Around 21% of the UK’s carbon emissions come from our homes. With the increase in energy prices that we have seen, making your home more energy efficient will lower your energy bills.
We look at money saving initiatives and well as green alternatives to energy.
Recently, as a milestone birthday treat, I took a boat trip out to the Rampion Wind Farm which lies 13 kilometres from the shoreline on the South Coast and covers a total area of 72sq. kilometres.
This impressive feat of engineering has been providing green energy since 2018 to around 350,000 homes – around half the homes in West Sussex.
Read more
As COP 27 begins, what’s happening locally to help save our beautiful little planet from doom?
Well, Horsham District Council held a Climate Action Day on 20th October to help prepare the parish councillors for what lies ahead for all of us.
Two thirds of the 32 parish councils in HD were represented, with 11 parishes not attending. So what progress has been made?
Around 21% of the UK’s carbon emissions come from our homes. With the increase in energy prices that we have seen, making your home more energy efficient will lower your energy bills. Good for the planet and your pocket!
Many organisations talk about energy saving tips, but they often require a big financial outlay with buying a new boiler or retrofitting your house. These are great ideas and will have a big impact on your energy consumption, but if you can’t afford these right now, here are some lifestyle tips you can make that won’t cost you a thing. Read more
Why the UK Energy Price Hikes and Energy Shortages? Its our reliance on imported fuels, rather than developing the huge tidal and wind resources we have around this island. Most UK homes are still heated by gas and many are woefully under insulated.
Multiple factors are behind the gas price increases. Geopolitical pressures, including high demand for gas from Asia and low supply from Russia, as well as last year’s cold winter, which left gas stocks low, are among the main reasons.
Other countries, such as Norway and Germany, have done a much better job of moving away from gas-fired heating and adopting electric heat pumps, meaning consumers are less exposed to price leaps. Many energy companies have gone bust in recent months and new suppliers have had to purchase gas and electricity on the wholesale market. Britain’s entire energy market needs modernising. Read more
Click to view presentation
At our last Sussex Green Ideas Zoom event on Wednesday 16th June we learnt about the challenge of transitioning from gas and the urgent need to cut the 17% of UK emissions that come from heating our leaky homes. You can view the Homes after Gas presentation here.
It helps that we can now choose renewable energy instead of fossil fuels – and generally save money, this is our energy cost comparison and switching site www.Bigcleanswitch.org/SussexGreen it only takes about 5 minutes to switch!
But the next step is the end of gas heating. From 2025 new builds will not be connected to the gas grid. The government hasn’t yet set a cut off date for new gas boilers in existing homes but it will need to do this soon. Read more
Heated households: New report reveals the energy usage and cost of household appliance
86% of the UK are consciously trying to be sustainable
A new report by Wren Kitchens has revealed the amount of energy used by kitchen appliances based on the average usage time and how much power they consume.
86% of the UK are now are consciously trying to be sustainable according to a new report by Wren Kitchens1.
Recycling, reusing, and repurposing have now become an everyday occurrence in the UK as households try and do ‘their bit’ for climate change and reduce their carbon footprint.
However, with energy use for household appliances tripling within the past 40 years2 just how much money and energy could we save by changing to a greener solution?
The new report has revealed that the kitchen is the most likely culprit for carbon and energy usage, due to the amount of appliances the room hosts whilst detailing tips on how to save energy and money. Read more
Take a few moments to learn how you can power your home using clean renewable energy, saving money and the planet!
What do we mean by ‘clean energy’?
Power stations, wind turbines and solar farms all feed their energy into the Grid, like rivers running into a big pond. When you switch to clean energy, your supplier guarantees that however much electricity you take out of the ‘pond’, the same amount of clean energy will be put in. The more people who switch to clean tariffs, the more renewable energy that goes into the pond. This means that the energy sector is producing less pollution and carbon which is crucial if we are to reduce global warming and climate change.
Approximately 30% of the UK’s electricity is generated from renewable sources.
Under new laws, Britain’s biggest energy companies will have to buy renewable energy from their own customers, for example, homeowners who install new rooftop solar panels from 1 January 2020 will be able to lower their bills by selling the energy they do not need to their supplier. Read more
Do you dread turning on your Christmas tree lights? The festive season can be an expensive and wasteful time of year and so often those Christmas tree lights don’t work! Well if that is the case, do not despair, the Horsham Repair Cafe can help.
On 2nd December at the Quaker Meeting House, Worthing Road, Horsham there will be a team of experts ready, willing and able to fix Christmas lights, flashing Christmas jumpers, small electrical appliances, computers, iphones, ipads, tablets, clothing repairs and much more. Read more
There is no doubt that more families in Sussex than ever before are trying to live a green life these days.
The availability of online information and environmentally friendly products mean that it is now possible to live a green life without making huge efforts or sacrifices. However, this seems like a good moment to consider how far Sussex residents have come in making their homes as energy efficient as possible.
It seems as if just about every day environmental practices are gaining ground in the news. As our planet’s environmental challenges become clearer, and receive more coverage, more and more people are inclined to make personal efforts toward helping to clean up and preserve the environment. And much of these individual efforts deal directly with the concept of solar power.
A common goal of homeowners in summer months is to cool your homes in the most efficient manner, while using as little energy as possible. Using cross ventilation to cool your home without using the air conditioner is an energy-efficient method that will save you money and help to protect the environment, but there are certain necessary elements to properly facilitate cross ventilation. Read more
An abandoned viaduct is to be transformed into a Wind Turbine
A bridge that repurposes abandoned viaducts, produces energy AND looks futuristically sleek? Yes, it can be true, and it is Italy’s proposed Wind Turbine Viaduct called “Solar Wind.” Southern Italy is dotted with unused viaducts, and rather than spending $50 million to tear them down, town officials near Calabria held a competition called “Solar Park South,” open to designers and engineers asking them to come up with an environmentally conscious way to re-use the existing structures. Read more