How much energy is generated in the gym?
Looking back 150 years, everything in our homes was powered manually. Households relied on human power to work their pedal-powered washing machine, sewing machine or bicycle. These days we use electricity to power almost everything. Research found that the average gym goer in the UK exercises 4.8 times a week, for an average of 35 minutes per session. By working out their average weight, time and distance per exercise, weve calculated their human power - how much household energy could be generated by the countrys dedicated gym goers. Its January, meaning many of us will be hitting the gym as part of our New Years resolutions to get fitter and healthier. If we were able to harness the extra human power generated in gyms in January alone, we could generate enough energy to power Ipswich, Exeter and Windsor for a day. Run like the wind  Looking beyond January, the UKs gym goers generate the equivalent of 41.62GWH per year with their workouts. Sadly thats no match for our growing wind power generation, at 1,367 GWH per year (thats about 17% of the UKs power needs). Pumping iron to power the UK  If we relied on human power alone, the energy generated in gyms over a month could only power Scotland for around 12 minutes. Greater Londons electricity would last for 14 minutes while Wales would get 21 minutes. Northern Ireland would enjoy a whole 55 minutes of power in a month. The Isles of Scilly could be powered for 30 days by the amount of energy used in the gym across the UK in the same time period! As a nation of tea-lovers, we often think nothing of popping the kettle on for a quick cuppa. But if our homes were run on gym power, it might take a little more effort - especially with our apparently unquenchable thirst. Gym goers in the UK generate enough energy during their workouts to make 208 million cups of tea per month - but thats not quite enough. Tea drinkers in Cardiff alone brew 198 million cups per day! Gamers would need to do 5195 deadlifts to power three hours of their favourite games, while it would take 5,533 chest presses to generate enough energy for a Netflix binge. Or if youd prefer to tackle that pile of laundry, youd need to row for 10 hours to wash one load of clothes and then run, swim or cycle for six hours to power your iron for an hour. Run to charge your runaround  If recent car-buying trends are anything to go by, more of us are going to be using our homes to power our commutes, by charging our electric cars from our domestic electricity supply. However, if you are out and need a charge top-up, check out where in the UK has the most charging points per electric vehicle right now. If you harnessed the energy generated by the UK in gyms each month, you could charge more than 46,000 Tesla 3s or over 788,000 Toyota Prius cars. There would be enough power to drive from the top of the UK to the bottom, with a few hundred miles left over. Commenting on the research, Sarah Broomfield, energy expert at Uswitch, said: "We should be feeling pretty chuffed with the amount of energy we generate at the gym... but when you realise that our pedalling and pounding could only keep Scotland going for 12 minutes a month, it makes you realise just how much power the UK uses in a day  never mind a whole year!" "We can narrow the gap a bit more by making some simple changes around the home to use less energy, or even switch to a green energy tariff  saving money to spend on our gym memberships and doing our bit for the planet at the same time!"