Build A Better Future With E.ON Innovation

As a large, working from home family it does concern me how much money we spend on our energy bills, so when E.ON invited me to hear about their Innovation campaign I jumped at the chance.
I spent the morning getting excited about Home of the Future, the Channel 4 show co-funded by E.ON that follows an everyday Sheffield family whose lives are transformed after their home is given a state of the art modern tech makeover.
It's really exciting to hear that some of the 'space age' gadgets incorporated into the house are only a few years away from becoming everyday reality in all our homes.
Exciting, if you're a tech geek because if you are the other way inclined I can see that it all seems a tad Buck Rogers.

So after seeing the Robot vacuum cleaner and see through toaster in action it was time to get stuck into the E.ON Innovation site.

Billed as being a creative collaboration between E.ON and the public at large, the Innovation site is a vibrant community hub, bursting with new energy saving ideas and services that really could make it to market.

Think of it as a social energy network where community members support, encourage and build on ideas.
Even at this early stage you can envisage some of the amazing crowd sourced products being used in homes across the UK.

There are prizes too and if you submit an idea that's chosen as a winner in one of the four (out of five) remaining challenges, you'll win a home energy makeover worth up to £2,000.
Judges then choose one of the five challenge winners to receive the star prize of a home energy makeover worth up to £10,000.

In addition, E.ON will develop each of the five challenge winning with the view to bringing them to market later this year. Pretty amazing stuff.

Interested? Here's how you can get involved.

Each of the challenges are linked to Home of the Future. You don't need to have seen it but you can watch it online on 4OD. (It's brilliant, addictive viewing and brimming with inspiration).

E.ON's aim is to work with the community to create some amazing new products and services that will be practical and profitable whilst making a real difference to the future of energy.

There are three ways to get involved.

If you've had a lightbulb moment of your own you can submit an idea. It can be big or small.

Think small acorns and let the community help your idea to establish and grow.

You can comment and help to develop other people's ideas and you can vote for the ideas that you like the best.

It's about the community working together for a better future but if you have an amazing idea that you'd rather not share publicly due to it being the next best thing to sliced bread, then there is the ability to submit via a closed route.

Get your ideas in before 9th April and the winning ideas will be announced by 25th June 2012.

In the next couple of weeks I'm having an E.ON Smart Energy meter fitted. I'm pretty excited about this (I know I need to get out more) because my children are rubbish at switching off lights and TV's when they leave a room.

With the help of the Smart Meter I'm going to challenge them to save energy. It isn't going to be easy but we will chart our journey and treat ourselves with the money that we manage to save.

Wish us luck!