saving energy

I have to agree with Hyacinth when it comes to saving electricity and gas. I have tuned down my room heating stat and boiler temp. I aslo only take showers these days. I use a convection microwave instead of an oven as it is much quicker and use my pressure cooker for cooking stews and veggies. If I have only washed non greasy pots I use the water to clean my kitchen floor and outside paint work. I must admit that whilke I do use energy saving bulbs in some rooms I find them a real pain as they never get as bright as an ordinary light bulb. I do all these things not to save the world. China uses as much energy in a day as all the household in the UK can save in a week, I do it to save myself money.

I make sure I switch off all my televisions at the mains every evening and I only ever do full loads in my washing machine, often cutting out at least one of the rinses, I do the same with my dishwasher always makeing sure it is full up but inbetween I wash many cups and non greasy plates through by hand,. We have changed our lawn mower to a petrol one instead of electric and I have got rid of my dryer and make sure I only wash on hot sunny days. during the winter I always wash first thing in a morning and hang the clothes in the conservatory until they dry. I also buy supermarket labelled goods which can often be canned or packaged by the big firms anyway.

Personally I find it really hard to save energy. We do as few washes as possible and do them on 30 degrees. We don't turn lights on in rooms unless we are going to stay there and turn them off immediately we leave the room. We don't leave appliances on standby if we don't use them, we take very quick showers and don't take baths. The only thing we are going to do which hopefully will be a good idea for us is reseal our fridge as the seal is getting a little dodgey and loosing heat through the fridge door seal can cost you as the fridge has to keep pumping more cold air in the meet its temperature requirement.

I do everything Cynthia (below) does apart from the lawn mower (I dont have grass) and the dryer (which I've never had). I think we are all having to find ways to economise but I think most people will be doing it for their own benefit and nothing to do with energy conservation on a global scale. I may be selfish but everything I do is for me and not for the country as a whole, its to save me money as the elec and gas bills are set to soar (again) and food is so expensive.