Ways to reduce utility bills and make home energy efficient

Insulate internal walls, under floors and stack up more in the loft if it is below 12 inches



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See also https://www.diynot.com/diy/threads/electric-lightbulb-economy.599454/
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Done just that... in doing my Kitchen I have insulated 2 externals walls in my kitchen and 1 in my living room.

Also in doing my Kitchen I have replaced all the 15mm hot feeds to taps with 10mm feeds and insulated them from a manifold.

Next year I'll insulate the spare room and hopefully fit triple glazing.
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Ladyfriend has just suggested to me, that wrapping metal (cooking) foil around cables, can reduce electricity bills by 50%. She said she found it on a web site and it sounded quite convincing. She also found those little plug in heaters which claim to be able to quickly warm a room up. I will not repeat my reply to both ideas. Her rather good energy fix recently ended, and now she is paying the same as everyone else.
 
Great tip. Shall try this now so to reheat my cornish pasty I will cook on full for 5mins then literally turn the oven off for 10mins, voila thanks
 
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This autumn is warmer than last year.

Heating has hardly been on this year, and both gas and electricity usage are £10 less this October than last.
 
Turn down oven temp to say 100deg about 10 to 15mins before your cooking finishes. There is enough heat in the oven to finish the cooking without oven keeping itself at full temp.
I do a similar thing when I'm boiling eggs. I bring them to the boil, cover with a lid, turn the heat off and, after ten minutes they are nicely boiled. They never crack open either.
 
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She also found those little plug in heaters which claim to be able to quickly warm a room up.

there are so many scams circulating at the moment. Sad that some people will use the energy crisis and cost of living crisis to scam people into buying **** that will probably burn their houses down.
 
This Autumn has been very mild. Our heating has not been on since March (only switched on once a month between, to keep it moving).

The £66 the government put in our account has meant our G&E bill was only £13 last month.

Putting a log burner in during 2017 was a great idea. I spent the year collecting timber and burn pretty much anything. Other half is on maternity leave and it seems daft heating the whole house for them both.

One thing I did learn about was convection. We have thermal curtains at 90" tall. Although they almost go to the floor (about 8" off) there was a gap at the top near the ceiling. I once found a stream of cold air pouring out the bottom in winter. As a result, I moved the curtain so that they almost touched the ceiling and that stream all-but-stopped (warm air was getting sucked into that gap, cooling down and sinking). Certainly made a difference.
 
Great tip. Shall try this now so to reheat my cornish pasty I will cook on full for 5mins then literally turn the oven off for 10mins, voila thanks

It doesn't work with microwaves or fan ovens so well.

I do a similar thing when I'm boiling eggs. I bring them to the boil, cover with a lid, turn the heat off and, after ten minutes they are nicely boiled. They never crack open either.

I always habitually cook with lids on pans - the lid slightly increases the boiling temperature due to the slight increase in pressure, limits water loss from the pan into the room, this also means it needs less heat input to keep it simmering. So it's a win, win all round.
 
Turn down oven temp to say 100deg about 10 to 15mins before your cooking finishes. There is enough heat in the oven to finish the cooking without oven keeping itself at full temp.
The oven stat does that , a warm oven just dries the food.
 
Why would you insulate internal walls? (Assuming masonry walls). If they are hollow, then they an act as thermal funnels in certain circumstances.

But if masonry, they act as thermal stores.
...or, why bother wasting energy heating the external walls up in the first place? I get the whole 'thermal mass' thing but it's not an efficient option.
 
...or, why bother wasting energy heating the external walls up in the first place? I get the whole 'thermal mass' thing but it's not an efficient option.

Thermal mass works both ways, in summer when it's too hot - it helps to keep the house cooler.
 
...or, why bother wasting energy heating the external walls up in the first place? I get the whole 'thermal mass' thing but it's not an efficient option.
We were talking about internal walls.

But if you want to talk about external walls, then a thermal mass (read: heavy masonry), with external insulation, reduces the need for said external insulation, meaning it is more effective than just a insulated external wall.
 
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