really want to be more energy efficient

[TheLadyVanishes]

Our property is being extended in about 4wks it got me to thinking of energy effiency. I found myself getting annoyed when i was looking for new appliances yesterday as I had heard in the news that the government were going to start grading properties on how energy efficient they were and this information was to be made available to any prospective buyers blah blah. It seems to me tho that it isn't made easy for people who are on average incomes to be able do this iyswim. Looking at the prices of lets say a tumble dryer that was graded A and then looking at a C well the difference was quite big. How energy efficient are you? do you wish you could do more? do you find it expensive?

I have a grade A washing machine, and grade A dishwasher, I also line dry my washing in this weather.

I must confess to a certain cynicism to the way some manufacturers have gone for accountancy rather than engineering on this. We have A style fridge and dishwasher, and I'm left with the impression that instead of going for better ways of doing the job, they've simply underpowered them.

Thus our fridge can't cope well with being fully loaded, and can quite literally take a day to get things down to the target temperature.
The dishwasher also doesn't seem to get things as clean as the "inefficient" m/c unless we use the highest level.

Now I could be unlucky/unwise in my choice of gear of course.

Having energy efficent windows installed next week.
Not really sure what it means but if it stops the draughts thats fine by me.

We have always tried to go for the most efficient options. If you do your homework, you can usually buy a good quality appliance for a reasonable amount. for example, we recently bought a new dishwasher. It's triple A rated, and has a eco option. It's made by Siemens, which is exactly the same as Bosch and came with a free 5 year guarantee. It was £259, which is more than some, but substantially less than others of the triple A category. I think the answer is to try to use Which magazine and websites etc to find the most reliable/value for money then shop around to find the cheapest deal. we actually ended up buying ours in a local shop which was better value than any website. We also chose large load washing machine and tumble dryer, which we never run until full, which again saves energy and water. Hope this helps.

We have a Bosch fridge and washing machines. May be eco-friendly, but they're not very good. Seems to me that you don't save resources much if you have to keep rewashing things.

I found a cheap solution to a tumble dryer and saving energy, a washing line!!
I brought a new washing line of this site that specialises in new eco friendly washing lines and airers, which has made a big difference to our energy bills.
They have these cool folding ones that can go inside so you can even dry when the weather is not the best.

check out washing lines