Sustainable Enniscorthy

Energy Saving - Jan 2023
Saving energy has never been more important, especially in the face of significant increases in energy costs and there have been lots of articles in the media over the past few months setting out the many ways to save energy from small tips and tricks to large retrofitting projects. 

But all this info can be overwhelming and it can be hard to know where to start and what actions will make the most difference in your home, so here is some advice from the Sustainable Enniscorthy team based on our experience of doing our own project and some of our expertise!
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1: Know your use
It sounds simple, but it is really important to understand what fuels you are using and how much they cost over a year, particularly for oil and solid fuels. Keep a track of your fuel usage for a year, both the amount of fuel used by type and the cost as this makes it easier to understand if changes to your heating system will reduce your costs. 
For electricity, it is really helpful to use an energy monitor, even just for a month or two. These can show you what appliances in your home use the most energy and help you figure out if there are any electrical goods using much more energy than you thought! There are lots of these available online such as the Owl Monitor of the Efergy Monitor. These are easy to set up yourself and are wireless and portable so you can  easily walk around your home switching on and off appliances to see how much energy they are using. They can also give daily/weekly/monthly consumption as well. 
You can also borrow a Home Energy Saving Kit from Wexford Library, Gorey Library & Enniscorthy Library. The Kit contains six simple tools to help you assess how energy efficient your home is and identify possible problem areas for improvement.
Knowing your electricity use in more detail can also help you figure out if solar panels might be a good investment to help you reduce your bills, especially now that electricity companies are paying for excess energy produced.

2. Short term goals
There are a few relatively simple and low cost actions that most households can make over the coming year. These may not knock hundreds off your bill but can help make your current heating systems work more efficiently and burn less fuel.

• Get your boiler serviced - ideally during the summer when there is less demand on boiler technicians
• Bleed or flush your radiators
• Get your chimney cleaned - again a good one to do during the summer when chimney sweeps tend to be quieter. This can really improve fuel efficiency and also reduces the risk of chimney fires. 
• Change lightbulbs to more efficient bulbs over time
• Upgrade your heating controls - this is grant supported and is not a big cost but can make a big difference.
• Get your windows serviced to make sure they are sealed properly.
• Draft proof rooms

3: Plan for longer term
Once you better understand what your heating and electricity costs are and have taken some of the smaller steps you can figure out if you want to look at bigger measures, like insulation or changing your heating system. 
Some of these are supported by grants through the SEAI. 

However there are also other actions that have a big impact but are not currently grant supported, for example changing from open fire or older stoves to new efficient stoves or upgrading your older oil boiler to a new boiler. 

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