A HUGE energy firm is giving away up to 16 hours of free energy to customers, starting this weekend.
EDF customers who cut down on their energy usage during the week can get some of their supply for free.
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It’s part of the energy firm’s Sunday Saver initiative, which is encouraging households to use less energy each month.
If you reduce your usage between the peak times of 4pm to 7pm from Monday to Friday then you can earn up to 16 hours of free electricity the following Sunday.
EDF will calculate the usual amount of energy you use between these hours and use it as your “baseline”.
The amount of free energy you get will depend on how much you manage to save compared with your baseline.
If you reduce your energy consumption by 5%, you’ll get four hours for free.
A 20% reduction will get you eight free hours, while a 35% reduction will earn 12 hours.
If you manage to reduce your energy consumption by half you’ll get a huge 16 free hours.
To be eligible you need to be an EDF customer and have a smart meter installed.
You must also be 18 or over and live in England, Scotland or Wales.
Your smart meter must be set up to give half-hourly reads and you should be on an electricity tariff with no more than two unit rates.
EDF says the initiative will take some of the strain off the electricity grid at peak times and help the country move towards net zero.
How can you take part?
EDF’s monthly challenges start on the first Monday of the month and you need to sign up in advance.
That means if you didn’t sign up already then you’ve missed out on this month’s Sunday Saver challenge.
However you can register for October’s challenge now by following the link here.
You can also sign up by visiting the Energy Hub after logging in to your EDF account.
How will you get the free electricity?
Once you’re signed up to the challenge, you don’t need to do anything to get your free electricity – other than reducing your usage, of course.
Any free electricity you get will be automatically added to your account as credit.
You won’t be able to withdraw it as cash but it will take money off your energy bill.
You can keep track of how much free electricity you’ve earned each week through Energy Hub.
The time you can use your free electricity on the Sunday depends on the amount of free electricity you’ve earned.
EDF says its customers have earned a total of 6.2million free electricity hours so far.
Ways to cut down on your energy usage
EDF has given some handy tips for how to cut down on your usage during peak hours.
For example, you could put your dishwasher on later in the evening after 7pm.
Alternatively you could put it on after your breakfast.
The same could be done with your washing machine and tumble dryer too.
If it’s warm and dry enough outside, you could hang your washing out there.
You could also unplug your devices and chargers between 4pm and 7pm and use your battery power instead.
Remember, they would still use electricity on standby.
You could also batch cook at the weekend to save energy and time.
If you have an electric vehicle, you could charge your car outside of peak times too.