Case Studies

Mrs Stone

Mrs Stone is 91 years old and has lived in Islington most of her life. Under a council scheme for people who are elderly or disabled or families on low incomes, she received a grant for a new central heating boiler. Her 16 year old boiler was replaced with a modern condensing boiler and additional funding provided solar panels which were fitted to her roof.

Solar panels are fitted to the roof and collect heat from the sun's radiation. " The hot water comes up lovely with the new solar panels," Mrs. Stone explains . "I used to have to have the hot water heating on low over the summer, but I don't need to now." When used alongside the condensing boiler this is a great way of making your home more environmentally friendly.

Solar water heating can provide most of the hot water required by the household during the summer months, and about a third year round. A domestic system can reduce carbon dioxide emissions by up to 325kg and save around £40-£45 from energy bills per year.

The Erasmus Family

The Erasmus family lives in Richmond in a small 3 bedroom terraced house, built around 1820. They are strong believers in saving energy and with help from Energy Saving Trust they have taken various measures to reduce their domestic energy consumption. One of the first measures the Erasmus's took was to install solar-panels.

"Although we paid £5,000 for the solar panels we have not been disappointed, commented Mr Erasmus - Because we have two panels it easily provides us with all the hot water we need, meaning we don't have to use our conventional water system to make up for any short falls."

Subsequent energy saving measures taken by the Erasmus family included installing a new energy efficient boiler, putting in insulation, draught proofing, double glazing and changing to energy-saving bulbs.

Mr Erasmus commented -" Some of the measures, such as draft proofing, were a little tricky to install in an old house but a little effort really did make a massive difference! Not only is our house now warmer but we are also paying less in energy bills."

With the help of the London Energy Saving Trust Advice Team the Erasmus family are now getting heating controls installed. This will help them to monitor temperature in their house more accurately and keep heat loss to a minimum. This installation will be completely free because it is being carried out under the Cold Busters scheme, a government funded scheme aimed primarily at helping the elderly and those on lower incomes.

My Erasmus commented " I really appreciated the help I got from the Energy Centre's Advice team, they had all the information about the grants I could apply for and were very friendly."

The Advice Team have also referred the Erasmus family to Warm front, a government funded initiative, which will allow them to get a free loft insulation top up (200 mm) as well as draught proofing.

Mr Erasmus - "I'm so pleased that the measures we have taken make us increasingly independent of the utilities companies and have reduced our carbon footprint dramatically."

If you would like to submit a case study to our website please click here