Renters in Canberra are sticking bubble wrap to their windows in a bid to retain much-needed heat and reduce their energy bills as overnight minimums continue to dive below zero.
Advocacy group Better Renting runs an initiative called 'Home Truths', a home visit system designed to help renters increase the energy efficiency of their houses with easy DIY techniques.
Eliza Moloney, 26, found out about the program through a newsletter.
"Our house can get pretty cold and we find that we put the heater on but that heat doesn't retain very well," she said.
"Anna [Dennis from Better Renting] took us round the house and she also has some expertise so she did a bit of evaluating in what she thought was cold and where she thought draughts might be coming through."
As well as draught-proofing the front door and using a door snake for other doorways, Ms Moloney was surprised to learn about the bubble wrap solution.
"I was really shocked, Anna explained a little of the science behind it — how the air in the bubbles keeps some of the heat in," she said.
"I take her word for it.
"It's made a big difference, we really noticed it straight away and in the few days after were were like 'oh my goodness, it is much warmer in here'."
Ms Moloney said when Ms Dennis over a month ago she sprayed a small amount of water on the window and stuck the bubble wrap to it and it was still going strong.
"We've put it in all the areas we hang out, so our rooms as well," Ms Moloney said.
'Ice on the inside of the windows'
Joel Dignam, executive director of Better Renting, said seeing how poorly insulated some Canberrans homes were was "confronting".
"What's striking isn't just the low quality of some of these homes but that it's almost become accepted and normal," he said.
"A lot of people we're coming across often have their home getting below 6 degrees [Celsius] before they put the heating on.
"Some of them had ice inside on the windows in the morning.
"Renters can't do big structural changes so we're trying to find things that'll make a little bit of different for them."
Mr Dignam said he hoped the advice the Home Truths program offered would help improve both people's quality of life and their energy consumption over winter.
"For a lot of people too it's about reducing the climate pollution as well," he said.
