Make our home more energy efficient.
At first glance around our house we knew there were plenty of improvements that could be made to maximise our energy efficiency, despite not having a great deal of knowledge on the what and how.
The key consideration was how do you achieve these home improvements on a limited budget without borrowing any money on these government green schemes? Well first step was to work out where we stood.
Where did we start?
To get started, we decided not to worry about the ‘what and the how’, but to look at what we currently had ‘installed’ and the state of disrepair. To keep things simple we took an A5 sheet of paper, drew a couple of straight lines down the middle and scribbled down headings for Gas and Electric with the following key: [P] = Priority | [R] = Repair.
We then went on to list what home improvements we had written in each column and alongside each item we made a note of its status using a simple number key:
- Good condition – Has years of life left
- Ok – Will last a few more years
- Poor – Needs urgent repair
With an EPC this process was much quicker
As we had not been in our new house for very long, we had both a property survey and an EPC (Energy Performance Certificate) report outlining where we could make future improvements to our home. Unfortunately for us, there was plenty we could do, with our house being 100 years old; it is not very energy efficient compared to modern builds.
Taking both our initial visual inspection and the items highlighted on our EPC report, we set about ordering them in priority for which would yield the greatest return on investment, both financially and for time spent.
Here are the top ten improvements we identified
To date we have not implemented all of these, though we hope to gradually make most of these improvements as our budget allows over the coming months.
Quick links: Gas heating
Quick links: Electric
First six are for Gas heating
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Loft insulation
Ours was incredibly thin, well under 6 inches when the recommendation is 12 inches minimum. We were going to do it ourselves, but in the end we got ours for free. (will explain in more detail in a later post)
- Investment required: FREE through British Gas. (though on average is up to £300)
- Savings: This can save between £25 -£175 per year (depending on current thickness of insulation)
- Further reading:
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Double Glazing
This was the one thing we did not have to do, as the previous owners had replaced all the windows only a few years ago. Though we know there are better, more efficient options available that we may re-visit in the future.
- Investment required: Anywhere between £2500-£5000 (don’t forget to haggle)
- Savings: This can save up to £170 per year, in some cases it’s claimed up to £400 per year.
- Further reading:
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Draught exclusion
In addition to door draught excluders, we went round the door frames with the draught tape and silicon sealant on the windows frames/gaps to remove all those cold draughts. We filled in wall cracks, holes around external pipework and the gaps around the loft hatch. All this meant we were able to turn our thermostat down (for extra savings)
- Investment required: Prices can vary, but typically:
- Tape per roll: £5 (we used two rolls)
- Silicon sealant: £5
- Door brush: £5-£10 (or you can make your own below)
- DIY door excluder: free
- Savings: This can save on average £55 per year, plus potentially another £65 per year for a lower thermostat.
- Further reading:
- Investment required: Prices can vary, but typically:
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Boiler
Our boiler is certainly not the most efficient model and it is getting quite old, so this is something we will upgrade one day when we have budget available (or it packs in).
- Investment required: Anywhere between £1500-£5000 (depends on model, installer etc) on average we have seen them in the £2000 range.
- Savings: This can save anywhere from £100 to £300 per year, depending on its efficiency rating.
- Further reading:
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Floor insulation
A potential future home improvement, though this looks quite expensive unless you do it yourself.
- Investment required:
- DIY: Floor boards average at £13 each. So expect at least £100
- An installer could cost £500-£700
- Savings: This has potential saving of £60 per year
- Further reading:
- Investment required:
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Wall cavity insulation
Being that our property is so old, our walls were not built with cavities, so this is not an option for us. We have heard of some expensive techniques where the internal/external walls are thickened with insulation layers.
- Investment required: Free with British Gas (though typically £400-£500)
- Savings: This can save up to £140 per year.
- Further reading:
The last four are for electric
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Energy saving light bulbs
Yep certainly a no brainer, though the prices have come down considerably and over the duration of their life expectancy, they are well worth the investment.Depending on the size of your home, the savings will vary but it can save on average £55 per year in electric.
- Investment required: Depends on the bulb and the supplier but on average £2 a bulb (you can also get some free from your energy supplier)
- Savings: Swapping each traditional bulb for an energy saving bulb can save between £3-£5 a year per bulb.
- Further reading:
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Appliances – Economy Mode
Again this one is quite obvious, if your white goods have an eco-mode, use it! It might take longer than some of the other settings but it certainly cuts back on power and water consumption. Plus do full loads in your washing machines/dishwashers, turn down the wash/drying temperatures.
You can also turn the temperature of your fridge/freezers up by a few degrees, keeping them within the safe limits to keep your food preserved. The temperatures do vary slightly depending on how full/empty they are, but ideally the warmer they are the less energy they use. There is a great deal of advice online and they all vary slightly (depending on the country), but on average this is what we have found and what we have done.- Fridge: Ours is at 4 degrees (recommended 1-5 degrees)
- Freezer: Ours is at -15 degrees (recommended -15 to -21 degrees)
The energy savings will depend on each appliance, which makes it hard to quantify and I have not found any useful links to add here that give us an average saving in terms of money saved.
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Standby devices – Turn them off
We all know on standby they are using power, but what we don’t realise is that all these devices left on standby together are cumulatively drip draining power and over a year it all adds up.
- Investment required: Effort mainly
- Savings: This can save up to £85 per year (according to a 2012 study by Defra)
- Further reading:
Nearly everything gets turned off, though for our Sky TV box we use a simple low energy plug timer, so that in the evening it turns on power to the socket so it can record any TV shows, then turns off at midnight.
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Computer equipment – Power saving mode
Unless you need the extra horse power for doing any processor intensive tasks, switch your computer(s) into power saving mode. This will power down devices (Hard drives, Network adaptors, USB hubs etc) into sleep that are not in use after a period of time and the entire computer if you should be away from your desk for any duration. Computers power consumption will vary depending on what you are doing; gaming for example turns a med/high spec computer into a power hungry rabid beast!
- Investment required: Effort mainly
- Savings: The cost saving will vary depending on your computer and what you use it for. We have found that typically our two computers which we have running every day during working hours were using around £50 per month, which we cut back to just under £25 per month.
- Further reading: A great guide on how to calculate your usage:
All this work, did it make a difference?
Yes we believe it has, even though we cannot quantify exactly how much we have saved for each item, also as were reducing our energy usage it also made it difficult to calculate with any level of precision. All things considered we have cut our bills back considerably;
- GAS consumption reduced by: 40% (we saved £288 per year)
- Electric consumption reduced by: 50% (we saved £360 per year)
Based on many of the average savings listed in our top 10, from the information we have sourced from these parties, there is a potential to save anywhere between £900-£1290 per year. We have personally found that we are saving on average £648 per year, but we have not (or cannot in some cases) implement all of the above improvements. This figure also includes us cutting back on our general usage.
Plenty more to learn and implement
I am sure there are other things we could do to also make our home more efficient, if you have any ideas or contributions to add please leave a comment below. We would love to hear your thoughts.
Piers Caswell
You mention a boiler replacement and budget – you may be eligible for a free boiler replacement with the government’s ECO scheme, click here to find out if you qualify. Even if you don’t qualify, the upcoming Green Deal is another method of funding for the instalation without costing you.