SAVING ENERGY – Top 10 Tips
Submitted by Joss Kennordrie on Fri, 03/08/2007 - 20:30.
As part of the campaign by the new Action Group:
SusMo - Sustainable Moseley: cutting CO2
to cut our carbon footprint in order to tackle Climate Change, we want everyone to follow the Top 10 Tips for Saving Energy below:
- Trim your Trolley
Be a savvy shopper: only buy what you need and avoid excessive packaging. – On average, every person in the U.K. throws away their own body weight in rubbish every 7 weeks; binning £420 worth of food and £470 worth of packaging each year. - Buy Local Food
It’s best to buy locally produced food in season – it should be fresher, tastier, and more nutritious than food imported from halfway round the world.
One-third of your carbon footprint is likely to be caused by the production & transport of the food you eat; roughly half of this is from meat & dairy products. - Join the Real-World Gym
Get fitter & stop polluting at the same time - For shorter journeys, try walking or riding a bike, rather than jumping in a car: you will trim your emissions, as well as your waist. - Flick that Switch
Switching off your lights can save 30 kg of carbon emissions per year – if you are leaving a room empty, there is no need to have lights burning. - A Bright Idea
Switch all your light bulbs to low-energy versions – they should last at least 12 times as long as standard bulbs and use only one-fifth of the energy, saving you up to £100 over the life-time of each light bulb.
You do not need to make do with large & clunky styles – low-energy compact fluorescent tubes are now available for nearly all light fittings. - No Red Lights
Don't leave your T.V. on standby: turn it off - Millions of televisions, D.V.D. & video players, and Freeview set-top boxes remain switched on across the U.K. when there is no need. If everyone in Great Britain switched them off, it would save the country £1,000 million per year in wasted electricity – about 10% of all electricity used in British homes. - Pull the Plug
Unplug unused electrical equipment – Most appliances still use up energy when left plugged in, such as mobile phone chargers without a phone attached. - Turn Down the Heat
Homes waste much energy when we over-heat them - Turning down your thermostat by just 1ºC (and pop on a pullover, if necessary) saves about 300 kg of carbon emissions per year – saving you about 10% on your heating bills. - 30ºC is all you need
Washing your clothes at 30ºC could save you 40% of the energy consumption of your washing machine. - Pad your Roof
Installing loft insulation is one of the best ways of minimising your heating bills – cutting your CO2 emissions dramatically.
250 mm (10 inches) of loft insulation could cut your heating bills by 25% – if we all installed it, we would save enough to power 635,000 homes each year.
For more information about each point please click on the respective link below:
- U.N. Report on the carbon impact of animal husbandry, 'Livestock's Long Shadow'
Full report: www.virtualcentre.org/en/library/key_pub/longshad/A0701E00.pdf
Summary presentation: http://siteresources.worldbank.org/INTWRD/Resources/38_Cees_de_Haan_LEAD...
