Easy Ways to Reduce Your Carbon Footprint

Thinking of effective ways to reduce your carbon footprint and play your part in helping to reduce carbon emissions can be daunting. To help you learn how to decrease your carbon footprint, we take a look at what carbon emissions are and provide you with some easy tips to help reduce your carbon footprint.

What are Carbon Emissions? 

Remember learning about the greenhouse effect in school? The greenhouse effect is a process that occurs when gases in the Earth’s atmosphere trap the sun’s heat. This process makes the Earth a comfortable place for us to live, as it makes the Earth much warmer than it would be without an atmosphere. 

Carbon dioxide emissions actually play a pivotal part in maintaining our ecosystem here on Earth. Still, thanks to the excessive amounts of carbon emissions entering the atmosphere daily, more heat is being trapped, and this contributes to global warming. 

Sources of Carbon Emissions

Some of the sources of carbon emissions include:

• Electricity
• Transportation
• Industry
• Commercial/residential
• Agriculture
• Land use/forestry

Humans are extracting, refining, transporting and burning fossil fuels that are emitting too much CO₂ for our ecosystem to remove. Humans are also cutting down rainforests, and deforestation removes the natural systems that absorb and store carbon. According to Carbon Brief, fossil fuel emissions in 2018 increased at their fastest rate for seven years, with another record high in 2019.

10 Easy Ways to Reduce Your Carbon Footprint

When it comes to how to decrease your carbon footprint, many people are still in the dark about how to get started. However, there are plenty of ways to reduce your carbon footprint, and many of them are small and easy to implement.

1. Insulate your home as much as possible.
2. Switch to heating oil – more on that in a moment!
3. Turn off appliances when you’re not using them.
4. Use heating sparingly; if you’re chilly, put on more layers.
5. Use less water and avoid heating more water than you need.
6. Eat less meat – avoiding meat and dairy is an easy way to reduce your carbon footprint! Did you know that 20 livestock companies are responsible for more greenhouse gas emissions than Germany, Britain or France?
7. If you can create your own compost bin, you can reduce your carbon footprint and use the nutrient-rich compost to nourish your garden!
8. Avoid fast fashion – the apparel industry accounts for 10% of CO2 emissions globally.
9. Fly less; going abroad is exciting, but air travel is a significant contributor to global carbon emissions.
10. Minimise single-use plastics – look for biodegradable alternatives or simply avoid these altogether.

Switching to Heating Oil to Reduce Your Carbon Footprint

Did you know that heating oil is altogether clean, safe and efficient? Some of the benefits of heating oil over other fossil fuels include:

• Heating oil burns cleaner than other fossil fuels and is extremely adaptable. Due to advancements in technologies, heating oil can be modified to give a cleaner burn and reduce carbon emissions. 
• Heating oil has the highest stored energy by volume of all fossil fuels. This allows you to heat your home much faster than any other energy and reduce your carbon footprint by using your heating oil for a much shorter amount of time. It’s a win-win! 

How to Decrease Your Carbon Footprint with Heating Oil

1. Order in bulk

Ordering your oil in bulk means that the tankers which deliver it will make fewer journeys, thereby reducing their carbon emissions.

2. Premium heating oil

Utilising premium heating oil as a way to reduce your carbon footprint means that your boiler isn’t burning impurities and doesn’t have to work as hard to maintain temperature. Rix’s quality premium heating oil contains components that reduce the build-up of carbon fouling in your boiler, which can lead to a decrease in efficiency. This means that your boiler stays cleaner for longer and, in turn, lowers your carbon footprint.

3. Hydrotreated Vegetable Oil (HVO)

HVO is a liquid fuel alternative to existing heating oil and diesel that can cut carbon emissions by up to 90%. It is a cost-effective option and, although it is currently only available on trials, we are working with the UK and Ireland Fuel Distributors Association on the ‘Future Ready Fuel’ campaign to raise awareness about HVO as a more environmentally friendly alternative.

Finding ways to reduce your carbon footprint is key to becoming more environmentally friendly, which has become a huge concern for many people as the environmental crisis gets worse each year. From powerful speeches by Greta Thunberg to David Attenborough’s moving documentaries about climate change, there is undoubtedly a huge movement around creating climate change action.

Here at Rix, we care about our environment and how to decrease our carbon footprint. To find out more about what Rix are doing to reduce carbon emissions, read our CSR policy.

For more information on ways to reduce your carbon footprint, check out our blog posts on energy saving tips for your home and three features of a carbon-zero house.

Rix Services

Rix has been providing customers all over the UK with domestic heating oil for over 80 years. Contact your local depot today to discuss your domestic heating oil requirements.