Energy efficient reptile keeping?

[Sputnik]

I love my wonderful collection of snakeys, lizards, dragons, etc. but I have always had this niggling worry about electricity costs in the back of my mind.
Sure enough I had a letter from my electricity company yesterday, saying that they will increase my monthly standing order by £20 ($39). That's a heck of a lot of money.

My supplier is Ecotricity, so at least the energy is produced via wind turbines but I still worry about my hobby having an adverse effect on the environment.

Is there any way that I can keep the energy usage lower? My garters only have heat mats, the babies get natural light, the adult enclosure is lit with a low energy bulb, but of course apart from the python, who has no artificial light, every other reptile has heat mats, thermostats, UV lights and basking spots. Eeek.

[drache]

thanks for bringing that up
I've been mulling over the same thing
I like to give some of my species basking lights
yet I know that that is probably the most wasteful kind of heat
I imagine that mats and tape are probably the most efficient

[adamanteus]

I think the most energy efficient method is provide a good ambient 'background' temperature in a well insulated reptile room. Thus minimising the need for supplementary heating.

[Sid]

James brings up a good point. My reptile room was originally an open carport. I built it in and added a window heat and air unit to control the room temp without keeping the entire house overly hot. This is the only heat source that I use and have not had any problems in three years now.

[Lori P]

LOL-- this is so funny-- my hubby has been teasing me for months, telling me I was causing our electric bill to shoot up with all these heat lamps and stuff. So I proved him wrong by showing him that last year at this time, we actually used MORE electricity than this year with the reptiles!!

[Sputnik]

Tell me how you do it, Lori, pleeeeease!

My daughter and I have been trying to convince our boys to "carbon offset" and ensure that they cut down on using electricity in other parts of the house and being more conscious about switching off lights, keep things off standby, etc.

I sadly don't have the space to have a separate reptile room, I haven't even got a room for each of my children, so have taken to sleeping on the sofa, lol. And I must say, I prefer to keep the animals in the living room where I can see them all the time.


Would anyone know which light/ heat providers are more energy efficient than others while still providing all the animals need? Fluorescent lightstrips compared to bulbs use less energy for example, don't they?

[Stefan-A]

Wooden enclosures keep the heat better, cohabitate if possible, use a single source for both light and heat, supplement lighting with LEDs if necessary.

I dunno.

[Sputnik]

There are drops that are supposed to eliminate the need for uv lighting, maybe that's one way to cut out at least one bulb per viv?

[adamanteus]

Stefan raises another good good point in that wooden vivs retain the heat better. Mine are wooden, illuminated with a fluorescent strip and heated from below by a cable.... but to be honest the cable rarely switches on, as the light gives enough heat in the wooden viv.

[Elliot]

I'm not sure if this would really help you at all, but you can buy heat lamps with dimmers that you can change the flow of electricity with, and you can also manage temeratures better. Just a suggestion.