purple |
Just been forced to buy a new washing machine. It is apparently very energy efficient compared to the second hand and regrettably short lived one it replaced. I’ve been using the carbon account to monitor my emissions and unfortunately I was right about its actual energy consumption. Gas has gone down by about .2kg per day and electricity has gone up 1kg. So my ‘energy efficient’ new appliance will emit over 170kg extra co2. I’ve dropped the difference a bit (0.8 to 0.5)to allow for the rather large number of loads I had to do to cover the 2 week search for a suitable second hand one.
I’m now going to have a nice walk up to the allotment to take out a bit of carbon rage on some mostly defenceless weeds. Followed by a cold shower and seriously considering making a complaint to the advertising standards to stop the manufacturers making false claims and force them to start making actually efficient washing machines again. If I had a thermal solar panel/heat pump I’d be hopping mad at this point.
Will update when I have some more readings put in to see if this carries on.
Hot and cold feeds for washing machines
david
Yes, it seems most new washing machines only take a cold water feed and then heat it using electricity – we’ve discussed in Sevenoaks a bit. Its a good example of non-joined-up thinking, and a slip backwards in energy efficiency. What to do apart from “carbon rage”?! If anyone knows of new washing machines that take both hot and cold feeds, then please post it up.
Interesting you can pick up this quite small effect using the Carbon Account – shows how useful these tools can be in tracking and making visible the effects of changes you make.