What's big, white and cuboid, has a round door...

What’s big, white and cuboid, has a round door, and collects weird grey fluff inside? Yes … it’s a tumble dryer!  Did you know that this is one of the most energy intensive appliances in your home?

Your challenge this week is to help your parent / carer hang out the washing – so you completely avoid using the tumble dryer.  The weather forecast is for sunshine and a light breeze this week, so can you make the most of the sun and wind - do your washing on those days and then hang it outside to dry? If it’s raining, can you hang it on a rack inside?

Can you make a poster to stick on the door of your tumble dryer to discourage other members of your family from using it – ‘no entry – help us fight climate change’ (please check with your parent / carer first).

Don’t forget to HIT THE RED BUTTON when you’ve made the most of the sunshine and avoided your tumble dryer! If you’d like to send us a photo of your tumble dryer poster or your washing hanging outside (no underwear please) then we’ll post it on the Young Climate Warriors website photo gallery.

You may have heard that, in April, the UK had 18 consecutive days without coal-fired power generation of electricity – the longest stretch since the Industrial Revolution in 1882.  Isn’t that amazing!

Have you yet learnt about ‘graphs’ in your maths lessons?  A graph can be like a picture that is used to show a story.  This graph shows a story from 2006 to 2019, of how our UK electricity is coming less and less from burning coal, and more and more from renewables. Exciting progress is being made.

Despite this progress, we do still need to reduce our own consumption as much as we can.  As you can see from the graph much of our electricity still comes from the burning of natural gas, which releases carbon emissions, and until 2025 coal-fired power stations will  still be in use.   If you’re interested in seeing a ‘live’ snapshot of how much electricity is being produced by renewables, at this exact time – you could have a look at this website: https://gridwatch.co.uk/renewables/percent/

Don’t forget to HIT THE RED BUTTON when you have helped combat climate change by taking your washing outside and hung it up to dry in the sunshine.