Green Streets project cut energy bills and carbon footprint
Families who participated in the Green Streets project have reduced their carbon footprint as well as energy bills. With this greener living experiment they managed to cut their energy use by 30 per cent and carbon emissions by 20 per cent.
The project's organisers believe that had all the UK households done the same, the UK would have saved £4.6bn on energy bills.
This is a year-long energy saving social experiment organised by British Gas and monitored by Institute of Public Policy Research (IPPR). It involves 64 families in eight different cities.
Families living in the Green Streets, a mix of British Gas customers and other energy suppliers, were given a budget of £30,000 per street. They utilised the budget to spend on energy efficiency measures, with advice from British Gas energy experts.
The energy efficient technology that they installed consisted of better insulation, solar panels, and modern boilers working along with simple energy saving behavioural changes.
Temporary results based on the first five months of the experiment reveal that the best performing households actually managed to achieve savings on gas of more than 50 per cent.
Thus, British Gas and IPPR claim that the success of the experiment points the way to how the UK can reach the target of reducing carbon emissions by 20 per cent on 1990 levels by 2010.
Further, on the basis of the successful experiment organisers have made three specific recommendations:
1. The acceptance and extension of neighbourhood energy advisers scheme with one adviser for all 20 streets. IPPR say 10,000 advisers would cost £500m per year but would turn out potential savings of £4.6bn.
2. The creation of new green mortgage packages by banks and energy companies to pay for the setting up of energy saving technology.
3. Communities rather than individual households should be provided with incentives to change their behavior maybe through a £4m annual national energy saving prize-fund.
Moreover, there is a need for a clear policy framework and Government funding to fortify the recommendations and provide regulation and incentives for energy companies to invest in making them happen.
