Comments on: E-Day O-Dear http://www.everythingsgonegreen.co.uk/2008/e-day-o-dear/ Mon, 14 Dec 2009 10:27:42 -0600 http://wordpress.org/?v=2.8.6 hourly 1 By: Lincolnshire Family http://www.everythingsgonegreen.co.uk/2008/e-day-o-dear/comment-page-1/#comment-21182 Lincolnshire Family Mon, 24 Mar 2008 16:06:57 +0000 http://www.everythingsgonegreen.co.uk/2008/e-day-o-dear/#comment-21182 We started on the road to cutting our energy bills about five years ago. We couldn't afford to go out and buy new energy saving appliances in one go so instead we gradually replaced items as they reached the end of their lifes with low energy ones. We did change our lifestyle quite a bit too though. We are a family of five in a medium sized three bedroom house. Our annual electric bill was just £200 last year with British Gas. Currently 4 to 5 units per day. Our hot water, heating and cooking plus clothes drying, kettle boiling, toast etc is all done on a solid fuelled AGA. Previously we'd been burning anthracite (coal) but last year we started using wood instead as it is more eco friendly. Our Total household energy bill including the electric, wood, coal and BBQ gas was £750 for the last year. At a time when everybody else was complaining about escalating fuel bills our bills actually went down! It wasn't easy to reduce it though and it took a lot longer than we had planned. We knew about E-day but to be honest we couldn't cut anything else off as our 4 units daily is already extremely low usage for a family of our size. Sadly most of the general public are either not aware of the savings possible or are too unwilling to give up their giant plasma screens etc. The environmental groups and the media don't help matters by putting so much emphasis on small things such as energy saving bulbs and not leaving things on standby when they actually account for a tiny percentage of annual bills. While we use energy saving bulbs in every light and we don't leave items on standby the largest savings were replacing the washing machine with a very efficient model, swapping the large 32" tubed TV with a small 18" LCD, insulating the bathroom and getting rid of the electric oil filled radiator, moving the fridge to the coldest room instead of the warmest and using a laptop instead of desktop PC - these things alone shaved £400+ a year off our electric bill. We started on the road to cutting our energy bills about five years ago. We couldn’t afford to go out and buy new energy saving appliances in one go so instead we gradually replaced items as they reached the end of their lifes with low energy ones. We did change our lifestyle quite a bit too though. We are a family of five in a medium sized three bedroom house.

Our annual electric bill was just £200 last year with British Gas. Currently 4 to 5 units per day.

Our hot water, heating and cooking plus clothes drying, kettle boiling, toast etc is all done on a solid fuelled AGA. Previously we’d been burning anthracite (coal) but last year we started using wood instead as it is more eco friendly.

Our Total household energy bill including the electric, wood, coal and BBQ gas was £750 for the last year. At a time when everybody else was complaining about escalating fuel bills our bills actually went down! It wasn’t easy to reduce it though and it took a lot longer than we had planned.

We knew about E-day but to be honest we couldn’t cut anything else off as our 4 units daily is already extremely low usage for a family of our size.

Sadly most of the general public are either not aware of the savings possible or are too unwilling to give up their giant plasma screens etc.

The environmental groups and the media don’t help matters by putting so much emphasis on small things such as energy saving bulbs and not leaving things on standby when they actually account for a tiny percentage of annual bills.

While we use energy saving bulbs in every light and we don’t leave items on standby the largest savings were replacing the washing machine with a very efficient model, swapping the large 32″ tubed TV with a small 18″ LCD, insulating the bathroom and getting rid of the electric oil filled radiator, moving the fridge to the coldest room instead of the warmest and using a laptop instead of desktop PC – these things alone shaved £400+ a year off our electric bill.

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