Just as with Wikipedia, the value of having so many people contribute is the vast range of experiences and ideas that you can tap into, including:

• Cyclists have 40% less risk of dying from diabetes, certain cancers etc. (life insurance companies take note)
• Why women cyclists are more likely to be killed than men (although cycling is actually safer than walking and gardening)
• Tips on how to avoid having your bike nicked (e.g. paint it a horrible colour) and tactics used by bike thieves, from an ex-thief
• The legal position of drunk cyclists
• The legal status of cycle lanes
• The great Red Light Debate
• The ’shower in a bottle’
• Avoiding punctures, and imaginative repair ideas
• The world’s worst cycle lanes (www.gu.com/p/2cxn5)

Also (inevitably) lots of slagging off of the enemy (road users with four or more wheels).  One of the more creative suggestions in the book is that cycling should be made a religion, so that abusing cyclists becomes illegal!

The blog/comment format makes it a very easy book to pick up and put down.

Every cyclist, road users especially, should read it.

Attention all cyclists - let’s try to get our own cycling top tips together. Please post a comment below with your no. 1 tip.

1. Energy-efficient projector
A new generation of micro wireless-networked projectors make presentations more affordable, and more portable than ever.  Some are small enough to fit in a pocket. By using long-life mini-LED lamps, in-use power consumption has been reduced to as little as 50W (or 5p a day).

2. Mobile devices
It’s now possible to do a lot of communication and computing work on a small handheld device. Why fire up an energy-intensive computer and monitor when your mobile options are smaller and more energy-efficient?

3. Portable power devices
Chargers for batteries, MP3s, MP4s, notebooks, smart phones and many other devices not only consume a lot of energy, they will often continue to use energy when not in use – unless you remember to unplug them. Portable chargers take energy from the sun and the wind and are now being adapted to be flexible, folding and fully portable.

4. Mini computers
Computers are getting smaller and smaller, which makes them significantly cheaper to run.  A new trend is towards ’solid state’ laptops that do not rely on energy-hungry drives. Although quite expensive to buy, they are small, silent and cut energy usage costs – as well as having extended battery life.

5. Low energy monitors
Flat screen Liquid Crystal Display (LCD) monitors use much less power than cathode ray tubes.

6. Energy-saving devices for computers
One of the biggest drains on the electricity bill is wasting electricity when computers and devices are left switched on or in standby mode. Use power-saving devices that make it easy for staff to put computers and monitors into money-saving mode.

7. Energy monitors
These devices display how much energy is being used by the company and store performance and usage data so you can track how your costs go down as you invest in improved technology or change your habits.

Monitors help staff and owners understand where they are using most electricity. For example, by installing a monitor, a hairdresser discovered the biggest usage of electricity was caused by tumble-drying towels from wet instead of hanging them up overnight to dry and giving them a quick blast in the morning.

8. Low energy lighting
Good lighting might be important in your business for ambience and to maximise visual appeal. Low energy spotlights have been developed to match the brightness of halogen lamps – the only difference is they may require a few seconds to reach maximum strength.

9. On-site generation
Finally, there can be no better way to offset power costs than to generate your own. The Feed in Tariff introduced by the Government in April 2010 has promoted a surge of interest in wind and solar power generation from homes and businesses. This tax-free benefit allows excess power generated by photovoltaic, wind, hydro, anaerobic digestion and Combined Heat and Power installations to be sold back to the grid.

Have you got any other ideas? I would be interested to hear.

You can read the full article here

Sustainable Routes offers grants of up to £1,000 to businesses who want to cut business travel costs by adopting new ways of working.

If your business is based in Buckinghamshire, Milton Keynes, Oxfordshire and Berkshire and ranges in size from sole trader to 250 employees, you will be eligible to apply.

Simply register online at www.sustainableroutes.co.uk to receive your personalised Travel Efficiency Plan and Grant Application form.

Here at Kirkpatrick & Hopes we are applying for the grant to allow us to install showers and a bike shelter for the benefit of our team members who cycle to work, and also to buy some notebook computers and software to allow us to do video conferencing.

