Saturday in the market square - low carbon heating

Last Saturday I joined Cambridge Carbon Footprint on their stall in the Cambridge market square. Fortunately the weather was kind - not too hot and no rain to speak of. This was the second of CCF's four themed Saturdays covering shopping, energy, transport and food. I was using our new Low Carbon Heating Options materials (advice page here). I also used an updated 'What are we doing for Climate Change' survey while CCF were encouraging people to use their carbon footprint calculator and sign up to the Cambridge Climate Change Charter - when people came to the stall I invited them to do a 'quick' survey (ours) or the 'proper carbon footprint'. Finally, I had some materials on water saving as that is climate related too. So much to say! Here is the new low carbon heating poster.

From the survey - water saving, cycling and low meat diets are popular. 

You meet all sorts of different people on a stall like this and I had some good fun with the survey. We got the most ticks for 'I take short showers and/or I have a low flow shower head. It saves water as well as energy.' (11) followed closely by 'I always walk or cycle for short trips. It keeps me fit too.' (10). A lot of people said they had insulated/draught stripped their home to save energy (8). Practically everyone said they had changed their diet to eat less meat, even if not vegetarian or vegan. Surprisingly - to me anyway - four people ticked limiting their family size to reduce population growth. Of course people do not always do what they say they do, but then the survey acts as a little nudge. Seeing the other ticks shows that other people are doing it so why not them? 

Not everything got a lot of ticks. I was disappointed to meet only one person with an electric car (there are several in the energy group) and only six said they avoided air travel when going on holiday.

Yes heat pumps are expensive but they do work - and hydrogen might never happen.

I did manage quite a few conversations about low carbon heating. One was with a chap who informed me vociferously that heat pumps would never catch on as they are too expensive and don't work. I agree they are expensive, but the Clean Heat Grant, due to come in next year, will help with a voucher at install time. I do not agree with the bit about heat pumps not working. However, I could tell I was not going to change his mind so we chatted about the (im)practicality of the hydrogen option instead. I have heard from several sources heating engineers tell people not to worry about having a gas boiler because 'hydrogen is coming' but, well they would say that wouldn't they. Yes, you can get 'hydrogen ready' boilers now but being ready is one thing and actually making carbon savings quite another. We will not get hydrogen in the gas grid, for at least another 15 years, and even then it will not be as low carbon as you might think. (See Heat pumps or hydrogen: how do we decarbonise our heating?)

Warren Pope from RetrofitWorks is still working on getting Ecofurb in Cambridge.

We had a lot of home energy expertise on the stall, as we had Tom Bragg from CCF (and two other CCF people but Tom was the energy expert) and also Warren Pope from RetrofitWorks. I passed all the serious queries on to Warren as he has masses of experience and knowledge about retrofit for energy efficiency and also heat pumps. Warren is trying to get the Ecofurb plan tool rolled out to Cambridge - for the time being S. Cambs have it but not here in the city. I am sure he will succeed soon. The key thing about RetrofitWorks is that, although it is a co-operative scheme for industry and installers, it works for the benefit of householders too. It supports small businesses with all the bureaucracy around quality standards like PAS 2035 and they coordinate and oversee each project. I have written about this for CCF here. 

Getting advice too - switching to a fossil free pension.

You give advice and you get advice too. I had a long discussion with a gentleman about his experience switching his pension to avoid fossil fuel investments. The energy group has discussed investments in general but not pensions in particular. The scheme he ended up with is called PensionBee and I have resolved to take a look at that myself. It is astonishing how much we have invested in pensions, compared to the time we typically spend choosing and monitoring them. We leave it to the experts - but they don't make it easy to be sustainable as well as safe. Anyway, he also has a blog and you can read his story here.

Climate change is still in the news and it is important to showcase what we are doing.

Covid is not quite over yet, but climate change is not going away either. With the COP 26 coming up in November it is critical to build momentum for action - one way is to showcase what we are doing. If you get a chance to talk to your friends and family about climate change, take it and tell them what changes you have made in your life, and what you plan to do next. We need more than just the doom and gloom - we need the positive action too. Just this morning I was in a Local Climate Change Forum with other organisations and officers from Cambridge City Council. We talked about action plans and how to engage residents - that means us!