Many people site the inconvenience and expense of going green as their major stumbling block but it really doesn’t have to be pricey or difficult. In fact many of the ways that you can turn your home green are designed to save energy and therefore save you money.
Of course you could fit your own wind turbine or solar cells to your roof, it costs a couple of thousand but it should make money in the long term, you’ll need planning permission but most local authorities are under instruction to make it as easy as possible. Other people are tearing out their central heating systems to fit modern ones which, while being expensive, are far more efficient. Combine it with your solar bank and turbine and you can heat your house for free!
Now, all that plumbing and building work is going to get pretty messy and very expensive, so what are the options for normal people who want to do their bit but don’t have fortunes to invest?
Well, there are ten things you can do today which will bring down household costs, save energy and have a proven beneficial effect on the planet.
1. Reduce Your Water Consumption
The Environment Agency have found that, on average, we each use 150 litres of water every day, half as much again as twenty five years ago. To make the problem worse water companies lose thousands of litres in leaks, to help reduce this loss make sure none of your pipes are leaking, fix dripping taps and put a brick in your cistern so that it doesn’t take so much water with every flush.
2. Put In Draught Excluders
Properly sealing windows and doors around the exterior of your home can reduce energy loss by up to thirty percent and keep your rooms at a decent temperature with the heating on lower for less time. You can get strips of silicon seals from hardware stores and make your own draught excluders for doors by filling old tights with rice or dried beans, tying them off and making a cover out of a long strip of fabric.
3. Heat Stealthily
Keep your energy consumption to a minimum by only heating the rooms you are using at the time and keep the doors closed to stop heat wastage. Also, if you put tin foil behind your radiators they will reflect heat away from the wall and back into the radiator making it more efficient in keeping the room warm. Don’t let the foil touch the radiator or it will conduct the heat to the wall more quickly and move furniture away from the wall too.
4. Look After Your Appliances
Of course you need to switch everything off when it’s not in use but you should also make sure everything is working at maximum efficiency. Setting your fridge to 5˚C and defrosting your freezer once frost starts to build up will make them both far more efficient. When it comes time to buy a new fridge or freezer, check their energy rating; according to the Energy Saving Trust A rated appliances save up to 60% of the energy a G rated one will so while it may be cheaper at purchase, the additional energy costs soon make a fallacy of that economy. Greenpeace are also able to provide data on which manufacturers are committed to energy saving, use of recycled metals and plastics and the use of toxic chemicals in the manufacturing process.
5. Look into Energy Efficient Lightbulbs
Traditional filament bulbs are getting harder to find anyway but fluorescent ones are up to 80% more efficient than the traditional equivalent.
6. Go Chemical Free
Switching to eco-friendly cleaning products and detergents if far kinder to the environment than chlorine bleaches and chemical based detergents. You can even make your own so you know exactly what’s gone into them. You can use ingredients such as lemons, vinegar and baking soda to clean and sanitise most of your work surfaces, sinks and taps.
7. Go Recycling Crazy
People who do recycle only manage to recycle quite a small percentage of what could be recycled out of their household waste. While 100% recycling is virtually impossible it is possible for almost all of us to increase the amount that we keep from going to landfill. You can increase the amount you recycle by simply visiting your local authority website and seeing what they do recycle and then making sure that all of your recyclables are properly cleaned and sorted.
8. Get Growing
If you have a garden or not you can probably use a composter or wormery. You can make these yourself or make one with a kit. Once you have compost you can use it to fertilize your own vegetables and pots or donate it to friends, keeping them from having to buy environmentally damaging peat based composts.
9. Paint Things Greener
Paint is among the most toxic and harmful things you bring into the home and you’ll probably flush a certain proportion of it into the waste water system. Next time you’re thinking of freshening up a space, look into the eco-friendly paint ranges that are available today. They are as versatile as conventional paints yet they are carbon neutral, mineral based and free of dangerous toxins.
10. Veg out
If you want to turn your home green you’re going to need lots of vegetables growing. Food miles are a major concern with food being flown or driven all over Europe to be packaged and returned to its place of origin. Start off by growing herbs on your windowsills; you’ll soon want to graduate onto growing your own vegetables. If you don’t have a garden, see about an allotment, there may be a waiting list but once you get one you’ll be able to provide the freshest seasonal vegetables for yourself in perpetuity.
Dan Cash is a feature writer who used to be a press officer for a national environmental charity. Cheap washing machines and condenser tumble dryers aren’t necessarily bad for the environment, you just need to shop around for the A rated models and use them less frequently.
Image: Flickr/Dano
Authors bio is coming up shortly.
