6 surprising energy hacks

There are some basic energy-saving tips that anyone who is conscious of their environmental footprint or looking to save money on bills  will have heard time and time again. These are not those. We’ve gone down the unbeaten track to gather six surprising energy hacks that will take your home’s sustainability levels to the next level.

Game, set, match. 

Pack your freezer tightly 

As counterintuitive as it may sound, the more you have in the freezer, the more efficient your freezer will be. Avoid buying an unnecessarily large fridge and start getting into the habit of freezing leftovers rather than throwing them out. In those instances where your freezer isn’t full, use newspaper, ice trays, ice packs or bags of ice to keep the space tightly packed.

Get stove smart 

The smaller the burner, the less energy it uses, so simply matching your pot size to the burner you’re using can save you a huge amount of energy. In addition, only boiling the amount of water you need and adding a pinch of salt to speed up the boiling process can save you energy, and cooking with the pot lid on for as long as possible will help speed up the process.

Use a slow cooker or microwave 

Despite the fact that slow cookers are on for hours on end and microwaves simply seem as though they would be energy suckers, in fact these smaller appliances use far less energy than the oven. Use these two time-savers and your wallet will benefit, too.

Light up the corners 

Make the most of your lighting by letting it bounce off the walls to brighten an entire room. Putting a light fixture, like a lamp, in the corner of a room with a lower-wattage bulb will provide your room with an amount of light similar to that given off by a more powerful bulb in the middle of the room.

Redecorate around your heating and cooling 

If you have curtains or furniture blocking the heating  vents in your home, you’ll find yourself cranking up the thermostat more often than you really need to. Shuffle things around to allow for at least 30 centimetres of space so the air can get out and flow through your home.

Close your apps, use airplane mode and unplug your phone charger 

Our smartphones demand a lot of charging and can suck up more energy than we realise. Cut this down by closing all your apps to conserve battery, swapping to airplane mode while you’re charging to speed up the process and unplugging your phone charger when it’s not in use.

Making sure you’re on the best value energy plan can also help you keep costs down.