Alan King, Director of Syntegra Consulting

Not everyone knows this, but buildings produce nearly half of the UK’s carbon emissions – almost twice that of cars and planes. The EU knows about high carbon emissions from buildings, hence the European Energy Performance of Buildings Directive (EPBD) in 2002.

The UK too is ramping up its energy efficiency targets and legislation for buildings. Since 2009, it has been compulsory for all properties rented out or sold to have an Energy Performance Certificate (EPC).

This new EPC market in the UK is currently estimated to be worth £500 million a year, and is set to increase. And the energy assessment market will continue to grow with it.

Syntegra Consulting Ltd was formed in direct response to the EPBD and to the increasing green legislation for the UK built environment. In 2009, we carried out more than 1,500 energy assessments for our property homeowner clients alone. In total, we made recommendations for savings of more than £161,000 a year on energy bills, and for reducing carbon dioxide emissions by more than 1,062 tonnes a year.

So, energy audits have become the MOT for buildings. The UK Green Building Council (of which Syntegra is a member) has started discussions about further legislation to encourage reduced carbon emissions from small businesses, and for all commercial buildings. It won’t be long before all buildings will have to have a Display Energy Certificate that specifically shows their running costs in terms of energy efficiency.

What we at Syntegra Consulting offer is energy audits. Small business clients of K&H in the south-east of England can benefit from our free energy grant assistance, and, for larger clients, we can offer a free LED lighting feasibility study alongside a building energy assessment.

If you would like to learn more, then please email me or visit the Syntegra Consulting website.

Having just recovered from Christmas and come back to work, one of the first tasks of the working year is to take down the decorations. The tinsels and baubles will be packed away to be reused next year, the Christmas cards will be recycled, and the tree will go on our compost heap.

As far as green resolutions go in 2010, at K&H we will be looking further into reducing our energy use and finding more about ways of carbon offsetting.

We tend to think that it is the small changes that we can all make that help to create a better world. If you would like to make a difference, here are some ideas for business resolutions:

• buy recycled products (e.g. paper, envelopes, pencils)
• encourage working from home to reduce emissions from commuting
• start a cycle-to-work scheme
• drive a car with low emissions (less than 120g/km)
• order supplies in large amounts to reduce packaging and deliveries
• use energy-efficient lighting
• turn off computers, monitors, printers and other machines at night
• switch off monitors at lunchtime or when away from your desk for any length of time
• print double-sided
• drink tap water rather than bottled

If you have any other ideas for being greener at work, I’d love to hear them. Email me.

Susan Kemish
Operations Director

Last year we all put our heads together to come up with ways in which we could be more eco friendly and between us we came up with over 30 ideas. Over the last 12 months we have done most of the easy things, like changing to energy efficient light bulbs, recycling as much as possible, switching off computers and printers at night and starting our own compost heap. But we are now going to look into other ways to be greener and come up with a plan for the next year or so. I will update on our efforts over the next few months!

Meanwhile, we are starting to think about what to grow in the K&H garden this year. All the team tend to get involved in one way or another, whether by bringing in surplus vegetable plants from home, weeding or eating the produce.

We started our own compost heap last year and have been adding various vegetable matter over the winter and are hoping our homemade compost will help provide us with bumper vegetable crops in the summer and autumn. I will keep you posted!

If you would like to share your green ideas with us, please contact Susan Kemish on 0118 923 5811 or by email

• Turn off lights and equipment that are not being used
• Recycle as much as possible – by doing this we have halved our waste disposal cost as our rubbish is now collected every 2 weeks instead of weekly
• Drinking tap water instead of bottled
• Paperless working means lower paper costs
• Cycling or walking to work instead of driving
• Using a ‘Hippo’ bag (or a brick) in the toilet cisterns to reduce the amount of water used per flush – this saves money if you are on a water meter as we are.
• Change to energy efficient light bulbs – OK they cost a bit more to buy, but they soon pay for themselves

If you would like to share your green ideas with us, just give us a call on 0118 923 5800.