Why are there no viable nuclear power plants for the home?


A "Mr Fusion" device from the movie Back To The Future.

Whenever you talk about renewable energy, it's impossible to avoid a very particular strain of reply-guy. The "Nuclear is really good actually" dude is convinced that you have critically misunderstood Our-Lord-And-Saviour Uranium. Nukes are clean! They are cheap! They are safe and healthy! They are brilliant! Nuclear power will save us all! Look, I 100% […]

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I think "Law 3.0" is OK, actually


An electric car charging at a public charger.

I recently came across a post about "The Energy Bill 2023 and the Fusion of Technology and Law - We are going to be governed under 'Law 3.0', and we won't like it one little bit". It is a superficial look at the "horrors" of being governed by technical measures. It starts off reasonably enough […]

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1 year of @edent_solar. We are 100% offset!


A generation meter showing 4,165kWh.

Our domestic solar panels have generated more electricity in a year than we have consumed. We installed 5kW of solar panels on our roof in 2020. Half are East-facing, half West-facing. Over a full year, they've generated 4,165kWh. By comparison, the average UK household uses about 3,800kWh of electricity per year. But working out exactly […]

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Is a smart electricity tariff worth it?


A graph of energy consumption.

(Long and data-filled post ahead!) I've switched to energy provider Bulb (£50 off if you join using that link). They offer a "peak time" electricity charge which looks like this: 23:00 to 07:00 = £0.0815/kWh 07:00 to 16:00 = £0.1235/kWh 16:00 to 19:00 = £0.3263/kWh 19:00 to 23:00 = £0.1235/kWh By contrast, the standard tariff […]

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What if your Internet Connected Fridge came with free electricity?


A bit of future-gazing which I can't be bothered spinning into a 15,000 word Gartner report. In the UK we have a competitive electricity market. Only one set of wires comes to your house, but you can buy your electricity from a number of providers. Some only offer organic, corn-fed, Wind Farm power - others […]

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Can You Power an iBeacon with a Lemon?


Photo of ten lemons wired up to a multimeter.

This is a necropost - resurrected from the now defunct blog of a previous employer. Sadly, most of the photos have fallen down the memory hole. So use your imagination. Energy efficiency is the next battleground for electronics. As the price of electricity soars, people will become less and less enamoured with charging their devices […]

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It's The Little Things Which Make An App


I've been a big fan of Ovo Energy since switching to them last year. They email me a PDF statement, pay me 3% interest on any overpayments, and have their call centre waiting times displayed prominently on their homepage. So, when they announced their new app, I was expecting something a little bit special. And […]

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How Our Solar Panels Have Performed After 1 Year


Last year, Liz and I took the plunge and had Solar Panels installed on the house we rent out. I've been tracking their progress, and so now it's time for our yearly update. We based our estimations on the Europa Solar Calculator which estimated that they would generate around 2,700 kWh per year. Annoyingly, we […]

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Humm Energy Monitor Set Up – Part 5 – Data Visualisation


After my disastrous attempt to upload data under Ubuntu, I found a Windows laptop to upload my energy usage data. The good news is that Sam from Humm is actively working on making the Adobe Air upload application work under Linux. So, how does the process of uploading your data to the service work? The […]

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Humm Energy Monitor Set Up – Part 4 – Data Upload


So, I've hit my first snag with the Humm Duet Energy monitor.  As I mentioned in my first post, the device doesn't have any Internet connectivity.  Instead it records everything onto an SD card. In order to visualise the data, I have to manually upload the files to the Green Energy Options MyEnergy site.  Rather […]

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