Creating a green home is without a doubt a challenge and one which many people choose not to take, however with a little thought and effort you can achieve a greener room for the environment. It is best to walk before you can run so why concentrate on one room at a time – surely the best room to choose is one where you spend most of your waking time at home – the living room.
Let us close our eyes and think of all the things in the room….OK!
TV – DVD Player – Games Console – Sky Box – Plugs – Radiators – Settee – Carpet – Fireplace – Lights – Cupboards, mobile phone chargers….
One of the best ways to make your living room greener is to think about your energy use and the heat that is generated and potentially wasted. There are many websites such as the Energy Saving Trust which can give you actual tips on how to achieve savings. Although financial help for homeowners is probably subsiding again after a high in recent years, there are still savings to be made. A carpet may be damaging for the environment in the short term but will be cost effective in the longer term as they retain heat in the living room. With so many carpet retailers both local and national there is a wide variety of options such as Hillarys and Carpet Right – the website carpetinfo.co.uk states that a saving of 4-6% can be made.
The carpet is a big tick on the road to a greener front room but what about a second? Most people often forget to recognise the white metal thing on the wall as it’s just, well you know, the radiator. Again most people probably assume that their radiator is working well and efficient but this may not be the truth, a lot of radiators could benefit from a service or even replacing altogether. There have been major advancements in technology, verismartheating.com stock a wide variety of modern solutions, these include smart radiators and those which contain their own thermostat. They also offer a heating room calculator so you can calculate yourself the green benefits of investing in a new radiator or heating system, and they also have a chat facility on their website if heating fails to excite you to call or visit a physical store.
A really simple final idea is to physically turn off the lights in the room when not in use. The games console on standby, turn it off. The DVD player that is rarely used, turn it off. You may walk around like your grumpy father used to, but it will ensure that your front room is greener and less of a sensory overload for your family. So an increased awareness of how green your front room is can be boiled down to the carpet, the radiator and simply being on top of energy sapping devices such as the TV or a phone charger. Once the front room is conquered why not move onto the rest of the house -it can be done!
