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How much have you cut your emmissions?

 
Post new topic   Reply to topic    alternative-energy.co.uk Forum Index -> How well does your system work?
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Miles1010



Joined: 09 Oct 2006
Posts: 2


Location: York
PostPosted: Mon Oct 09, 2006 10:19 pm    Post subject: How much have you cut your emmissions? Reply with quote
Having put some effort into cutting my emmissions, I have done the most obvious things (switched to Good Energy, cavity wall insultation, new loft insulation, diesel car, reducing mileage, AAA rated appliances, low energy bulbs etc). However, for next year, I am forecasting 10.8 tonnes! That's hardly impressive (slightly better than average), but well down on my 18 tonnes for 2002.

I think I can squeeze another 1-2 tonnes off this, but after that am stuck for ideas. What are your emmissions? If better, how are you doing it?

(PS my household drives 28,000 miles pa, so this drives the lions share of the CO2)
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admin
Site Admin


Joined: 08 Dec 2005
Posts: 33


Location: Kent
PostPosted: Thu Oct 12, 2006 9:33 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote
HI Miles,
I think you've done a massive job to reduce your co2 to your present levels.
We have bought an older diesel engine which has only done 40k we are going to have a go at running it on a veg diesel mix soon. It seems the less sophisticated the engine the greater the chance that you can add some veg oil in the tank... 25 :75 for winter and 50:50 for summer.
However its not much cheaper as you have to pay the duty on the fuel.

Our PV has been running for 6 months so far and has saved 1.6 tonnes of CO2 to date.

Growing your own food or buying local, seasonal must save a lot of CO2 as well but i dont know how you would calculate this!

keep us posted... Paul
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Miles1010



Joined: 09 Oct 2006
Posts: 2


Location: York
PostPosted: Sun Oct 22, 2006 6:45 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote
I've tried veg oil in a TDCI Mondeo. Local to York is a retailer who sells "bio diesel" at 90% veg oil with 10% alcohol etc. It worked OK for about 6 months and then the injectors gave out. A pity, as driving is my biggest source of CO2.

I've found a few sites which suggest heat exchangers to warm the oil and reduce its viscosity. But I'm not too keen to experiment after the cost of replacing the injectors.

I have heard of household boilers which can burn veg oil. That maybe worth more investigation.
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palix



Joined: 16 Nov 2006
Posts: 1
PostPosted: Thu Nov 16, 2006 11:06 am    Post subject: Re: How much have you cut your emmissions? Reply with quote
Miles1010 wrote:
Having put some effort into cutting my emmissions, I have done the most obvious things (switched to Good Energy, cavity wall insultation, new loft insulation, diesel car, reducing mileage, AAA rated appliances, low energy bulbs etc). However, for next year, I am forecasting 10.8 tonnes! That's hardly impressive (slightly better than average), but well down on my 18 tonnes for 2002.

I think I can squeeze another 1-2 tonnes off this, but after that am stuck for ideas. What are your emmissions? If better, how are you doing it?

(PS my household drives 28,000 miles pa, so this drives the lions share of the CO2)


For homes you might want to look at the PassiveHaus institute on retrofitting existing houses to make them extermely low energy. There is a UK site at: http://www.passivhaus.org.uk
The main themes are:
* insulation, typically externally clad on block walls
* windows that gain energy through the winter by good insulation typically triple glazed and with a high solar gain
* airtightness and mechanical ventilation, with a high efficiency heat exchanger and very efficient fans. For a UK retrofit you may want to look at: http://www.nuaireforhomes.co.uk/piv.shtml its a smart solution that uses the existing loft to preheat the air before pushing it into the house.
* solar water heating with a backup for periods in the winter, combined with a pellet back boiler gives a very low footprint
* very effient applicances/lighting with the electricity supplied from a renewable source if practical

If someone is going to do a new build the passivehaus approach allows you to make a building that uses 4-6,000 kWh for water heating and space heating per year. This requires about one ton of pellets at £150 a ton.

Driving is more tricky, a small modern TDi should get 60+ miles per gallon. Anything else is fairly experimental and it depend on how keen you are. If you could replace some of your trips with an electric scooter you could get a lot more miles for a lot less. There are a couple of lithum ion ones that have come on the market recently with sensible range 50-60 miles at 30 mph. Alternatively an electric car inside the congestion zone pays for itself reasonably quickly with no congestion charge and free parking in some places.
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