Spill the beans... on your extreme energy saving tricks

spinningsheep

We have a multifuel stove which ticks over nicely for 6 hrs on a shovel of smokeless coal and heats the lounge and kitchen areas easily to 20 degrees or more and the heat gets into the hallway too, keeps the fabric of the building warm so seems to warm up alot faster, and we set the central heating to come on an hour in the morning and 2 hrs in the evening on a low setting, and the house seems to stay aired all the time. We have a thick thermal door curtain over our old draughty wooden front door as well.

lemontart

I go to bed early with laptop and snuggle under covers, have fingerless gloves for chilly nights on keyboards and fleecy pjs add blankets as it gets colder but have several hot water bottles so lovely and warm only thing is the 5am starts are a shocker when I get up in winter so really should short out a timed heater for bedroom just whilst I don my thermals at least.
and

joe9071

when i go to the supermarket i take a few more of those bags you put fruit and veg in, they come in handy at home for sandwiches and for freezer bags .

rogerblack

lemontart wrote: »

I go to bed early with laptop and snuggle under covers, have fingerless gloves for chilly nights on keyboards and fleecy pjs add blankets as it gets colder but have several hot water bottles so lovely and warm only thing is the 5am starts are a shocker when I get up in winter so really should short out a timed heater for bedroom just whilst I don my thermals at least.
and

I have one of these - http://shop.lenovo.com/SEUILibrary/controller/e/gbweb/LenovoPortal/en_GB/catalog.workflow:item.detail?GroupID=38&Code=55Y9003&category-id=E9ADAEB6787146E29B78400A33E7FE8A&hide_menu_area=yes (well - actually, it's the older PS/2 model.)

This is a keyboard with integrated trackpoint.
At the moment, I'm snuggled up on the sofa, with an electric blanket under me, a couple of blankets over me, and the above keyboard on my lap, under the blankets.

I found that if I have to get up - even when it's really cold in the house - it gets a lot easier if you blip the electric blanket to max for half an hour or so, so you're uncomfortably warm.

That way getting out of bed is pleasantly cooling, not horribly freezing.

cookiejen

LauraFox - I can't understand why you should want to iron pants and socks. Why not use the residue heat in the iron to do something that needs ironing? If you have multi bulbed light fittings, when one dies don't bother to replace it!

Corriander

Move frozen food stuffs into the fridge the DAY BEFORE YOU NEED THEM. They will defrost slowly and save energy running the fridgeby keeping it cold. Slower defrosting is better then the microwave defrost for the food too.
Take items to be cooked out of the fridge at least a couple of hours before needed. This reduces fuel used getting the food from chilled to cooking temperature.

barrenelly

I'm on Economy7 and have modern storage heaters (they are excellent – much better than the old sort used to be). However, there isn't one in my bedroom and I'm a chilly mortal. So I have a 900w electric convector heater in there (with its thermostat set fairly low – it only comes on when the room's really cold) – and that's on a time-switch, so it can't come on at all until the cheap-rate electricity cuts in.

Then I have my electric blanket on another time-switch. I put the main switch of the blanket on in the morning when I get out of bed, that way I don't forget or, if I do, I have all day to remember ... The time-switch then fires it up when cheap-rate comes on so it's nice and toasty by bedtime (1am-ish), and switches it off at 4am (just in case I've forgotten and go to sleep with it on). As I said, I'm a chilly mortal and rarely get too hot.

I have a heated foot-pad under my desk in winter, so I don't need the room so warm. I can cope if my feet are warm! Haven't had it on yet this season though.

And like several others of you, no coffee or tea, stand-up wash with a sinkful of water, no TV, don't iron anything (give clothes a good shake when they come out of the machine, put them on a rack, outdoors in good weather, or by the storage heater if raining). I have a gas combi for hot water, and drink that, since there are no tanks in my house at all, the water comes straight from the mains, over the flame and out of the tap.

MartinWickham wrote: »

jeepjunkie wrote: »

Gave up tea and coffee so no longer boil the kettle. Est saving £70 a year and just drink water now, i did drink a lot [/QUOTE

I know the cost of boiling one mug (half pint) of water is half a penny (at the cheapest currently available tariffs). Therefore, I can calculate your saving of £70 per year is due to not drinking 38.4 mugs of tea/coffee per day.

"drink a lot"? - you must have been plumbed in!!!

Maybe the £70 included the cost of the coffee/tea itself? I find, drinking water only, that it doesn't need to be nearly so hot as it would to make tea/coffee, so that saves some gas or electricity, too.

sitka40

I take plugs out of sockets as electricity is still drained even if the item is switched off (tiny amount I know, but over time it mounts up). Having said that when I lived in an old farmhouse we used to keep plugs in the sockets just to keep the draught out!! Any gaps in floorboards were filled with soggy newspaper (dries hard and can be painted if necessary) and then covered with rugs/carpet.:)

Maat

donteatthat wrote: »

Do people who are not heating their homes not have massive issues with condensation and mould?

Yes I do. In my case, though, there's nothing I can do about it as my boiler quit over a year ago.

Some great tips on this thread though, thanks everyone.

ListysDad

sitka40 wrote: »

I take plugs out of sockets as electricity is still drained even if the item is switched off (tiny amount I know, but over time it mounts up).

That depends. If you have 'proper' on/off switch (by that I mean one that you can feel switches like a light switch and NOT a touch for on touch for off version) then it mostly doesn't.

If you have those low voltage power supplies (wall wart) that plug into a socket and then a thin cable goes to your appliance you can do a simple test to ascertain whether it does still run when it's off. If it's heavy for its size then more than likely it contains a transformer. When this is turned off no current flows. If it's lightweight then it's more than likely what's know as a switched mode power supply and these DO still use current even when the appliance is off so it's best to turn these off at the socket. This last one INCLUDES ALL COMPUTERS!

Just be careful about inkjet printers tho. Mostly, it is best NOT to turn these off. That's not for power reasons but the cost of ink. Each time you turn a printer on it uses the ink for anywhere between 50-200 pages of printing! At any price it's best to leave it on. IMHO!

David