Reality Check on the Numbers

A very helpful reality check on my original figures comes from a comment on the blog questioning the original figure of 20,700 kWhs per year. He couldn’t believe that we could be using four times the national average for domestic electricity use. This sounds right. The figure was based on electricity bills that were themselves based on years of estimating rather than meter reading.

What I can be certain of is the amount used since the start of the greening project on 1st March 2005. In the 7 and a half months since then we have used a total of 747 kWhs. This equates to an annual rate of 1,195 kWhs. Of course this includes all the savings we have made with low energy light bulbs and a strict policy of turning of everything not in use.

So although we can’t calculate the electricity baseline for our savings, it seems likely to have been nearer 1 tonne of CO2 (twice the current usage) rather than 9 tonnes. That would make our baseline position on all emissions 14 tonnes a year.

So going forward, our electricity use will probably double with the use of the heat pump – up to around 2,000 kWhs. This represents around 1 tonne again, but all from renewable sources now (Good Energy).

But the really big story is going to be the change from cutting fuel oil usage to zero from last week. That should mean we are saving at a rate of around 11 tonnes per annum by the end of our first year and takes us under our final target for global equity of 2 tonnes each. Then, before we get too smug, it will be time to look at our other energy usage beyond Hedgerley Wood.