Npower has launched an initiative to help the Government tackle fuel poverty. As part of its campaign the company has reproduced a typical living room, but at a temperature it believes cash-strapped and vulnerable customers endure regularly. Yesterday, reporter Marjorie McIntyre joined Arctic explorer Sir Ranulph Fiennes in the Cold Room.

ARCTIC explorer Sir Ranulph Fiennes took part in a mini- expedition of the North-East yesterday to help drive home the detrimental effects that cold weather has on health.

To coincide with Sir Ranulph's visit to npower's Contact Centre, in Peterlee, County Durham - to add weight to the company's Spreading Warmth campaign - staff were left shivering at their desks.

Temperatures in their offices had been turned back to 16 degrees centigrade for the day to give staff a first-hand taste of how cold conditions can be for some of their less well off customers.

Workers were also being encouraged to visit and hold meetings in a portable Cold Room - a purpose-built modular building housing a typical dining and living room with the temperature held at nine degrees centigrade.

Emulating the ground floor of many normal homes, the Cold Room duplicated the dark and damp conditions often found in a vulnerable customer's house.

Npower is hoping that, by educating staff about the dangers and the effects of the cold, they will find it easier to recognise and understand the plight some callers are in through fuel poverty and as a result provide them with greater help.

David Threlfall, chief executive officer for npower retail, said: "We want customers, especially those most in need of help and support, to find it easy to deal with us when they give us a call.

"Npower Spreading Warmth brings together all the social initiatives, services and energy products we offer customers and aims to connect those most in need, with what they need most.''

The company, he said was keen for its staff to experience exactly what a cold home felt like.

He said 16 degrees centigrade may not sound that cold, but it was ten degrees below a comfortable room temperature and cold enough to reduce a person's resistance to respiratory diseases.

According to Government figures published in 2003, two million homes in the UK suffered from fuel poverty, with 95,000 of these in the North East.

On average, 32,000 people die each winter due to the cold - ten times more than in road traffic accidents.

Sir Ranulph Fiennes said he was delighted to join npower's Spreading Warmth campaign which aims to identify those most in need of help.

Cold comfort - even for an explorer

IT CREPT up slowly. First my feet felt tingly and damp and gradually my whole body was cold.

And that was after only a few minutes in a simulated living room with the temperature turned down to nine degrees centigrade.

For my companion on the sofa in the Cold Room - the intrepid explorer, the man who completed seven marathons in seven days on seven continents, 61-year-old Sir Ranulph Fiennes - it should have felt like the tropics.

But as we talked and steadily got colder Sir Ranulph - who only the day before had been scaling an ice wall in the Alps - revealed it was the damp climate combined with low temperatures during winter in the UK which was the real killer.

With a rail of damp washing standing nearby, Sir Ranulph described how despite having trekked to both poles and survived temperatures of up to minus 122 centigrade, he had been at his coldest at his exposed farmhouse high on Exmoor.

His adventures have taken their toll on the man - once shortlisted for the role of James Bond - with severe frostbite, leaving him with one cold hand and one hot.

And as our body temperatures dropped, Sir Ranulph, who suffered a heart attack in 2003, explained that he understood very well how vulnerable people, particularly those with cardiac, asthmatic or diabetic problems succumbed to the cold.

He told me that during the winter, every drop of only one degree centigrade resulted in 8,000 deaths.

Few deaths are from hypothermia, most are related to cardiac problems, he said, which is why this year he is hoping to raise £2m for the British Heart Foundation. As an aside, he expressed his irritation that he had had an angina attack 300ft from the summit of Everest during a recent fundraising ascent.

It meant the expedition "only" raised £1.6m, but he is confident a further venture will bring in the remaining £400,000.

Back in the Cold Room, Sir Ranulph passed on some tips to keep warm.

"Most of our body heat is lost through the head. Covering up the head increases the body temperature, as do layers of clothes, rather than one heavy garment,'' he said.

As our feet got colder, he suggested using layers of newspaper on the floor for insulation and recommended eating and having a hot drink as you go to sleep.

By now I was really feeling the damp coldness of the room and was cheered to hear Sir Ranulph's enthusiasm for npower's campaign of Spreading Warmth, which he will help officially launch in London on Wednesday.

At the end of our chat, only 20 minutes or so had gone by and while it would have been a pleasure to talk to this great adventurer for hours, I was relieved to get outside into the warmth with just a little understanding of what it must be like to be living each day in the cold.