February 2015 – I Should Probably Change

People and energy

Last week I finished my blog by pondering the human cost of our energy consumption. There’s the questions of fair pay and fair pricing but then I came across Ebico. Thanks here have to go to Rachel Ingle for directing me towards them. I haven’t come across any other company like them so though this blog might sound one sided it’s because it is!

Ebico are the UK’s only not-for-profit energy company. They are seeking to reduce people living in fuel poverty, that is those who can’t afford the cost of fuel or are forced into poverty due to high bills. They are attempted to face the issue that with most energy companies the poorest people nearly always end up paying more because they often use pre-payment meters. More well off people get discounted prices because they pay by direct debit (making them a much safer bet for the energy companies).

The money bit

Ebico have one flat-rate which you pay no matter whether you are on a meter or pay by direct debit. They promise to keep their prices competitive and currently advertise their average prices as £848.19 a year for a low energy user and £1,307.02 for medium use. By my (somewhat haphazard) calculations that makes them a bit more expensive then other suppliers, but I suppose they are aiming at people form who the issue of fuel poverty is important and who want to use their money to make a difference. They have no standing charge so you only pay for what you use, therefore turning lights off will actually make a difference to your bills.

Energy with a conscience

As well as giving fairer prices to people of meters they have also set up a trust to support initiatives to improve the energy efficiency of the homes of low income householders and offer support and advice on saving energy. A list of the current projects they are funding can be found here.

I found an interesting interview with their founder, minister Hugh Lee where he explains the heart behind the company. It’s worth a read, especially if you need encouraging that not all energy companies are out to make as much money as possible!

The down-side

Now to the negatives, while Ebico’s principles are great and I think is amazing they even exist after doing so much research into green energy I had to take a look into that! Unfortuntely they are still relatively low on the renewable side of things, using only 24% compared to 44% coal, they do however use significantly less nuclear (only 2%), here’s the Good Energy’s fuel mix for comparison.

So I go into this week with a conundrum. Basically my choice is go green or fight fuel poverty, it seems I can’t do both…

To green or not to green?

I’ve spent some serious time trying to research the issues surrounding energy. An initial glance tells me that going ‘green’ is the most promoted of the ethical issues surrounding energy. With this in mind I’m going to focus this blog on what it means to be green. Next week I’m going to take a look at some questions that might have got lost in the shadow of ‘green’.

What is Green Energy?

I’m going to start right from the beginning since maybe some of you out there are as clueless as me! Green energy is any power that comes from sustainable sources (wind power, solar etc). The effect of carbon emissions on the world’s atmosphere are well documented but fossil fuel usage is the main culprit, in fact carbon dioxide emissions from power stations account for one third of the total produced.

The challenge of course is that the wealthy fraction of the world (of which we in the UK are part) have access to cheap energy however this energy contributes to climate change which has devastating results not for those of us who use it but for the poorest in the world. The evidence of floods, drought and other climate related problems through much of the world is rarely far from our TV screens.

What makes a company ‘green’?

So I think most of us know moving towards more greener sustainable forms of fuel is really important, in fact the lives of our brothers and sisters on the other side of the world quite literally depend on it. But how does it actually work? Well when I buy green fuel clearly it’s the same old gas and electric coming from the pipes and wires. The difference is that I’m now paying a different supplier. This supplier buys energy for the supply chain, if a company is green then they promise to buy a certain amount of energy from Green sources. Most companies offer this option however if differs how much they promise to buy, for example a ‘green tarrif’ could promise to buy £30 worth of green energy for every £100 you spend. Of course the best companies buy £100 for every £100 which leads me to look at some green options. This is explained much better here.

Looking into energy options feels totally overwhelming, there are just so many companies and tariffs offering green options. After reading lots and getting some recommendations I’ve narrowed it down to three options, as always I’m no expert, I’m just trying to wade my way through this stuff and make it slightly more coherent!

Ovo (Greener Energy)– This has been recommended by lots of people. Their website is great but in terms of being green only the Green Tariff is 100% renewable most of the other tariff’s are only 15%. This page shows where they get their energy from.

Ecotricity– Over the last six years, Ecotricity have invested more per customer per year in building new sources of renewable energy than all other UK suppliers put together. They will give £40 to Tearfund if you take up electricity or gas, or £60 to if you switch to their dual fuel option.

Good Energy – They come top on Ethical Consumer and The Good Shopping Guide. They are ethically accredited which means they have jumped through lots of tight hoops. The most important things is they are the only UK electricity supplier to use 100% renewable energy. They are trying to ‘make a difference to climate change’ and use many independent generators, lots more here.

What I found interesting is that all the ethical ratings for renewable energy companies focus on their green output and whether they fund nuclear power. While this is really important it’s interesting that the ratings for ethical issues surrounding people only take into account armaments or political donations (see below). This is something I will take a look at more in my next blog!

Clueless about energy

You join me at the beginning of my third challenge. This month I’m going to be looking into the ethics of energy both gas and electric.

We currently get everything from EDF who from a customer service and pricing point of view have actually being pretty good but a quick bit of research has shown me that they are the top offender in the ethical energy stakes!

There’s been a lot in the news about the ‘Big 6’ cutting their prices so I’ll be interested to see how companies outside those six are fairing. We are on a pretty tight budget so I’m keen to find out what makes energy ethical or not but I will be realistic that we can’t afford to up our energy bills much, I will try to be honest about this challenge!

It’s slightly embarrassing to admit that my knowledge of green energy comes from secondary school geography so that’s about 15 years out of date! Hopefully over the next month I can remedy this huge hole in my knowledge and suss out what buying from a green supplier actually means.

I need all the help I can get with this one so if you have any tips please do comment and set me in the right direction.

Haircare update

In December I looked into how to make more ethical choices with the shampoos and conditioners I bought. You can catch up on all the ethical questions I considered here.

I’ve now nearly two months into this particular ‘ethical change’ so I thought it would be good to do a little bonus update because I’ve always wanted this blog to be honest about the challenges of attempting to be ethical.

I started out using Body Shop (my reasons are here). While the products were great, and I’m sure would be perfect for a lot of people, I found that I was increasing frustrated with how my hair was feeling. My hair is thick and curly and it felt like the shampoo wasn’t really cutting it. My hair is the one thing I wear everyday so I was determined for it not to be a source of annoyance plus surely ‘settling’ for a product just because it was ethical was never what this blog was about?

I decided to take a trip to Lush to see what they had to offer. I came away totally converted! Lush should really be offering training on their secrets of customer service because they excel at it. The staff were SO friendly, really helpful (and not in a pushy way) and above all refreshingly honest about their personal opinion on products. I was directed to Daisy because she has similar challenges with thick curly hair. She gave me her tips on what worked for her and walked me through the ethics of Lush (I’d explained about this blog).

I walked away with;

– a bar of shampoo – using a solid bar has been really interesting but quite fun! Does include SLS which is another ethical minefield but Lush explains why they use it really well here.

– a ’Big Solid Conditioner’ – strange to use after getting so used to the silkiness of liquid conditioners.

– Jungle conditioner bar – smells AMAZING!

– R&B hair moisturiser – used after washing as an extra treatment.

I probably spent more than I normally would in one go however I’m hoping these will last me a while, the shampoo bar claims to do 80 washes which is the equivalent of 3 bottles of shampoo. The result – well my hair is feeling lighter and cleaner. The combo of Jungle and R&B means is feels a little more tamed without relying extra styling products. I know my hair will never be described as ‘under control’ but this is definitely helping!

All of this has taught me to persevere and look for the right product rather than sticking with something just because it’s ethical.