What ideas have you had for reducing Electricity consumption

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yes a very rambling and inconclusive article!
Anyway- as (or if..) we go greener presumably gas will be priced out and electricity will be the future.
One big plus of electric is no need for ventilation and no condensation. Extractor fan can be recirculating and no heat lost. Have discovered that you don't need to buy new filters - they are washable in sugar soap.
With no ventilation you'd soon reduce the air quality in the space with detrimental effects on the occupants. Natural ventilation would meet the requirements.
 
I'm just getting all my wood together to make external window shutters. This is for a couple of reasons namely - Keeping heat in in the winter, keeping the heat out in the summer, keeping the light out (have a street lamp over the road so need blackout curtains at the moment), reducing sound (not that important but a potential bonus). I am predicting they will come back into fashion in the coming years.

As for in the house, what a lot of people seem to forget is that as long as the heat isn't leaving the house e.g. a condensing tumble drier then it is pretty much 100% efficient, same with lightbulbs. Also the turning off of a 5w LED bulb is pretty much negligable as you could leave it on for 200hours and it would cost you 1 unit ~35p. Which makes no sense why they keep putting stories about people having to use candles for light. Candles are significantly more epensive than running an LED and likely to burn your house down.
We have security shutters which are made of aluminium sandwiched around foam insulation board. They seriously reduce sound and heat loss, are pretty much light proof and lower our insurance premiums.
 
Yes, but that only makes sense if you heat your house with resistive electric heating. Efficiency and cost are not the same thing.
That is true but it is rarely taken into account when people quote prices to run things e.g

(not real values just for example)

If you say an old style external vented tumble drier costs 80p to run for an hour and a condensing one costs 40p to run for an hour this doesn't take into account that the heat from the condensing unit is kept in the house and will reduce the amount of additional heating required to maintain a room temp. The actual cost would therefore be lower e.g if it saves you 10p on gas it actually only cost you 30p to run. The maths would be pretty hard for me to work out and it will vary depending on the additional heat type.

Whilst it won't make as much difference for mains gas (as its relatively cheap), it may be more significant if you are on bottled gas for example or as you say electric (my parents are electric only heating).

It's the same for your oven, fridge, freezer, kettle etc
 
We have security shutters which are made of aluminium sandwiched around foam insulation board. They seriously reduce sound and heat loss, are pretty much light proof and lower our insurance premiums.

Seems to be much more common in other countries than the UK. All of the ski chalets in france have them, although dont know how much that is just traditional looks over efficiency but I assume they do both.
 
With no ventilation you'd soon reduce the air quality in the space with detrimental effects on the occupants. Natural ventilation would meet the requirements.
I meant no cooker hood blowing hot air straight outside. Instead it it filters it and catches fat on the first grills, and more through the carbon filters and passes the warm air back into the room.
 
yes a very rambling and inconclusive article!
Anyway- as (or if..) we go greener presumably gas will be priced out and electricity will be the future.
One big plus of electric is no need for ventilation and no condensation. Extractor fan can be recirculating and no heat lost. Have discovered that you don't need to buy new filters - they are washable in sugar soap.
If you are boiling water you still need extractive ventilation.
 
Went round the house the other evening with a thermal camera - found quite a few cold spots (some known and a few unknown previously). Definitely worth doing if you can get your hands on one.
I've just ordered one of these on the pretense to do exactly that. If I'm honest, I just wanted a new toy but let's gloss over that!

Where were the areas that surprised you? It may be useful to others who don't have access to a thermal camera if we can provide a list of the main offenders.
 
I've just ordered one of these on the pretense to do exactly that. If I'm honest, I just wanted a new toy but let's gloss over that!

Where were the areas that surprised you? It may be useful to others who don't have access to a thermal camera if we can provide a list of the main offenders.

1. The house has a "vented" crawl space (ranging from 3 feet to 5 feet in places). Rather than fit something that brings the air flow into just the space (some kind of "liner\tube") so as to close the cavity around the vents - the cavity has been vented as well. So there are cold spots on the inside walls above the vents.

2. The inner door to the porch has some kind of vent (8 x 3 in size) at the bottom (can be closed) but being metal on both sides is conducting the cold.

3. Up in the parts of the loft conversion (that aren't part of the habitable bit) although the rafters have kingspan in them (and I never got round plaster boarding them), some have bowed out a bit in the middle of the lengths. Mind you, I've got to pull them out and put another 2 inch in there as the roof was counter-battened after I did the 1 inch kingspan.

4. All the keyholes - all the doors are timber and have mortise locks (got some brush seals for them). A few of the doors have no seals between the door & frame. Fitted a letterbox brush seal thingie already on the inside of the outer door.

5. The "hatch" in the floor to the crawlspace (from the under stairs "cupboard" ) needs "sealing" as the draught is a little noticeable.

6. A few of the Velux windows in the loft conversion - need the "final" detailing doing on the inside. The slightly angled boards that meet the "ceiling" surface need fitting - could foam\insulate the little space behind them.
 
The wife did ask me last night - "What's that speed camera looking thingie you were walking round the house with the other night?" I had to chuckle quietly in my head and just say it was a thermal camera.

Then got the "Can I have a go?" and the ensuing giggles as her and my daughter aimed it at each other for 20 mins in the living room.

Thankfully my daughter isn't of primary school age anymore - I could have imagined getting a phone call from the headteacher as the camera went to school.
 
Took a look at my energy bill for the first, it’s in the wife’s name so I never see it. I was pleasantly surprised to discover the recent changes we have made have had a significant reduction in our energy usage.
FF876FC5-295A-4B27-AFE4-B3E4E20EC157.jpeg
E0675430-2AFC-4E60-8198-F5659716CD53.jpeg

Turned the heating down to 18°, started using a Ninja, changed a couple of high use light fittings to led. Unfortunately it doesn’t represent any where near the same financial saving.

It does beg the question what the hell were we doing last year.?
 
Took a look at my energy bill for the first, it’s in the wife’s name so I never see it. I was pleasantly surprised to discover the recent changes we have made have had a significant reduction in our energy usage.
View attachment 149048View attachment 149049
Turned the heating down to 18°, started using a Ninja, changed a couple of high use light fittings to led. Unfortunately it doesn’t represent any where near the same financial saving.

It does beg the question what the hell were we doing last year.?

Smacks of estimated readings to me, you'd need to check last years bills
 
We are on a smart meter and it claims to be based on “actual readings”. Is any one else seeing similar savings on their bills?
Actual savings from perhaps not putting the heating on as much - otherwise none.

I reckon your meter is duff if it is claiming 80% or so reductions in usage. Unless you've been out of the UK (or just the house) for 10 months. LOL
 
Bypass the Meter:p
Bought a house off someone who had done just that - most frightening electrical work I have ever seen, far worse than "professional" electricians - no offense meant to true professionals, I'm sure you still exist just wish I could find you.
 

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