The main source of heat in our home is a wet-back log burner in the living room. It’s fantastic at its job when loaded with tea tree logs and a load of dried pine cones. The fact that it is wet-back, means we save on our electrical water heating costs as well.

Recently, however, the log burner was out of service for several days while we waited for a chimney sweep to visit. This occured during a really cold spell in Auckland and I am forced to admit we plugged the small, pretty hopeless electric heater in. Its inefficiency meant we wanted to keep its use to an absolute minimum (rightly so, as, even after the minimal use we gave it, it still added $40 to our electricity bill!), so I came up with the following five home heating alternatives:

1. Do the vacuuming
By far the best, this one. You’re going to do it anyway, so it might as well be when you’re cold. Have you ever noticed how much heat those things pump out? Plus, almost as a bonus, you get your carpets all nice and dust-free!

2. Bake a cake
In my experience, ovens are pretty good at making heat. I’m not saying try to preheat it with the door open, but you won’t be disappointed with the heat that huge chunk of metal sat in your kitchen gives off with a pan of cake mixture inside. You can even boil the kettle and enjoy the cake once the work is all done!

3. Have a bath
Treat yourself to a nice, hot (warning: not too hot!) bath. When you’re done, leave the water in it until cold. It will help!

4. Exercise!
Now is the time to follow the government’s advice and do some exercise. 1000 press ups or sit ups ought to do it, but beginners can start at ten and see how these warm them. Hopefully you’ll be eager for more by the end!

5. Insulate things
Although home insulation is a great idea, I’m talking about other things here. Like yourself. Try investing in a fleece or some possum-wool socks and wearing those around the house. Put an extra blanket on your bed. Or maybe an extra duvet…

So there you go. Next time you are stuck for some heat in the home, give these a try and you’ll be sure to survive the winter. And become stronger for it too. And a better person.

Yesterday afternoon, NZ time, a guy came round to our house, asked me a load of questions, complimented our toilets, tried the shower, asked me some more questions, gave us a load of free lightbulbs and then drove off!

Now, I realise that this may sound like an account of a dream I had yesterday afternoon, while slumped out on the cosy lounge suite, but I promise you: it definitely happened!

The visit was down to EcoMatters Environment Trust, a charitable trust based in Waitakere, West Auckland that aims to aid those wanting live a more sustainable lifestyle. We first heard about the offer of a free Sustainable Home Check at the monthly market here in Swanson (coincidently on our first weekend in Swanson, as ‘Westies’!). An project called ‘ Sustainable Ranui – Swanson’ had a stall and introduced us to their ideas and offered us the free visit.

The visit was most impressive. Our advisor began by asking questions about our property, before moving on to questions based on our water and energy usage habits. He then began the practical tests, such as measuring how much water our shower passed in a minute, the temperature of our fridge and freezer, checking our water thermostat setting and our home insulation.

The whole process represented extremely good value for money, seeing as it cost nothing, and to then receive a number of freebies, such as re-usable shopping bags, an water aerator for a tap and some low-energy lightbulbs was extremely useful (haters, take note, these are NOTHING like the original energy saving bulbs. They have been vastly improved since you last ‘used’ them. There is definitely no need to ring up Newstalk ZB when the Prime Minister is on and waste his precious air time with stupid questions like “Are you going to make us all use energy saving lightbulbs?” like one lady recently did!).

The whole process helped slam home to me that New Zealand is definitely a world leader when it comes to environmental and community initiatives. I would urge anybody who qualifies (Waitakere City residents, I believe) for a free home sustainability check to book one in right away. It will cost you nothing and will save you more.