Green energy - best way as a consumer to influence ?

barker77

When my current fixed deal expires I am looking to see what I can do to encourage greater investment in renewable energy .

My current concern is that I may simply be fooling myself into thinking that this is possible - where the reality is that everyone get energy from the grid where coal power and majority gas still exists.

As such I think I have the following options

1) Move to green electric tariff where the company buys green credits (ie so energy ) but doesn’t generate anything themselves
2) Move to a company such as SSE. Who are investing heavily in renewables - not sure I would then need to go on specific green tarrif ?
3) Go with anyone and assume that energy companies will move to renewables quickly and there isn’t much need to waste money pretending the above makes any difference ?

Grateful for peoples thoughts !!

[Deleted User]

Option 3 - this is a money saving site after all.

There isn't enough "renewable energy" power generation in the UK for every supplier to switch to it now, so the more suppliers that try to buy it, the more the price goes up.
The power generation companies are spending on renewable installations so future supplies with be greener. Indeed the North Sea off Great Yarmouth is becoming one massive wind farm.

Jonesya

The most powerful thing you could do is first make sure you've done all the best, highest payback efficiency steps to minimise your energy usage:

1. Replace regular light bulbs and halogen bulbs with LEDs. (they're amazingly cheap now in the space of a few years, in so many versions - dimmable, filaments, colour shifting/hue etc)
2. Fit decent heating controls to minimise unnecessary heat waste - this will be one of your biggests costs and impact.
3. Fit a jacket to your water tank and insulate pipework.
4. Loft and wall insulation if you haven't got it.
5. Get an energy monitor to monitor your consumption and identify any really inefficient appliances or gadgets.

You can also help just by making changes to when you use electricity - avoid running appliances during peak times, typically 4-7PM in winter when the most inefficient generation needs to run, run things outside of peak time or over-night (if safe to do so).

Good website showing how carbon intensive UK electricity is across the day - it varies quite a bit depending on the day, time and weather, but generally best outside of peak times, either in the afternoon when solar generation is at a maximum or when wind generation is high: http://carbonintensity.org.uk/

[Deleted User]

Another good website showing in real time the mix of energy sources used in the UK is http://www.gridwatch.templar.co.uk/