Tag: energy saving

50% carbon cuts and £1.5million savings a year – The Natural England Success Story

10:10 and Newnham Croft Primary School, Cambridge, UK invites you to a talk:

 50% carbon cuts and £1.5million savings a year

The Natural England success story and how to make it work for you

by

Mr Paul Hinds, Head of Sustainability at Natural England

Monday 21st November, 6.30pm – 9pm Newnham Croft Primary School, Chedworth Street, Cambridge, Cambridgeshire CB3 9JF, England

RSVP to krysia@1010uk.org to secure your spot

In 2006 the Natural England Board committed the organisation to reduce the carbon emissions of 50% by the end of 2010.

Paul was the man charged with achieving it.

Come along to hear him talk about exactly how they hit their goal and offer advice and guidance on how you can do the same.

The evening is being hosted by 10:10 Solar School – Newnham Croft who will also be talking a little bit about how, with the help of their community, they are setting out to be become a cleaner, greener primary school.

Drinks and refreshments will be provided after Paul’s talk.

Natural England Website

10:10 Website

Newnham Croft Primary School Solar Project

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Nearly half of British homes do not have adequate insulation

New figures released on 17 June 2011 revealed that nearly half of Britain’s homes do not have adequate basic insulation and are throwing away at least £100 in wasted energy payments every year.

The latest lagging statistics show that only 57% of Britain’s lofts have been properly insulated and only 58% of cavity walls have been filled. Insulating lofts and cavity walls cuts down on energy leakage and therefore reduces energy bills.

Energy companies have been told by the Coalition Government to increase the help they make available to people to insulate their homes and save money. A total of 3.5 million homes are set to benefit by December 2012 as a result of a tougher Carbon Emissions Reduction Target.

Today’s figures show that 479,000 professional insulation measures have already been installed against the new target, with over three million further homes expected to be treated by the end of 2012. On average this will amount to more than 140,000 insulation measures a month.

Chris Huhne, Energy and Climate Change Secretary, said:

“At a time when money is tight and with energy prices predicted to rise, householders are missing out on over £100 of savings every single year by not getting their lofts lagged and cavity walls filled.

“We are making energy companies do more to help their hard pressed customers, with another 3.5 million households set to be protected against higher bills by the end of next year.”

People who want advice on insulating their home should call the Energy Saving Trust on 0800 512 012 to find out about the latest local offers on insulation that are available.

To help even more people transform their homes, the Government’s Green Deal will start next year. Households will be able to invest in home improvements at no upfront cost and repay through savings on energy bills.

The scheme will involve an extensive range of energy efficiency measures including installing insulation, replacing leaky windows, or upgrading inefficient old heating systems to the latest high-performing models.

UK Department for Energy and Climate Change press release

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Gathering and Presenting Social Feedback to Change Domestic Electricity Consumption

A recent paper describes the CHARM Energy Study in which mobile technology is used to study the impact of social groupfeedback on household energy consumption. It describes the background and rationale behind the study, the technology which supports the study, and the study’s methodology. The work described builds upon similar studies by using mobile technology and on-line feedback to increase the frequency of accurate social group feedback to the participants.

Social Feedback on Web Interface

It is planned that all UK homes will have Smart Meters installed by 2020, and the EU Smart Meter market has been predicted to be worth 25 Billion Dollars US in the ten years from 2010 to 2020. Although the emerging UK standard mandates that UK Smart Meters will provide bidirectional communications and support in-house displays, the authors are unaware that there is yet a standard for the type of information that will be displayed to the consumer. If the study shows a real reduction in domestic electricity use resulting from social feedback methods, they hope that they may influence the emerging Smart Meter standard to providefor this means of change.

Full paper

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Smart Communities Project – Research to help families go green

Families from Kingston in south west London are getting involved in a ground-breaking project to reduce the amount of energy they use. Around 500 households and a primary school in the north of the borough are taking part in the Smart Communities project, led by a team of researchers from Kingston University, which aims to help them reduce their energy consumption and save money by measuring their usage against that of their neighbours.


Full report:-

MP Zac Goldsmith launches research to help families go green – Press office – Kingston University London.

Direct link to Smart Communities Project

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