You can model building thermodynamics on paper all day, but nothing tests a home's efficiency quite like an unexpected system failure in late autumn.å

When a faulty control board brought our heat pump to a complete halt on the 29th October, we faced a full week without heating.

Spoiler alert - we did not freeze. Instead, we got a firsthand look at how our insulation, triple glazing, and thermal mass perform under pressure.

And discovered a few simple adjustments that kept the house surprisingly warm, that we'll keep going forward!

Making it count, your EPC that is!

Energy performance certificates were launched in the UK in 2007, initially to help people assess homes they were thinking of buying. But they soon became a useful metric for ensuring new building were meeting building regulations.

Our current home had one for this reason - as it was built in 2010 - at least to the point where it could be assessed.

It's had two assessments since then, and somewhere between the three reports the true picture of our house's performance can be seen.

Why do I say that? Listen to this episode and find out how you can use the EPC to improve your home's energy usage.

After all, it's meant to be child's play!

Remember, the recommendations in the EPC do not have to be done all in one go to give you benefit. Insulation teamed with great heating controls have a multiplier effect more than the sum of their parts.

At the end of the episode is a teaser for next week looking at other steps to reducing your energy usage while boosting your nutrition.

And we're not scared.

We're not talking about the blood suckers like Dracula, secretly taking blood from Lucy Westenra.

We're talking about the hidden draws of electricity lurking in your home. How can you make use of your telemetry to make the most out of tracking these down?

Is it worth the effort? I give an example of our outside lights, which were only taking 30W while they were on. Leaving them on while we had the flu for 7 days meant we wasted 5kWh or £1.34.

That may not seem like much but that is running the microwave on full pelt for 5 hours - what could you do with that energy? What tasty treats for the trick or treaters could you rustle up?

See what garlic we used to defeat this leeching draw of power. And the steps we took elsewhere to stop these pests.