The fantastic team at the Money Supermarket have drawn up a list of 11 realistic changes which can be made to help reduce your energy bills.

How to save energy

The energy saving tips below give you some tools and tactics that will help you save gas and electricity at home. We have included estimated figures from the Energy Saving Trust to illustrate the potential energy savings that you could make.

1.      Turn off standby appliances

  • Turn appliances off at the plug to save an average of £30 a year. Households with more gadgets could see annual savings reach between £50 and £80.
  •  Use plug sockets that can be turned on and off via your phone, to make sure you switch unused appliances off. You could use cheaper timer plugs to schedule turning appliances off.

2.       Install a smart thermostat

  • Smart thermostats can make your heating more efficient by only warming the rooms you are using.
  • They learn how long it takes to heat your home so they can have it at the right temperature at exactly the right time.
  • They can also be controlled by your phone, which means you won’t have to come back to a cold home.
  • Smart thermometers can cost a few hundred pounds, but the leading models could save customers as much as a third on their heating bills.
  • If you installed room thermostats, programmers and thermostatic radiator valves, you could save around £150 a year.

3.       Turn down your thermostat

  • Almost half the money spent on energy bills is absorbed by heating and hot water costs.
  • Turning your heating down by just one degree could save up to £75 a year if you have all the controls listed in the previous point.

4.       Buy efficient appliances

  • Throwing out a perfectly good appliance won’t save you much money, but when it is time to swap, going for one with a high energy-efficiency rating can be worth the investment.
  • An electric oven with the new A+ efficiency rating will use around 40% less energy than a B-rated oven.
  • A modern, efficient dishwasher will typically cost around £8 less a year to run compared to an older model.
  • An A+++ fridge freezer will save around £190 in energy bills over its 10-year lifetime compared to an A+ model.

5.       Install a new boiler

  • You can save energy by upgrading your old boiler to a new A-rated condensing boiler with a programmer, room thermostat and thermostatic radiator controls.
  • Based on fuel prices in April 2017, a detached house upgrading from a G-rated boiler could save up to £320 a year.

6.       Wash clothes at a lower temperature

  • Washing at 30 degrees rather than 40 degrees can be a third cheaper, meaning savings of up to £52 a year – though you should make sure you have the right detergent for this.
  • You might still want to run a hotter wash occasionally to help keep the machine clean.

7.       Be smarter about water

  • Wasting warm water charges you twice – once for the water, and once for heating it – unnecessarily adding to your bill.
  • You can save around £25 a year by washing up in a bowl rather than using a running tap.
  • You can get hold of some water-saving freebies from your water provider.
  • Buying a more efficient showerhead can save you as much as £75 a year on gas bills.
  • If you fit a shower timer in your bathroom, you could save up to £7 per person each year by cutting just one minute off every shower.

8.       Invest in double glazing

  • Double glazing insulates your home from the cold and helps reduce your heating bill, as well as keeping the noise out too.
  • If your detached home is entirely single glazed, you could save as much as £160 a year by installing A-rated double glazing. However, smaller properties will see reduced savings.

9.       Draught-proof your property

  • A cold draught can cause your home to lose heat, especially older homes, which makes it more tempting to turn the heating up. Draught excluders or draught-proofing kits are a good way to prevent this.
  • Seal cracks in floors and skirting boards, line your letterbox and block an unused chimney to reduce your heating bills by up to £25 a year.
  • If you don’t have double glazing, you can buy plastic lining for your windows to save energy and keep more heat in.

10.       Insulate the roof

  • Insulating your roof can stop heat escaping from your home – however, the process can be complicated to it may be best to employ an expert to do this if you want to use your roof space.
  • While insulating your loft can cost several hundreds of pounds, it can also shave around £200 off your energy bills each year.

11.       Monitor your usage

  • Keeping a watchful eye on your consumption levels can help you decide if and when you have to change the way you use energy.
  • Installing a Smart Meter lets you track your consumption with accurate and real-time information. Learn more about how they work with our guide to Smart Meters.

 

To read more, please click here.