But why would an energy company want its customer to use less energy? At E.ON, our ideal would be to have more customers all using less energy. It would be better for our customers, because they’d have lower bills, and it would be better for us, because lower bills generally mean happier customers who want to stay with us. And it would be better for everyone, because we all need to reduce carbon emissions.

How we use our energy has a huge impact on the environment and on our ability to help prevent climate change. Our homes are big contributors to the causes of climate change, as they currently account for almost a third of the carbon dioxide emitted in the UK. There’s an urgent need for us to reduce our energy consumption to reduce our carbon footprint and to move towards the Government’s target of an 80% reduction in carbon emissions from domestic properties by 2050.

At E.ON we’re working hard to help people become more energy efficient by helping them to better understand and manage their energy usage.

We launched energy fit earlier this year, a nationwide campaign to raise awareness of the need for our customers to become more energy efficient and also offer them practical help in doing so. So far, more than a quarter of a million people have signed up for Energy Fit, which gives them practical advice on energy efficiency and enables them to create an energy efficiency plan tailored to their home and their lifestyle.

To help really bring our campaign to life, we created an ‘energy fit squad that has toured major towns and citites to provide practical help and support as part of our aim of making energy fit a way of life across the UK. They set up roadshows with lots of information about getting energy efficient and, linking in with our sponsorship of The FA Cup, offering a once-in-a-lifetime experience to be photographed with the trophy.

At the same time, we continued with our popular series of Talking Energy Live events – town hall style discussions that were open to the public and chaired by TV presenter Phillipa Forrester. They gave people the chance to share their own energy fit experiences and also get advice from our own energy efficiency experts and those of the Energy Saving Trust.

We’ve also installed over 350,000 cavity wall and loft installation measures since 2006 as well as energy efficient boilers and smart meters to help customers manage their energy more efficiently. Last year only, we gave away four million energy-saving light bulbs and helped 200,000 people to insulate their homes.

We offer advice and support to older people through our EnergyRight programme which we run in partnership with Age UK, and we have a number of community and education programmes to help people better understand and manage their energy usage.

To keep our own house in order, we’ve reduced the amount of carbon we emit per unit of electricity we generate by 35% since 1990. We want to go a lot further in the next twenty years by reducing it by another 50%

Find out what people are saying about energy efficiency.