What have you done to be green/reduce costs?

Cabaal

So what have you done in your home to help reduce costs and become more green?

My efforts during the past 10 months:
- All light bulbs in my new house are energy saving (except three spots that are hardly used)

- Installed a Green Cone in my garden for kitchen food waste

- Recently started growing my own potatoes

- Sort all my recyclable material into plastic and paper which I bring to a local center every 6-8 weeks, bring my glass to bottle banks just up the road from me. (have one black sack of non-recyclable every 6-8 weeks)

- Installed a Efergy Electricity Monitor to keep an eye on power usage

Think thats it for now

narkymarky

Cabaal - what are your thoughts on the cone? We're undecided at the moment - looking at some of the tumbling composters but not sure of the claimed results/decomposition rate.

Macha

Good moves, Cabaal. I'd be interested in your thoughts on the green cone as well. We had a wormery and it didn't work out so well..

Thought of doing anything on the transport side of things?

robtri

my home....

- Solar panels

- Wood pellet boiler

- house broken into zones for central heating, so I can ensure I am only heating the area's I need and have the ability to heat just the water tank and not any radiators all from a central point.

- enery efficient lights in all rooms except living room( can't get them for the light fixing)

- Compost bin, like green cone (can't remember name) out back.

- 4 bins to sort recycleables into parts and deliver to re-cycle center every week....


** would like a wind turbine at some stage.....

silverharp

one car family , wife works from home and I am walking distance from work. obviously not an option for everyone but am now in the position that no amount of money would make it worth having to commute.
Cancelling 2nd holiday this year , more due to the tax increases, sorry Schull in west cork:pac:

Alun

taconnol wrote: »

We had a wormery and it didn't work out so well..

Wormeries can be trickier things to keep running properly than the people who sell them make out. We've had ours for a good few years now, and it's ticking along quite happily now, but we've had a few disasters on the way.

Cabaal

narkymarky wrote: »

Cabaal - what are your thoughts on the cone? We're undecided at the moment - looking at some of the tumbling composters but not sure of the claimed results/decomposition rate.

taconnol wrote: »

Good moves, Cabaal. I'd be interested in your thoughts on the green cone as well. We had a wormery and it didn't work out so well..

Thought of doing anything on the transport side of things?

I have a breakdown of whats involved on my blog
http://www.cabaal.org/log/labels/going%20green.html

To date the digesting in the cone has slowed down alot and its almost full, the very cold winter hasd not helped things as well as lots of rain but it is very slowly going down.

I'm debating between leaving it or trying to empty it at this stage but overall I'm still happy with it as it stops my bins from smelling.

Its worth remembering that the contents of the green cone CANNOT be used as compost but it does take meat etc which is very handy

Post if you have any further questions about it,

Geog

Walk to work as often as possible. Always composting, insulating, using a diesel car now .....

dudara

Given that I live in rented accomodation, the biggest contribution I can make is from recycling. Like Caabal, the two of us are down to a fraction of a black bag a week. So easy. It makes me really annoyed when I see our black bins overflowing due to our neighbours' rubbish and the green/brown bins are only being used by us.

I use public transport a lot, and I keep use of central heating to a minimum.

BendiBus

• I recycle almost everything
• Almost all lights are CFLs
• I use public transport almost exclusively (don't have a car)
• I avoid using electricity at peak hours (5-7pm)
• I don't replace stuff until it needs it. I'm not one for throwing out a perfectly good TV for the sake of having the newest gadget.
• All doors & windows (including internal doors) are draugt proofed.

raz-man

Nearly all lights are CFLs in our house
Recycle all plastics and paper
Hope to start growing own vegetables this year and composting
Cycle everywhere, it's so much faster
Is this the meter ( http://www.energymeter.ie/index.php/buy-now ) you got and is it any good ?

Lobelia Overhill

CFLs everywhere

Recycle paper, plastic, glass, metal, cardboard (basically as much as possible)

Walk instead of driving as much as possible

Unplug everything electric at night (don't leave things on standby)

Throw food out to the crows. I don't compost as I've nowhere to use the compost.

Cabaal

raz-man wrote: »

Is this the meter ( http://www.energymeter.ie/index.php/buy-now ) you got and is it any good ?

Nope thats not the same, I have an Efergy Energy Monitor, its basic enough and doesn't gragh or save info as long as I like (over a number of months) or connect to my PC/Mac but it gives you real time data and I can't complain for 50e.

If you go to my blog (link in my sig) you'll find more into about it and a link to where I bought it

Lobelia Overhill

I forgot, I turned the thermostat down to 19ºC

I wash clothes at 30º

I use the coolest wash in the dishwasher

I use Ecover stuff for everything

bladespin

Started off by getting some advice

The first thing is I satrted insulating the house, draught proofing etc, this will make the biggest difference to any home.
I try to recycle all paper, card, tins and bottles that come into the house.
I tried replacing the lights with CFLs but they are rubbish IMO, the amount I neded to give a similar lighting negated their energy saying so they were shelved and I went for multiple spots - not as efficient but they actually work :rolleyes:
I have a big compost heap which is brimming right now lol.
Lastly we've changed when we take showers and baths, I found out just how much electricity an electric shower uses, carzy, could run the tumble drier for 2 hours or the tv all day :eek:

In the future I'm going to install solar water heating, I'm really starting to see how it would benefit the house now we've had a new arrival.

Appliances are mostly A rated too, paying attention to what's switched off, not just standby.

Oh, last thing, changed the car recently, took the diesel route even after the gov jacked the fuel up.

carann

Can you install solar panels on a ready built house. We are a semi detached house running on gas and finding the bills hard to believe. We have our roof insulated - is their other insulations we could add to the house? Recycle everything we can.

bladespin

carann wrote: »

Can you install solar panels on a ready built house. We are a semi detached house running on gas and finding the bills hard to believe. We have our roof insulated - is their other insulations we could add to the house? Recycle everything we can.

Yes, there's a grant too.

I've been looking at a kit from Ecologics, they have all the deatils and guides, you can get your own plumber to fit it.

www.ecologics.ie

carann

Thanks for the reply, so you are looking at a cost of circa 3-6k for the solar panels? is there any other insulations that can be added to a house.

gizmo555

carann wrote: »

Thanks for the reply, so you are looking at a cost of circa 3-6k for the solar panels? is there any other insulations that can be added to a house.

Apart from the roof, which you say you've already done, other common retrofit insulation measures would include:

pumped cavity wall insulation

external wall insulation (probably difficult to do in a semi-d unless your neighbour does it too)

internal wall dry-lining

There are grants available for these now:

http://www.sei.ie/Grants/Home_Energy_Saving_Scheme/

If your gas boiler is inefficient, or your heating controls are inadequate, there are also grants under the SEI scheme to upgrade these. It would do no harm to check that you have enough attic insulation - e.g., for glass fibre, up to 30 cm depth is recommended.

Proper insulation will save far more energy and money than a solar hot water system - the most efficient, least polluting energy is the energy you don't use! You should not even consider solar panels until you are sure you have fully addressed this.

djyay

Replace boiler if over ten years old..

robtri

carann wrote: »

Thanks for the reply, so you are looking at a cost of circa 3-6k for the solar panels? is there any other insulations that can be added to a house.

beside the one mentioned above, do not forget about windows,
one of the biggest area's for loss of heat.... when repalcing windows make sure you check their energy ratings.... they are rated same as everything else in how well the keep heat in..