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Bury plastic in landfill?
Like most people, despite my best efforts I end up with a lot of plastic that can't currently be recycled. My local council sends this to 'energy from waste'. Leaving aside the issue of pollution, my feeling is we should not burn this waste but bury it (preferably deep in old mines). Put simply, it's a product made from…
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Cost of reducing emssions
We all have seen the eye watering amounts the various political parties have committed in their manifestos to combat emissions. Sums of £100billion a year for the next 10 years are being proposed. Not far short of the entire expenditure on the NHS.…
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Storage at home for solar panels and electric car
Now that the FIT scheme is closed to new installations, electric cars are becoming more widespread, and battery storage is becoming cheaper, it makes sense to incorporate storage to match consumption with production or enabling purchase of electricity at cheaper rates. I am lucky to be able to access TOU/30 minutes pricing…
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Re-usable toilet 'paper'
Hi This is likely to have been discussed before but its years since I've been on forum, so am quite out of touch........searched and can't find anything. Am also not sure where the best place to put this enquiry is (Old style, Health, Green ?) Anyway, for a couple of reasons I'm very drawn to the idea of swapping to…
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Ashp & sahp combined system
I am refurbishing an old 4 bed detached victorian house and a one bedroom apartment (annex granny flat). It is really back to basics replastering, new damp course, totally new can-heatin. all round double glassing - extending 3 meters at the back to make big kitchen plus sun lounger for the annex. There will be 4 ensuite…
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Skipping the supermarket
I've spent the past hour reading through Ethical Consumer's Supermarket product guide (in their May/June 2019 publication, available here: https://www.ethicalconsumer.org/). I've been considering this for a while but have decided to set myself a 3 month challenge in which I visit a supermarket only once a month. Everything…
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Reducing water usage
I thought I would kick off a thread to see if there is interest in discussing ways to save water. After all, every drop that comes out of the tap has to be collected, cleaned and piped to enable that to happen and that involves chemicals and electricity etc. A significant amount of what comes out of the tap has to be…
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Heat pumps, install and real life usage help please.
Hi all We are in the process of adding 3 new bedrooms to our bungalow, in total its going to be an additional 80sq Meters of floor space across three rooms. Am wondering if forum members can provide some real life of experience of using an air sourced heat pump as the heating source for similar sized space, as well as…
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Solar PV and smart meters?yes or no
Hi I have had a 4kw solar system for 5 years now without any serious issues so far. I have been offered a smart meter for my house. I just wondered whether anyone with solar PV system has had one of these fitted and whether they complement each other or should I best avoid until it becomes compulsary. Do these smart meters…
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Solar panels not generating and company gone bust
We had solar panels installed in 2015 and everything was fine until February 2018. Then we received an email saying that our system had generated no electricity in the last 24 hours. Since then we have been checking the meter daily and, indeed, there are days when it does not generate. One of then was yesterday (19th April…
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Where should I take old electric toothbrush that no longer holds charge or can I change the battery?
They make it so it is really hard to change the battery so I was advised on here some years ago when it was last due to change that I should just throw it away and buy a new one. I hate to do that but can't really see how else to do it since they really seal them up and make it difficult for a layman to change. I have seen…
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Top 10 selling cars of 2019 and electrification
It should be possible to build a huge number of plug in electric vehicles These can be existing models electrified with 10-15KWh of batteries depending on the size of vehicle We need affordable electrification and plug in hybrids are a pathway to this The best selling cars in the UK 2019 were as follows with prices off…
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BEV emmissions
Was asked in another thread so here you go full info with more data and less assumptions with the BEVs charged by CCGTs Model 3 = 95g/KM* E Golf = 107g/KM (a less efficient BEV which uses more electricity) Hybrid Corrolla or Prius = 106g/km (real world users reporting 63mpg = 106g/km) So even an efficient BEV only saves…
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Extreme life extension and it's impacts on the planet
Extreme life extensions will happen within my lifetime I am fairly confident of this If life expectancy can be increased to 250 years that would mean a UK of 70 million will become a UK of >200 million just through births exceeding deaths and the planet rather than peaking at 10 billion will peak at 30 billion And there…
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FIT rates April 2020 onwards
With the latest RPI announced today the new FIT rates for April will be as below: 55.36p per kWh for generation 3.90p per kWh for export Full details and calculations are here: https://uk-solarpanels.blogspot.com/2020/01/fit-rates-april-2020-onwards.html
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Where to look?
Hello - I'm new to this website. What are your favourite sites for recommendations on how to purchase ethically?
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Reverse recycling
Where do I stand legally in removing plastic bottles & aluminium cans from bins in my work place. I’ll be taking them to the reverse recycling bank.
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electric cars as storage
Is anyone doing this? If an e-car is charged ovenight, most will not empty it in a typical commute so when the driver gets home it will still be carrying energy bought at night rates. Why not plug in the car and use the left over on board charge to boil kettles/cook dinner/do washing and then recharge the car overnight…
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Solar Panels
Hello everyone I have a building that has solar panels. They were installed in 2015 and have a MCS certificate stating that. The problem is the people looking after the place back then never registered them for a feed in tariff. So to me they seem to have been providing energy to the grid for nearly 5 years with no…
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Living a 1.5C lifestyle
I've been following this on Treehugger and thought it might be interesting to people on here. The linked report, "1.5-Degree Lifestyles: Targets and options for reducing lifestyle carbon footprints", analyses the carbon footprint of household lifestyles and how changes can contribute to meeting the ambitious 1.5-degree…
