Take a tour of our energy saving house and the discover how you can save
energy in your home.
Presenter
The average UK household produces around six tons of carbon dioxide a year. That’s double the amount produced by the average car in the same period. Yet by implementing some simple measures around the home, we could save around a quarter of the carbon dioxide we produce every year, and around £300. For example if everyone in the UK installed just one energy-saving light bulb, we’d save enough carbon dioxide to fill the Albert Hall fifteen hundred times.
Tamara Mauro-Trujillo is the Energy Saving Trust’s energy doctor. She’s gone to visit Sarah Harrison who’s transformed the downstairs of her Victorian house into a model of energy efficiency.
Tamara
What was your motivation for transforming your home?
Sarah
I wanted to see how energy and water efficient it was possible to make this house of mine which is an old Victorian one.
Tamara
And you’ve carried this passion into your work?
Sarah
My dream is to see all our old Victorian houses transformed into homes fit for the 21st century, and I provide practical advice to people on how they can refurbish their houses to make them more water and energy efficient.
Tamara
So everyone knows how important it is to insulate our lofts but what most people don’t realise is we actually lose more heat through our walls.
Sarah
Yes it’s really important to insulate all the surfaces of your home that come into contact with the external layer. Here we insulated all three walls of this semi-detached house as well as under the floor and in the loft.
Tamara
Was it a complicated process?
Sarah
In essence insulation is very simple. It’s like wrapping your house in a teacosy, but it does matter to get the detailing right or you can lose a lot of the effectiveness of the process.
We’ve got a central programmer and what that does is control when the heating comes on and when the hot water comes on. We’ve then also got here a room thermostat. This enables you to set the general temperature for the house. The final thing we have in our heating system is we have valves on each radiator and what they enable you to do is to adjust the heating within any particular room so that you can have it warmer or cooler.
Tamara
So you have an energy saving recommended fridge/freezer which is great because you’ll be saving £35 on your bills.
Sarah
Yes, we were very aware when we were choosing appliances just how much difference energy efficient appliances could make. This kettle’s an energy savings recommended kettle and what I love about it, it divides the water into the storage compartment and the heating compartment so you only boil the amount that you’re actually going to use at that time.
Presenter
So, there are so many ways to save yourself money on your energy bills, reduce your C02 emissions and help fight climate change.
