National Energy Foundation

How Good is my Bank? Supporting local businesses and ethical brands are some of many things that individuals can do for a better future, but have you ever thought about the impact of choosing the right bank? Simply letting your money “lay around” in your bank account can have a huge impact on our environment. Banks use your money, whether held in an account, pension or other investments, to loan to or invest in other businesses, which are often not environmentally-conscious.

SUVs: the killers of climate? Sport Utility Vehicles or SUVs are a type of car classification that combines conventional road using passenger cars with features of off-road vehicles such as raised ground clearance and four wheeled drive. Due to their rising popularity, in the UK alone emissions from SUVs have tripled in the last decade and have gone from making up 18% to 42% of the global market of new cars within the last four years.

The benefits of choosing to consider the environment in home design Our planet is changing rapidly, and if we want to stand a chance of reducing the effects of climate change, we need to change the way we live our lives. We spend a lot of time in our homes, especially now that many of us are working from home, so sustainability is becoming an increasingly important focus in the construction and renovation industries.

Understanding the differences between different types of electric and hybrid cars Electric vehicles (EVs) and hybrids are becoming a common feature on the world’s roads, and their popularity has grown exponentially in recent years. With growing demand comes a broader range of options, and manufacturers are latching on to this contemporary shift in consumer behaviour.

Three ways your home office could be made more eco-friendly With the pandemic bringing a change to our working arrangements, professionals making the shift to home working have been given freedom over their office setup. For many people, this has given them the opportunity to personalise their working environment to suit their individual tastes and needs. But this new-found freedom to design your own space also presents an obvious opportunity to play your part in the fight against climate change.

How are cities adapting to accommodate for greater bike use? Cities have always been busy and densely populated. People flock there for work, or the opportunities that come for socialising and entertainment. However, in the modern world, a big population comes with big traffic issues, especially if many people are trying to drive cars. This can be a particular problem in older cities that were never designed to accommodate cars –- narrow streets and one way systems can quickly lead to a build-up.

A simple tweak to boilers could save households energy, without affecting their warmth The majority of condensing boilers in the UK aren’t running as efficiently as they should. They’re burning more gas, creating more emissions and costing households more money than they need to. But households can easily improve their boiler’s efficiency by lowering its flow temperature – the temperature at which boilers heat the water that gets sent to our radiators.

Internal vs. Solid Wall insulation – which is right for my property? Are you thinking about insulating your solid walls, but unsure whether internal or external insulation would be more suitable? We’ll be looking at some of the advantages and problems associated with each way of insulating a solid wall. Firstly, do you have a property with solid walls? If your property was built before the 1920s it’s likely to have solid walls.

Hydrogen: the fuel of the future? “Paving the way towards decarbonising the marine sector” (EMEC, 2018) The use of green hydrogen as a fuel for ferries is a new avenue, one that has never been carried out commercially in the UK. But off the remote archipelago of Orkney located 10 miles north of mainland Scotland, the ‘living laboratory’ provides the ideal location for this future development. At the forefront of renewable energy uptake, Orkney is a producer and supplier of green hydrogen.

Heat Decarbonisation in the home – what Scotland can learn from Denmark The Scottish Government has recently set an ambitious target – all of Scotland’s houses will be net zero by 2045. This means that the country needs to decarbonise Scottish homes quickly and fairly. In Scotland, the energy consumed from heating contributes to 13%  of overall CO2 emissions, and makes up 30% of overall energy consumption.