Climate Change Series: How to cut carbon out of your heating
- Shidonna Raven
- 4 hours ago
- 3 min read
By Shidonna Raven, Chief Editor
& Laura Cole, BBC
November 16, 2020
Source: BBC
Photo Source: Unsplash,
This Year w are bringing you Our 12 Months to 12 Climate Change Goals & New Habits Series. The series is designed to help you begin making simple and easy habit changing goals that can have a huge impact on your pocket and the environment, you are leaving to your children. We hope that you will be inspired to make your own Climate Change Goals and share them here with the community.
Climate Change can seem daunting as a whole, however, we are many. When we each make our own contribution, we believe these add up to huge numbers. Be inspired, encouraged and most of all enjoy yourself. Involve your children and help start thier own space online where they can engage in Climate Change Habits.
We recently brought you the Cooling (Homes/Buildings/Office) Series for the July & August Climate Change Habit Changing Goal to help reduce greenhouse gas emissions, This change can have a huge impact on Climate Change and is important Habit for Corporations and Community (Individuals) alike.
September is all about EnergyEfficiencies (at home, in the office and other buildings), which can have a huge impact on the environment. In September the 12 Month Habit forming Climate Change Goal is Solar Panels. Even if you decide to go another route, we invite you to learn more about Solar Panels. Solar Panels are having a huge impact in states and locations like California, that lead in such energy efficiencies. Choose carefully, in some cases Solar Panels have other environment impacts, some associated with production and longevity of usage. Heating and cooling can require a huge energy load depending on where you live and the weather differential.
Enjoy this Series, Apply what you have learned here and share the Journey with the community here by making posts and submitting photos and video to us. It could be featured on our eZine here. Also be a Climate Change Community Champions and share with your community and help empower them to make New Habit forming Climate Change Goals also in the community you share.
With many people spending more time than usual in their homes this year, how can the environmental cost of heating them be reduced?
When it comes to heating, retiree Lucy Craig’s bungalow in north London is high tech. A self-professed gadget lover, when she refurbished eight years ago, she was keen to find the most carbon friendly methods for keeping her home warm. She settled on heat pumps.
Outside her house, all that can be seen of the pump is an innocuous metal box. Inside the machine is a closed circuit of liquid that cycles in a pipe running from the box outdoors to a water tank indoors. This liquid is a refrigerant with a very low boiling temperature, so even winter air has enough energy to vaporise it. At the outdoor box, the heat pump fans air over the refrigerant, helping it to absorb heat, which it then transfers to the water tank inside the house.
Craig has one of these pumps to generate hot water for an underfloor heating system and another that generates hot water that runs from the taps. On her countertop, an owl-shaped monitor on the tells her how much she is using. It’s usually good news. Heat pumps use only around a quarter of the energy needed for a traditional gas boiler and Craig is able to get the electricity needed to keep the system running from solar panels she has had installed on her roof.
What makes heat pumps so efficient is the refrigerant gas inside the network of pipes. It flows through a cycle of evaporation and condensation as it absorbs heat from the air, turns to vapour and is then compressed with an electric-powered pump. This compression step helps to concentrate the energy stored in the refrigerant. When it gets inside, the refrigerant cools and condenses as it transfers its heat to the water in the inside tank.
How can you introduce more (organic or natural) fresh vegetables and fruits into your diet? How could this impact the environment? How could a home garden contribute to your and your family's overall health?
Share the wealth of health with your colleagues and friends by sharing this article with 3 people today.
If this article was helpful to you, donate to the Shidonna Raven Garden and Cook E-Magazine Today. Thank you in advance.
Comments