Sunday 26 October 2008

Britons -No. 1 Europe Energy Wasters

I am there after looking at different energy issues for a while now, I decided to look into a problem of energy wasting in the UK. What prompt me to do so, is an article on BBC website which says that according to an European survey the British are the worst wasters of energy in Europe. After Guardian: Unless energy habits change, the report predicts that by 2010 we will have wasted £11bn and emitted 43m tonnes of carbon dioxide unnecessarily, equivalent to the emissions from more than 7m homes.
Although that article dates back to 2006, on the same website an interview with John Vidal, Guardian's environment editor confirms that CO2 emissions in the UK are only rising.

Unnecessary usage of energy happens probably in every home in the UK right now. The worst "energy eaters" are APPLIANCES left on STANDBY, filling your KETTLE to the MAX, or LEAVING CHARGERS PLUGGED IN. On top of that there are HEATING, LONG BATH TIMES and more. Those are things which we would rather consider a little annoying habits rather than a life saving issues. I guess from an every day point of view those may seem to be unimportant cases.

I myself live in London for a few years now and I am a part of that wasting culture. Investigating what is going wrong with my everyday habits will be an issue for the next couple of days. I wonder what has been done by government and local authorities according since dramatic results of the quoted pole had been revealed. On Monday I will contact my local council, the posh Islington, and ask how do they deal with this problem. I will also search psychological advice on best ways of changing the annoying habits. What me as a designer can do to help us out?

So far I had checked how Mayor of London deals with it and found a website set up by government especially for London community. I logged in and ordered a free pack in here.
I hope this will come to my door within the next couple of days and I will be able to try out some of the pack essentials. I know that those will concentrate on making me aware of energy issues throughout the day.

I also checked out the news section and found out the newest post from FEB the 10th. That stinks with a voting strategy to me. I wonder what is REALLY DONE by the Mayor to tackle the problem.
The interesting things on the site is probably the FAQ section and also the tips which would tell you how to make your home most energy efficient.

From there I managed to get to another site Green Homes which offers a survey to asses how green your house actually is but unfortunately I am not an owner of the property I live in and cannot sign in for that. The survey is free and is available for Londoners. I may try to persuade my neighbours to do one for their houses.

1 comment:

Ritika Gupta said...

I also ordered a toolkit for myself from the mayor's website. It's VERY helpful I think every single person should visit the link and use these methods to cut down energy consumption.