Make Your Home More Energy Efficient This Christmas

We are all aware of the high cost of living, especially regarding our energy bills. With that in mind, here are some tips on ensuring your home is working as efficiently as possible.

Whether making small changes, renovating your home or preparing it for sale, you can make significant savings by changing how you live. You’ll not only help the environment, but you’ll also help your pockets too.

Check the efficiency of your boiler

The first thing to look at, and the most critical aspect of keeping your home safe and warm, is your boiler. According to the Energy Saving Trust, you’ll spend around half of your energy bills on your heating and hot water, so it makes sense to check that your boiler is highly efficient.

You can only deal with the experts regarding gas and electricity for your safety and to stick to the law. If you need a boiler upgrade, the first thing to do is check the government boiler scheme in your region. This covers boiler replacement and more environmentally friendly options such as an air or ground source heat pump. The government will give you a full or partial grant for the supply and installation. Your boiler needs to be over seven years old, but the requirements can vary from council to council.

Insulation

If you’re getting a boiler using the scheme, you may need to upgrade your insulation simultaneously. Otherwise, the heat from your efficient boiler will escape via insufficient walls or windows. This could include cavity wall insulation or loft insulation, which will make a big difference.

Your insulation should be at least 30mm thick with no gaps. Your eaves should not be insulated as you will need ventilation to reduce the risk of condensation in the home. If you have a hot water cylinder, you can reduce your bills with good insulation and don’t forget the pipework too.

If you have draughts in your home, a big saving can be made by draughtproofing your doors, windows, floor and out-of-use chimneys. This can be relatively inexpensive and can be done yourself.

Saving water

According to the Energy Saving Trust, you can save £95 by limiting your shower time to 4 minutes. There are other ways, but this shows how much can be saved with minor changes. Consider fitting an aerator to taps and showers to reduce the water you use (up to 40 litres a day). A cistern displacement device can also reduce the amount of water you use.

Improve windows

A typical house loses up to 40% of heat through the windows. You’ll save 35% heat compared to double glazing by installing triple glazing.

Glazing is expensive, so you could consider secondary glazing, which is easy to fit and less expensive than new windows. Use thick-lined thermal curtains and blinds, but be careful that they don’t cover any radiators underneath the window. Curtains are generally better than blinds for minimising draughts but if you have a blind, Roman blinds fitted inside the recess is most effective.