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Cornwall tops eco car buying charts

Do you consider yourself to be an environmentally conscious driver? How about when it comes to buying your next car?

Well if you feel your green credentials slipping with the second question then you are not alone.

New research has shown that although 85% of motorists would like to do their bit for the environment when buying a new car, just 6% cite that the cars’ green credentials is the key decision maker when it comes to the crunch.

But with the deadline looming for the UK to meet challenging carbon dioxide (CO2) reduction targets under the Kyoto Protocol, and 35 million vehicles on Britain’s roads accounting for a fifth of the country’s total CO2 emissions, now is the time to take action.

The EU has set a target for the UK to have cars emitting below 130 grammes of CO2 per kilometre by 2015, currently the figure stands at 150.01g/km in Hertfordshire and car manufacturers are really starting to play their part.

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Best TVs – Tube, LED, LCD or Plasma

Energy Efficiency

From an energy conservation point-of-view LED televisions win hands down, they top nearly all our energy saving charts in all size categories, followed by LCD TV’s. LED should have a longer life due to the use of LEDs to backlight the screens. LCD TVs use fluorescent tube technologies, which have a shorter lifespan.

Tube, LED, LCD or Plasma

Best looking televisions – Tube, LED, LCD or Plasma

Plasmas are the most energy hungry, however their energy consumption does vary depending on what is being displayed (bright images use more energy than dark scenes) unlike LCD and LED TVs, which use a constant flow of power. So if you watch dark films you’ll be using less electricity!

Picture Quality

LCD pictures have improved greatly since they where first introduced. They still suffer from poor contrast ratios, meaning the blacks look grey. LED’s have better blacks at the expense of looking to monotone. Both technologies struggle when displaying images that aren’t their native resolution e.g. standard definition broadcasts on a high definition screen. Unlike a good old tube television, which display the most natural looking images. Plasmas still offer the best looking real life pictures with inevitable power overhead.

Sound

Audio quality is one area that flat screen televisions do disappoint, due to the nature of their design. Space and volume are required to generate good quality bass – which modern screens don’t have!

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“Watt no energy labels?” from the One Planet Home!

A recent trip to my local B&Q DIY store revealed that retailers talk green, whilst still trying to shift potentially inefficient tumble dryers without even displaying energy labels! Right next to the offending White Knight tumble dryers was a huge display explaining the virtues of the energy labelling system; great message if your products are displaying them! It looks to me that they are more interested in “stack ’em high, sell ’em cheap” and don’t worry when the bills come in!

No energy labels on White Knight Tumble dryers in B&Q

Energy labels for White Knight Tumble dryers missing at B&Q

We even tried to add these 3kg White Knight tumble dryers to the sust-it energy efficiency database, so consumer could see what they cost to run. The only problem is White Knight don’t even publish the energy rating on their website – I wonder why!

White Knight Tumble Dryer 3kg

We can’t estimate what this is going to cost to run!

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Playstations Slimdown their energy consumption

Playstation 3 PS2 PS1 power usage

Playstation PS1 PS2 PS1 energy consumption

We’ve been testing the latest slimline Playstation 3 to see if the energy efficiency is improving – which it is! The slimline version of the PS3 showed a 36% decrease when playing an online game, compared to the original fat version of the PS3. Plus a 31% improvement in it’s standby performance too!

Even the old PS2 which is still sold as a shrunk down version, has dramatically improved it’s energy efficiency with an overall reduction of electricity consumption by 60% ! You could watch a DVD on a Slimline PS2 for an amazing 12.5 watts per hour, compared to 128.4 watts on the original PS3.

It still bares no resemblance to what the original Playstation 1’s energy consumption was. An hour’s retro gaming on Crash Bandicoot only uses 6.3 watts! Cracking fun.

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Our Best Energy Efficient Products for Energy Saving Week

Keep your electricity bills under control with our best ranking eco electricals in 2010:

1/ Washing Machines – Panasonic NA-168VG2
2/ Tumble Dryers – Siemens WT46W566
3/ Wash Dryers – Hoover HDB854D
4/ Larder Fridges (Medium sized) – Siemens KI25RP60
5/ Chest Freezers (Medium sized) – Liebherr GTP2356
6/ Fridge Freezers (Medium sized) – Gorenje RF60309O
7/ Television 40 inch – Sharp LC-40LE821E
8/ Satellite Set-Top Box HD – Grundig GUFSDTR500HD
9/ Blu-ray / HD-DVD Players – Samsung BD-P4600
10/ Desktop Computer – Apple Mac mini (MC270LL)

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