Matt Rudd’s 5 step plan to save the planet

Sunday Times writer, Matt Rudd has written an interesting article about how he took on his own “eco-crusade” to save money… which have you considered or actually done?

1) Insulation – a great idea for all homeowners who have not already done this – he spent £149 on insulating his home with and thinks this will cut heat loss through the roof from about 20% to 10% – a good start.. what next?

2) Electricity meter – called the “Owl” http://www.theowl.com/ this piece of kit shows you “how much money per hour is going to your profiteering energy supplier”. As a result he got some energy-saving light bulbs, replaced his “knackered, insatiable old freezer” and now doesn’t leave his TV on Standby – all good ideas to save money.

3) Test drove a Leaf – going to a new level now! The revolutionary Nissan car  “has no internal combustion engine and runs on 192 lithium-ion batteries”. However, the test drive did not go that smoothly for Matt….

“It was a joy nipping about London, but when I set out to drive the 37 miles home, the display said I had a range of 62 miles. Yet after 4 miles of heavy traffic, the range dropped to 52 miles. I selected eco-mode, which enforces tamer driving, but the distance/range gap was still shrinking. Then the windscreen started to fog up, so I put the heater on. The range nose-dived so I switched it off again”. Who needs to see anyway – you’ve got to get home, right?

After pulling over to defog naturally, Matt got home with 6 miles to spare. “A leaf costs £26,000. That’s a lot of car for a 100-mile range that isn’t 100 miles if you want to defog your windscreen. I’ll wait for Leaf 2″.

So not the most successful outing in Matt’s quest to save the planet. Maybe the final 2 ideas will boost his spirits?

4) and 5) Windows and Walls – the walls (“a new, techie lining that will halve heat loss) and windows (I presume are double/triple glazed, but he doesn’t say) are a much more reliable eco-saving idea.

Apart from the Nissan Car (a bit on the expensive side, and not quite up to the mark you could argue), the rest of Matt’s ideas are quite simple but will save money each year and will help promote awareness of energy use as well (especially the Owl!)

Having an energy tight house should be considered if you are looking to have renewable energy such as Solar PV and heat pumps. If you are loosing energy out of your roof/windows/walls, your heat pump will have to work harder because of all of the lost energy. And reducing electricity usage by simply having energy saving light bulbs and not leaving the TV on standby will all contribute in the long term.

I will leave the final word to Matt – “when the oil runs out and we discover we haven’t built enough turbines because we were worried about a few eagles, I’ll be al right, thank you very much”. That’s the spirit Matt!