Energy suppliers overcharge customers by £100

Customers are being overcharged by £100 a year to heat and light their homes as suppliers fail to pass on price cuts, research by the Government's consumer watchdog suggests.Britain’s energy companies are paying much less for the power they supply, as prices on the wholesale market have halved in the past 12 months to reach the lowest levels in almost three years.
But despite the reductions, household electricity and gas bills are still higher than they were last summer, averaging more than £1,200 a year.
Consumer experts say the high prices charged to British families mean there is still room for further cuts, of as much as 10 per cent on gas bills and 3.5 per cent on electricity bills, bringing annual savings of £96.40.
Energy firms are estimated to be making an extra £2.2billion by failing to pass on the discounts to every household.
Pressure on suppliers is being increased by Ofgem, the industry regulator, which has given them until next week to explain why they have not passed on wholesale savings to their customers.
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Filtration system that lets you drink your own SHOWER water

Eco-thinkers have come up with an amazing new way to create drinking water - by putting plants in the bottom of a shower.
Designers Jun Yasumoto, Vincent Vandenbrouk, Olivier Pigasse, and Alban Le Henry came up with the concept when looking for new ways to recycle precious H2O.
After you have washed in the special eco-shower the water passes down into a series of physical filters and is treated by plants such as reeds and rushes growing around your feet.
'Using a natural filtering principle called phyto-purification, the bathroom becomes a mini-eco-system by recycling and regenerating the wastewater.
''With this project, we tried to combine the pleasure of taking a shower with the satisfaction of recycling water. We wanted the recycling process to actually interact with the use of shower.'


The waste water passes into a chamber below the shower floor where it goes through a maze of filters.
Included in the network is sand, reeds, rushes, a mesh filter, water hyacinths and lemnas, and finally a carbon filter.
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High-tech Mini-allotment

A 'mini allotment' designed by Nasa scientists to grow fruit and vegetables in space goes on sale today.
The gadget will allow residents of the smallest flats to grow their own food without a garden - or even soil.
The Power Plant Growing Machine uses hundreds of tiny jets to constantly spray nutrients on to the roots of plants. Scientists say this leads to far quicker growth than normal. It is suitable for fruit, vegetables and herbs.
The growing technique, aeroponics, was designed by the American space agency’s scientists to help astronauts get their five-a-day while on missions.
Oakthrift, supplier of the £34 device, claims it makes a bigger and stronger crop than if the plants were grown outside.
Guy Barter, head of horticultural advice at the Royal Horticultural Society, said: 'Some people don’t like the thought of dirt and insects in the home. This could be a way of overcoming that.'
The system is already used on a larger scale by commercial growers.
Power Plant is installed with a nifty internal microjet system with super-oxygenated, nutrient rich water to make the crops grow bigger and stronger.
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Rainwater Harvesting kits.

With unpredictable weather patterns wreaking havoc on the country’s water supply and utility companies ramping up costs, it’s no wonder rainwater harvesting systems are becoming increasingly popular. Marley Plumbing & Drainage sets out an overview for installing its kits.


The Marley rainwater systems are available in two versions:
USW100: Garden irrigation. The controls and hose tap are wall mounted and can be situated up to 17 metres from the installation. Pipework and power connections are made to the pump via a service duct to the inlet chamber, which provides access to the tank.

USW200: Garden use and domestic back-up. This kit is constructed in the same way as above, but is additionally connected to a storage tank, situated in the loft, to provide a supplementary water supply for non-potable applications (i.e. toilet flushing). A mains water supply back-up is required in case of power failure or the depletion of the recycled water.

The kits are provided with or without an infiltration (soakaway) facility. If the version with a built in soakaway is installed, it must be located a minimum distance of 5m from any building boundary in accordance with Building Regulations.
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