Planet’s Pick Of Energy Saving Tips For Big Energy Saving Week

Due to the rising cost of household fuel over the past decade or more, energy costs have become one of the largest outgoings for UK homeowners.

As things stand, the average dual fuel variable tariff is £1,138 a year, which works out at £93.83 a month – it’s a lot of money!

Because it’s such a growing financial concern for so many people, Citizens Advice and the Energy Saving Trust established Big Energy Saving Week, an annual initiative that’s run for the last few years.

Taking place again from next Monday (20^th January), it offers advice and support to those desperate to make their energy costs more manageable.

We sympathise with anyone hit hard by energy, so here are 5 energy-saving tips we’ve come up with to help you:

1. Make the switch

An annual saving of £300 can be made just by switching your energy supplier if you’ve been with your current supplier for a long time. Even if you’ve switched supplier in recent years, you can also still make a considerable saving by jumping ship.

Armed with your latest gas and electricity bill, get onto a comparison site to find a cheaper tariff – it will literally take seconds to do.

Once you’ve signed up to a new tariff with a new supplier, they will switch you over within 21 days, and no, you won’t be left without heating and lighting in the meantime!

2. Put a lid on those pans

Do you like to cook? If you do, remember to always get in those five-a-day, which means preparing lots of vegetables as an accompaniment to your main dishes.

When you have your carrots, brussel sprouts, peas and whatever else bubbling away in their pans, keep the lids fixed to them to keep the heat in and use less energy to cook them.

3. Shorten your showering time

We all need to keep ourselves clean, but some of us have a nasty habit of spending ages in the shower.

Our average showering time is eight minutes. If you were to shorten that you would save money as it will cut the amount of energy needed to heat the water, and obviously cause less water wastage.

Taking fewer showers throughout the week will also obviously help, as will buying an energy efficient shower head.  

4. Get a smart thermometer

It’s annoying when you leave the house and forget to turn the heating off. That won’t matter when you have a smart thermometer fitted as it will allow you to control your heating when on the move via your smartphone.

You can also use it to turn your heating on just before you arrive home to make it nice and cosy for your arrival.

5. Fit energy efficient windows and doors

There are varied opinions on how much heat is lost through poorly insulated windows and doors – it ranges between 25-40%.

If you have traditional single glazed windows and doors, they will be the reason why your home feels so draughty.

Get them taken out by Planet and replaced with our energy efficient windows and doors. We have a Windows & Doors brochure you can download for FREE to read more about them.