as you.. but already have low energy bulbs everywhere, already have all appliances turned off, already only boil the water we need, and dont have the heating on, and if we do only in the morning (or more if my son is ill) - we use the woodburner in the evenings. I walk to local shops and work from home, OH does drive to work, but works from home half the week, we dont have cavity walls, and do have deep insulation. as soon as we can afford it we will change windows for better..
really the thing that horrifies me is the suggestion that people are not already doing this stuff…
Well, I did a bit of research and a bit of thinking before coming up with my own contribution to Energy Saving Week.
I’ve also emailed the trust, saying that it shouldn’t forget the need to provide more challenging advice for people who are prepared to go further.
270mm of insulation. In Scotland you really need 300mm for Building Standards not to query it. And that’s in new, well draught sealed buildings with 150mm in the walls as well…
These commitments always seem to been designed for English housing estate houses.
Hi Stonehead, I totally agree with you - where else can you cut? We do things quite similar to you and cut our consumption by over 25 per cent compared to two years ago. But now it has plateaued out.
I suspect anything to go beyond that would need some major financial investment from us - new energy efficient fridge (heating and cooling tends to use the biggest amount of energy in a household, with plasma TVs now creeping in as a serious contender for wasting vast amounts of energy), new solar hot water system, or go totally off the grid and put photo-voltaics on the roof etc. All great options but not everybody can afford those.
On the other hand I find that at least here in Australia, the trend is unfortunately in the opposite direction - more and more people have air conditioning (partly because local Councils allow developers to build these massive McMansions on small blocks really close together with no thought about passive solar design or air flow or trees), and I find that many people have bigger and bigger appliances, thus squandering any energy saving made through more efficient technologies. What strikes me most is that the rule of thumb seems to be that the fewer people a household has, the bigger the fridges and ovens are!
You almost never hear anyone saying that it would be a great energy saving if people didn’t use tumble dryers.
Personally I have never had one as I have always begrudged paying to do something that can be done for free by hanging washing outside, or over radiators overnight.
I think there is a small handful of people for whom a domestic tumble dryer is a necessity - mainly people with specific disabilities or living in high-rise buildings with larger families and little or no drying spaces.
But for the rest of us, the tumble dryer is simply a convenience that we can actually do without. But when I say that, I usually provoke a major lecture that starts “it’s all right for you, but…”
As always, people have a load of excuses for not giving up their conveniences and comfortable lives.
agree Stoney, there are small number (myself included) that a tumble dryer is a necessary evil (and I have to pay the electricity bill for it, which grates). However even I am trying to cut down it’s use from an averaged out once or twice every 2 weeks and was recently been given a Sheila Maid which I shall be installing in the bathroom.
I do get really annoyed at those who just can’t be bothered with hanging out washing and even on the warmest and best drying days still put the dryer on. At least when I use mine, it’s a large capacity condenser dryer, I use the residual heat to heat the kitchen on chilly mornings and evenings.
A laundry maid hung from the ceiling near a radiator or other heat source (no naked flames though) is a very effective means of drying clothes inside. Clothes airers are a little less effective and take a bit longer.
However, if you don’t have a large house or flat and you have a number of people living there, you quickly find that your entire home has turned into clothes display. And not always to advantage either!
Scottish building regs now require new houses & conversions to have space provided indoors and outdoors for drying washing - 1.7m of clothes line per living/bed room (indoor provision only for flats). Makes for big bathrooms and utility rooms, but you can’t force anyone to use it…