Drying
Drying clothes in the open air is obviously the most energy-efficient option as it requires no electricity at all. Unfortunately it isn’t always possible due to the weather, to available space and of course to busy lifestyles.
The alternatives are to dry it in the air in the room, either on a frame or radiator, or to use a tumble-dryer.
If the radiators have to be put on specially to dry the clothes then there is a cost for running them. A typical 1m wide 600mm high double radiator produces around 2kW of heat. Assuming that two radiators are needed running for two hours to dry a full load, they would use about 8kWh of heat — and probably make the room quite steamy and unpleasant as well as making some of the clothes as stiff as boards. Drying clothes on radiators is not recommended as it can lead to damp and rot in the building.
By contrast an ‘A’ rated tumble dryer is likely to use less than 2kWh/cycle1, will leave the clothes easy to iron, and the room free of steam and condensation.
There are many old tumble dryers on the market that are much less energy efficient than this and may use three or more times as much energy to do the same job. Gas tumble dryers carry out the same task yet their running costs are around a quarter of their electric counterparts, with half the carbon footprint.
In fact, their green credentials are so impressive that they were recently awarded “Energy Saving Trust Recommended” endorsement by the Energy Saving Trust, but they do of course need plumbing in to the gas mains and that requires a Gas Safe registered engineer to do the installation which adds to the cost and disruption involved.
