Louisa Pearson: ‘You’ll expend so much energy arguintg you won’t notice the cold’

Back in the 1950s, housewives were freed from a life of drudgery thanks to appliances we now take for granted. Instead of requiring hours of physical energy, everyday chores were carried out by machines that used electricity instead. While women sipped cocktails and transformed themselves from Nora Batty into Diana Dors, energy bills began to rise – and they haven’t stopped since. These nostalgic musings were born in anticipation of Energy Saving Week (www.energysavingtrust.org.uk), which begins tomorrow. The Energy Saving Trust (EST) has a recession-inspired theme this year of reducing energy use in a bid to cut household bills.

The clocks will soon go back, meaning months of cold, dark misery. I envy bears their hibernation. How’s a girl to cope without switching on all the lights, cranking up the heating and regularly flicking on the telly to check Jason Donovan’s progress on Strictly? EST has many suggestions for more appropriate ways to behave, including doing housework. Apparently it will “keep you fit and warm inside”. While dusting, you could check all your bulbs are energy-saving ones; when cleaning your windows you might want to see if you could plug gaps around the frames with draught-proofing strips. Likewise, while wiping the skirting boards you can switch off any electricals left on standby. My inner 1950s housewife is shuddering. She never dreamed that, half a century after washing machines and hoovers released her from her shackles, she would be expected to slave again in order to pay the bills run up by her labour-saving devices.

We appear to have found ourselves in a bit of a pickle. A new report by EST shows that, despite increased awareness of energy-efficient products, householders in Scotland are consuming more energy than five years ago. We own three and a half times as many appliances and gadgets as 20 years ago. If each household replaced three appliances with EST-recommended models, it would save £50 million on fuel costs. Unfortunately, most of us are too busy worrying about how we’re going to afford the winter’s heating bills to start splashing out on shiny new kitchen appliances.

Tips from EST fall into two categories: technical and common sense (also known as the bleedin’ obvious). In the latter are things like putting on an extra sweater, eating hot soup, closing the curtains and gathering all the family in one room while turning down the heating in the rest of the house. This might see you all merrily engaging in 1950s family favourites like playing Monopoly or snakes and ladders. Then, when arguments start along the lines of “This is boring, why can’t I switch on the Xbox?”, you’ll end up expending so much energy arguing you won’t notice the cold.

I have no idea if anyone acts on statistics, but tempting energy-saving morsels include the fact that insulating your hot water tank can save around £40 and 170kg of carbon dioxide a year. Turning appliances off at the plug when not in use saves on average around £35 per year and 120kg of C02 .

Finally, if every home in the UK turned down their thermostat by one degree, collectively we could save £705m a year on energy bills. Let’s do it! With all the money I'm saving, I'll be able to invest in a nice, warm 1950s-style twinset to make up for that one degree.