Rising fuel costs, fuel poverty & managing energy consumption

Rising fuel costs and and fuel poverty are a serious concern for us all as we start to head into the winter months. However, this is sadly not a new issue. Exactly 10 years ago the Government of the day and in this instance local authorities such as Birmingham City Council (BCC) were using different digital tools to look at ways in which to support their vulnerable tenants with rising fuel costs and the ill-health associated with cold homes.

We were working with BCC and the Digital Birmingham team to implement the Property Log Book® as an engagement tool to help tenants better understand their energy consumption and costs and how to better manage these. Combined with this there was an element of improving occupants understanding of how their property should perform, how to use their boiler and heating system and what they could do to help keep their costs down.  Here we are with Annette King and  Ed Davey MP who was Secretary of State for Energy & Climate Change at the time, now a Sir. Annette was demonstrating the Property Log Book® and how it worked.

Here you can hear from Baron Barker, who was Minister of State for Energy and Climate Change, when BCC were looking at introducing the Green Deal, again using our Property Log Book® LINK.

This was further reflected in our other work with Scottish Water where we worked on 3 water and energy smart metering projects. Again to understand ways in which to support and advise people on energy consumption, the associated costs and building performance. Education and information combined with hard data can be used to help people. Different interventiosn were introduced depening on the house type and occupancy of the property to understand ways in which to support people to better manage their water and energy costs. Wates is the most expensive thing to heat in your home.

Property portals, such as the Property Log Book®  should also be used for other benefits such as smart metering combined with property data and occupancy data. Then you can start to deliver meaningful advice.  Too many property portals are only focused on the sales process, not what other wider benefits there are to home owners and occupants.