visit the 'Power to save' website
Power to save
Go to www.powertosave.nsw.gov.au to check out the NSW Government’s subsidies to replace inefficient fridges, tvs and halogen downlights.
Make the most of increased energy rebates for low income households, families, people on life support, people with medical energy needs, and people in short term financial crisis.
Small businesses can also benefit from online training courses and halogen downlight replacement with subsidised LED lights.
Energy Saver Ideas
With the cost of energy increasing, it's not just for environmental reasons that it makes sense to improve the efficiency of our energy usage. Energy efficiency simply means using less energy to achieve the same result.
Council suggests a two-pronged approach to reducing your household energy consumption:
- Change your behaviour - this costs you nothing, and if practised regularly will deliver immediate and ongoing benefits
- Change your fixtures - doing so will often incur an up-front cost and any purchase decisions should be well-informed
Visit the Australian Government ‘Energy Made Easy’ website to compare your home power use and check if you’re paying too much for energy.
Please click on the headings below to expand/collapse the corresponding information.
Change your behaviour:
- Don’t use the remote to turn off appliances like TVs and DVD players as this only puts them to sleep. Use the power button on the unit instead.
- Create a ‘recharge station’ for phones, cameras and other hand-held devices. This reduces the chance of accidently leaving the charger on when it's not being used.
- Turn the computer off instead of leaving it to hibernate all day.
Did you know that cutting out standby power can slash the average household’s energy bill by up to 10 per cent?
Change your fixtures:
- Make energy efficiency a top priority when you’re purchasing products, appliances and equipment.
- Council has a free electronic waste recycling program. Simply take your old television, computer monitor and other e-waste to Stotts Resource Recovery Facility and all the components will be reclaimed, rather than ending up as landfill.
Further Information
Calculate your appliance running costs
Search and compare the efficiency of appliances
Change your behaviour:
- Every 1°C difference in temperature adds 10 per cent to heating/cooling costs and greenhouse emissions.
- Use the heater or air-conditioner as a last resort, and then only sparingly.
- Don’t cool below 25°C in summer or heat above 21°C in winter.
Change your fixtures:
- Add extra insulation to walls and ceilings, and keep cooler by using external shading such as eaves, awnings, shutters or trees to reduce heat gain by as much as 80 per cent.
Further Information
Find out how much energy your heating and cooling appliances use
Change your behaviour:
- Resist the urge to run a second fridge or freezer. Turn it on for busy holiday periods if necessary.
- Keep the coils at the back of the fridge clean and well ventilated to improve efficiency.
- Use water bottles to fill up empty space in your fridge or freezer. More mass in the fridge reduces the amount of cold air escaping when you open the door.
Change your fixtures:
- Consider replacing your old fridge. They can consume twice the energy of a new fridge.
Further Information
Search and compare the efficiency of appliances
Check out guidance for buying fridges and freezers
Change your behaviour:
- If you have an electric hot water heater, it’s likely that more than 30 per cent of your electricity consumption goes into making hot water. Save money by using less hot water. Installing water-efficient tapware, taking shorter showers and cold washing your clothes are the obvious solutions.
Change your fixtures:
- Replace your old electric hot water system with an energy efficient system that cuts your power bill and your carbon footprint
- Solar hot water systems use the sun's energy to heat water. Save an average of 3 tonnes of greenhouse gas emissions a year
- Hot water heat pumps use a refrigerant which boils at ambient air temperature to generate heat. Saves an average of 2.4 tonnes of greenhouse gas emissions a year
Further Information
Solar and Batteries
More than 30% of Tweed households have solar. The cost of solar panels has come down over 50% in the past 5 years. Federal government renewable energy credits, known as small-scale technology credits (STCs), can further reduce the purchase cost of solar panels.
There are several benefits to installing solar panels at your place:
- lower power bills: when you use your own solar power instead of buying electricity from your power retailer your energy costs will be lower
- income: electricity retailers will pay you a feed-in tariff for excess solar power that you add to the grid. Some energy retailers will offer you 'grid credits' for providing power to the grid at peak times
- environmental: using renewable sources of electricity can cut up to 60% of the average household's carbon footprint
- local economy: buying from local, reputable companies keeps local people employed and ensures you have local support for future maintenance if required.
If you're keen to make the most of the sun's power for electricity at your place, check out our handy list of questions to ask and online resources to get an effective system that suits you.
NSW Fair Trading also has advice about licence and contract rules when having solar panels installed.
Installing batteries to store solar power for use at your own home may be appealing. There are many factors to consider:
- Hybrid or off-grid: a hybrid system allows ongoing access to the grid, but ongoing network costs will affect the economics of a hybrid system. Off-grid systems need to have enough capacity in solar panels and battery storage to provide power during several days of cloud or rain.
- Grid connected ‘tariff arbitrage’: storing energy from the grid when it is cheap for use at a later point in time when it is expensive. This can only be done if you are on a ‘time of use’ electricity tariff, and only with solar/battery storage systems that enable you to charge your batteries using the grid.
Battery storage is a rapidly changing area. Seek information from a range of suppliers with appropriate electrical licences and Clean Energy Council accreditations. For more information check out:
Alternatively, switch to
Green Power. Contact your electricity supplier and ask them to source your electricity from renewable sources such as solar, wind, biomass and hydro.
Electric Vehicles
Carbon pollution from fossil fuel use in cars makes up over half of the greenhouse gas emissions from transport, which in turn makes up nearly 19% of NSW's greenhouse gas footprint.
Electric vehicles offer a low pollution solution compared to traditional cars. Despite the extra resources that go into an electric vehicle’s battery, 85% of an electric vehicle’s environmental impact comes from the fuel it uses. Even grid-powered electric vehicles have a lower carbon footprint than diesel and petrol vehicles. When electric vehicles are powered by GreenPower or solar, they are the best low-impact motorised passenger vehicle available.
Council would like to see more electric vehicle use in the Tweed. The ‘Power Up’ Northern Rivers Electric Vehicle Strategy, an initiative of
Sustain Northern Rivers, helps to understand the opportunities to support low emissions vehicle use in the region.
Download the strategy to find out more, or find out more online whether an electric car could be a good option for you:
https://www.canstarblue.com.au/energy/electricity/much-can-electric-cars-save/,
https://myelectriccar.com.au/faq/