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Our second deep dive discussion took us outside our usual patch into Bawdsey to discuss how we can use and spend less on water, appropriately in a house that had its own hand-pumped well in the back garden.
In the Anglian Water area we each use an average of 145 litres of water every day, in a region which receives less annual rainfall than Jerusalem. Although it would appear to rain here a lot, in fact the UK has less available water per person than most other European countries.
About a third of the water we use runs down the drain or toilet without being used, and just 4% is used for drinking. So the key to water efficiency is reducing waste, using less hot water will save you money on your energy bills too. The Anglian Drop 20 campaign has lots of useful and interesting facts to get you started. Read the rest of this entry »
Our first session was held in February to discuss how we can spend less on our energy usage.
2012 ‘Energy Consumption in UK’ DECC Report
According to the 2012 DECC report ‘Energy Consumption in the UK’, around 60% of our total domestic consumption is used for space heating, 18% in heating water, 19% in lighting & appliances, leaving around 3% used for cooking.
Studies have shown that one of the cheapest and easiest ways to reduce your consumption is to monitor usage on a regular basis, typically seeing reductions of 5-10% per year. Electricity is easiest to track, with simple and easy to fit monitors available from your local Suffolk library. These electricity meters show your real-time and historical usage, measured in Kwh, £ and CO2. Similar information should also be available on your regular electricity bills to which should make comparison and switching easier to understand.
Boyton Community Group 