Energy

We're a bit on the ecofreak side (okay, being honest, we're A LOT on the eco-freak side). And energy usage is a big part of human impacts on the planet. So thinking global but acting micro-local, we spend a lot of time thinking about the energy usage in our own home. John even measures our weekly electricity usage, which means he knows quickly if somebody has been careless about leaving the immersion heater on or playing too many computer games.

We decided to live close to John's work to minimise energy expended in travel. As you might expect from an eco-freak family, we don't drive much, although we do have a car. I admit it's a luxury, we could manage without. At the end of the day advocating a hairshirt attitude isn't going to get the environmental movement anywhere, though; we all want some luxuries in life.

We have an oil-fired boiler at home -- the cost to get a gas connection would be prohibitive. So like everyone else using kerosene to heat their homes and water, we keep track of the price fluctuations.

Things we have done to try to minimise our oil usage include fully insulating cavity walls, increasing loft insulation to a depth of nearly 30 cm, and keeping the indoor thermostat at 15 degrees C. It tends to be warmer than that in much of the house, but that's the number we tune to on the central control dial. We don't have the heating on a timer; we only turn the heat on when we're at home. This seems to work well for us and our heating bills are below average for our type of house. We also have double glazed windows, and harangue the children to keep doors closed on cold days.

We have individual thermostats on each radiator; also, most of the time we only heat downstairs and not all the rooms downstairs, either -- just those we live in the most. If I turn the rads on upstairs, it's only briefly, for a little while after we wake up in the mornings or an hour or so before bedtime; this is plenty of time to get the rooms cozy warm before going to sleep. Keep the doors closed to any unheated rooms.

We have a small wood-burning stove which cost about £500 to buy and install. Most winter days it can do all the heating we need in the front of the house, but doesn't quite extend to warming up our large ground floor extension. A lot of the wood is scavenged -- ie, free. If we pay for wood that costs us about £4 to burn all day long -- for the amount of heat generated, using the stove to burn bought wood is much more expensive if arguably still much more environmentally kind than burning oil to heat the house. We don't burn coal mostly because it's such a pig to dispose of the ashes (very much not suitable for the compost heap!). John keeps a detailed diary of our experience with the stove.

We also have a roof-mounted wind turbine (the one advertised with B+Q). It also doesn't really pay its way, but at least it's easy to tell our house apart from any other.

We have considered Solar panels to heat water or generate electricity, but so far the maths just don't add up (they would be a lot more expensive follies than the wind turbine and stove!).

John keeps tabs of interesting climate change news tidbits here.

About Us:

Julii is finishing up work as an Environmental Economics Researcher at the University of East Anglia to give more time to the children.

John is lead developer of Blurtit.com, Qhub.com and other exciting Web projects.

Recent Updates:

Changed Entries
11 Mar : Qhub API Test
10 Mar : Potential Solar PV Installers
07 Mar : Feed-in Tariffs (FITs) for existing installations
06 Mar : Feed-in Tariffs May Make Solar PV Economical
03 Mar : Vote Bike!
03 Mar : Planning Permission for Solar?
24 Feb : Kia Sedona - Details
23 Feb : Good Energy vs. Ecotricity: which Green Electricity Supplier to use?
22 Feb : Get the Best Oil Price, When You Want It!
21 Feb : Affordable Solar - Really?
Changed Sections
11 Mar : Showcase
10 Mar : Solar PV Electicity
07 Mar : Wind Turbines
03 Mar : Cycling
24 Feb : Family Car
23 Feb : Electricity
22 Feb : Domestic Heating Oil Prices: Consider Your Options!
08 Feb : Measure
16 Jan : Life at Mindcom
05 Nov : The Swindells Name

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