The major contributor to climate change is our energy use – and its heavy reliance on fossil fuels. The burning of the fossil fuels creates carbon dioxide, a greenhouse gas which subsequently warms up the climate.
To address this, people in the borough of Hounslow can play our part in reducing the use of fossil fuels in our daily lives.
For our cars we can transition as quickly as possible from having petrol and diesel cars. These can be replaced by electric cars, or better still we can choose to walk, cycle or use the good public transport we have in the borough of Hounslow.
Locally, our home heating is dominated by the use of natural gas. We need to transition as quickly as possible to using electric heating – which will primarily be heat pumps in this area.
Changing our transport and home heating are the biggest energy uses in our lives where we can quickly do things to reduce our impact on the climate.
Changing our energy use can have some consequences that we can also help with. It is projected that with the increased use of electric vehicles and heat pumps, that our electricity distribution network will be put under stress across West London. This is exacerbated by the area having increasing demands from new housing developments and data centres.
The stress on the electricity distribution network is primarily at times of peak usage. We can reduce this stress by shifting some of our usage of electricity from peak times to periods of lower demand. Some electricity supply tariffs already reward this behaviour, and such tariffs are likely to increase. This shifting of usage is of particular importance in households with electric cars and heat pumps. Hounslow Green Party took part in University College of London research to show significant changes in household usage patterns can be achieved even without these additional uses.
Another big measure that householders can help with is for those with poorly insulated homes to do the simpler things to insulate them including double glazing, cavity wall insulation and loft insulation. In poorly insulated homes, these measures have a good return on the investment. From a local energy point of view, they also allow households to be more effective in moving home heating demand away from peak periods – thus saving the stress on the electricity network – and potentially getting electricity at cheaper rates.
Unfortunately, we are not in a good position in the borough of Hounslow to generate much of our own electricity. We are going to have to largely rely on importing electricity generated elsewhere in the country and via international links.
The most promising local generation method is solar panels. Solar panels are useful in the overall country’s electricity mix, but do not help much with the stress on the local electricity distribution network. This is because the main peaks on the local electricity network happen in the middle of the winter when the home solar panels in the area are generating very little or no electricity. While solar panels may not be the best investment for the UK’s energy system, they can, with and without battery systems, be economic for the household.
Finally, one of the major things that can be done now, with no investment, is just to do less. Large reductions in household energy use can be achieved by travelling less and turning down the thermostat in our homes.
Tony Firkins
14 July 2025