Saving power - add £4283 to your pension.

How to save electricity.

One expenditure that is definitely associated with the consumerist society is the consumption of energy.
I will specifically talk about Electricity.
　
There is a bewildering choice of suppliers and tariffs available in the U.K., when choosing who will supply your electricity, which makes it fairly difficult to establish a base line and always get best value.

Nevertheless, one element of power management that is in the control of all of us is how much we use.

I believe that my families power consumption has been fairly steady and is at a level that is both manageable and affordable.
This situation has been borne out of constant education of and habit forming of each user in our house.
The Thing's that we do to conserve power are:

All external lights are on timers so that they can be adjusted for lighting up time alterations;
Movement sensor lights are set at minimum operation times;
Plug sockets are switched off when not in use, at the wall;
All appliances are switched off when not in use or TVs on standby;
Most of us are out during the day so during these hours and when sleeping, power consumption is set at almost zero, bar freezers, refrigerators;
Any electrical appliances that are purchased are primarily purchased on the basis of economical consumption.
A small saving can be made at night if you cook on a timer, i.e. casseroles or cooking meat if your oven has a timer.

An area where you can proactively save money, is by using cheaper off-peak power at night to take advantage of incentives offered when the National Grid is at lower demand.
We consume a fair proportion, i.e. 15% of electricity at night to make use of the lower tariff, Economy Seven.
The Meter Point Access Number (MPAN) on your bill will also start with '02' if you have Economy 7 already installed.
If you have not got an Economy Seven meter, the process for getting one is to contact your power supplier who may, subject to contractual obligations, replace your current meter with a dual one. The costs involved would need to be balanced with the offset saving of switching to Economy Seven.
The biggest boon for us as a family has been the education received at high school by our children to save energy and conserve resources. This is great.
There are renewable sources for generating power, which I would dearly love to install.
I have looked at investing in solar power, but would require £12k to set up a system. This is not an option until I have the floating cash to purchase the system.

Overall, by using Economy seven, and assuming that I save 15% of my overall consumption, I estimate to save £180 on a £1200 annual bill. If I convert this to compounded payments into my pension, it works out at a gross figure of £4283, assuming 3% interest.
This saving is possible, but only if the times at which you use electricity are adapted to the Economy Seven period.

Thanks for reading and I hope these tips can help you to reduce power consumption.