The Electric Throw
Get 'em while they're hot
It was Baroness Rawlings who put me onto this. Sort of. She verbalised what I intrinsically knew already.
She said to the House of Lords on 2nd December 2013:
“Have the government considered as a simple, practical measure encouraging people to use electric blankets?
"They are the answer to many of the government's aims. They are very green as they use little electricity and they reduce the need for so much heating in the home.
"They also make the home very energy efficient - ie costing less - which is what the government seems to have as an aim."
I can’t find any reference online, but I distinctly remember someone saying that an electric blanket could literally save the lives of a vulnerable elderly person who might otherwise succumb to hypothermia. (Thought it might be Esther Rantzen, but google not forthcoming…) I’ve since intermittently googled OAP charities/Local Authority policies to see whether the inclusion of electric blankets for the vulnerable has crept onto the list (it hasn’t).
Much like with the pressure cooker, my early associations with an electric blanket are pure nostalgia, wrapped up in childhood memories of my grandparents’ house. The single bed, with the funny little lamp above the headboard, with the pully on/off switch. The 80s textured wallpaper, that they had throughout the house, which I used to pick off the wall between the mattress and the bed. It is worth noting that they lived in Whitley Bay, right on the North East coastline…. and by Jove that place is baltic. On foggy mornings (many) I’d lie in bed listening to the fog horn at Tynemouth.
Since those days, my electric blanketting has moved on to two heated throws (and counting). The premise is so simple: it takes quite a lot of energy to create enough heat to warm up a room sufficiently to feel comfortable. And most of that warm air is wasted, as you only really need to heat yourself. Further, most heating systems are set up so that multiple rooms are on the same loop, so you end up heating rooms you’re not even using. A heated blanket or throw transfers heat directly from the source to the person. And the throws offer additional insulation and residual warmth. They are quite honestly game changers and worth every bit of hyperbole.
Some sums! I’m currently sitting under a Dreamland Fallow Deer furry heated throw. Cost £109.99
Wattage: 150w
Cost per hour to run, assuming new ‘fixed’ October rate (@ 34p/kwh): 5.1p.
In order to calculate your personal saving, google your boiler and find out its size + rating (for newer ones there will be a PDF somewhere on google, for much older ones.. just assume it’s vastly inefficient and everything costs a fortune). I apparently have a Worcester Bosch Greenstar, 30KW. This costs £1.28 per hour to run (made up of 1.97p of electricity, and £1.26 of gas)
This bears repeating. 5.1p for an hour vs £1.28 to run the boiler. Use it for 8 hours a day instead of the heating and it’s paid for itself by the mid morning of day 11.
I’ve got two further throws on order for my parents’ Christmas presents (on quite a long lead in…) and debating the same for my stepdaughters… what more could a teenage girl want?! Electric dreams, innit.