This is vaguely astronomical I suppose, but I’m feeling pretty smug because today we commisioned our new Solar water heating system. We had Solar PV installed back in October and last week we went over the 1 MWh barrier and that’s during the Winter months! That means we could have powered an old-fashioned 1kW bar fire for 1000 hours, or lit a 15W energy-efficient light bulb for over 7.6 years. In any language, we could have powered the average American family for about 100 days!
So, today, the Solar water system went live. It’s already heated a full tank of hot water to 50 degrees C in just the afternoon so we won’t need to turn on the gas-fired boiler at all tonight.
Last week we had the loft re-insulated to over a foot thick, and the pipes re-lagged for free! (Thanks Tesco). Last year the 20+ year-old windows were replaced with very efficient new UPVC double-glazed units, and the walls are cavity insulated. We work mainly from home, so the cars remains on the drive for much of the time. Two Labradors and Chickens eat nearly all our food waste, and what they don’t eat gets composted.
Yep – feeling pretty smug right now! Pictures below.
