Archive for November, 2009

Noisy in bed ?

26Nov09

Overall I am a solid fan of these energy saving lamps (CFL).  Until recently I have never experienced in the home the industrial buzzing noises of the old strip-light tube magnetic ballasts. But there is only one place when a lamp is next to my ear.  It’s a bed side lamp using a 7w CFL […]


ALOT ! Phew, the days holding a spare 100w incandescent bulb under the kitchen sink are long gone.  So how many types of bulbs do you need nowadays ? Here’s a short list I started but never finished,…… GU10 50w, 20w halogen GU10 11w megaman G9 50w halogen capsule G9 11w megaman T5 and  T8 […]


After looking at and rejecting solar panels for myself, I stumbled over a combo-effort called PVT. From the US sites the numbers look very good and overall it just sounds like a better idea all round. Solar PVT or PV-T, means the getting best of both worlds thermal + photovoltaic together, in fact there are […]


I love this article on ‘solar air heaters’ here are some site links. http://sites.google.com/site/mysticsolar/Home/how-it-was-made-2 http://www.theselfrelianthome.com/articles/20/solar-air-heaters I reckon I should take feather out these guy’s practical can-do caps.  Instead of googling, reviewing, shopping, why not just make your own and have fun drinking beer cans.  It’s a perfect re-cycling project and it works. What is it […]


Everyone loves the convenience of wireless, it’s just great, quick to get going, even better for the likes of myself that changes their mind and thinks up a better arrangement or location. Just recently I must admit that I have started going back to wired for a number of things, looks like wireless ain’t without […]


I thought it would be worth looking at how much energy we use for cooking, especially now we have several weeks of data to drill into and analyse.  Tastey stuff. So using the beta dashboard from my Brultech ECM-1240 power monitor I can easily focus into the electrical power used by the electric oven/grill, microwave […]


I like XP embedded, there are many strong cases for using it, especially to get XP running on minimal resources to get volume device costs down whilst still having the benefits and flexibility of a mainstream OS. But, for low volumes and in particular one-off system builds XP embedded is a hassle.  So is this […]


The kids are really into the xbox360 COD game. I found this out because the long strip of AA duracells disappeared faster than the chocolate muffins that never seem to last the journey home from the supermarket. Common sense suggests rechargeables shall be used for the wireless controllers which where responsible for the locust like […]


Lets indulge our selves in pro-managment-strategy blue sky thinking and get a formal methodogy and energy plan.  Okay, enough ! stop right now, in layman’s terms here is my call,…… Motivate (start to care about) be honest, it is not the easiest to get people excited here –  too busy, too many excuses ++ easy […]


Cheating

07Nov09

As ever, some people just take it too far and get a bit too competitive, although I have yet to meet an energy cheater yet. Here’s what some cheaters (would) get up saving energy, all no-no’s in my book. The unspeakable illegal connection Live forever in the pub/church/friends house Never open the fridge Lounge Duvet […]


Shower saver

07Nov09

Anyone remember the old Cussons Imperial leather ‘luxury’ adverts, before the catchline ‘because your worth it’.  You’ve probably guessed my conclusion already. There is a little flow reducing device called the showersaver which reduces the water flow (if your lucky enough to have a gushing shower in the first place). Obviously less hot water used […]


After being impressed with the NISE 3110 I blogged about earlier, Nexcom have realised a cut-down atom based unit which looks ideal for industrial client stations. The unit is smaller at 185mm (W) x 132mm (D) x 50mm (H).  Even though there is less connectivity there is still gigabit ethernet and 3 serial ports and […]


Okay, at the time of writing the long touted Goggle powermeter is only available to the select few.  It seems they want the large utilities to bring it through to the masses. It is not open as far as I can see to the nosey techies. Not too worry, I have been a long admirer […]


Just a late to to say times change and I am now a solar PV yes-man Check out the update here,  old blog still below ….. Undeterred our Eco-green-warrior looked further in search of new ways to reduce the damming carbon footprint. Next under the spotlight is Solar PV.  So is it worth investing in […]


< Update planned … look out for update as financial justification changes due to proposed Renewables Heat Incentive> All this energy monitoring gets you a bit green under the collar.  So I decided to assess Solar hot water as an option to reduce my carbon footprint and maybe boost the beer kitty. It is a […]



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