Making your home more energy efficient is a cost-effective
way to not only save money but to also improve the performance of your
home. The most effective strategy for
improving your home’s energy efficiency is to focus the “shell” of the
house…the walls, attic, windows and doors.
Next, improve the energy efficiency of systems such as heating, cooling,
lighting and appliances. Last, but not
least, consider clean energy generation such as solar or geothermal.
The first step toward energy efficiency is to make sure that
your walls and attic are well insulated.
High
quality insulation slows the rate that heat flows out of the house in the
winter or into the house in the summer.
That means it takes less energy to heat or cool your house. If your walls have no insulation, it will
certainly pay off to have blown-in insulation and it will also improve the
comfort of your home. If you have an
unfinished attic, it is worthwhile to upgrade its insulation. It is a good idea to use an Energy
Auditor to make sure that the insulation is installed properly.
The next step is to upgrade or replace windows. If your
windows are old or leaky, it is time to replace them with energy efficient
models or to increase their efficiency by using weather stripping and storm
windows. While it’s not usually
cost-effective to replace windows just to save energy, if you are going to replace
them anyway, the additional cost of Energy Star-rated replacement windows is
very modest and is a comfort improving upgrade that is worth the cost. Energy Star
Replacement Windows
Another way to save some energy in your home is to plant
shade trees and shrubs around your house.
If you have an older home with poor insulation and windows, good
landscaping can help, especially if planted on the house’s west side. Deciduous
trees are the best way to go for this purpose. During the summer, the foliage will block the
infrared radiation that would warm the house, while in the winter the bare
branches will let the radiation through.
Replacing an older furnace with a new high-efficiency system
may seem like a huge expense, but in the long run it will save energy and
money. If your furnace was built before
1992 and has a standing pilot, it likely wastes 35% of the fuel it uses, and
it’s probably near the end of its service life.
ACEEE (American Council for an
Energy-Efficient Economy) recommends you replace it with a condensing furnace
with annual efficiency of at least 90%.
You can improve the efficiency of your hot water system by
turning down the temperature of your water heater to the “warm” setting (120
degrees F). You can also insulate your
hot water lines so that they don’t cool off as quickly between uses. And using
low-flow fixtures in your showers and baths will help as well.
You can use ¾ of the energy used with incandescent light
bulbs by replacing them with compact fluorescent lamps (CFLs). You may not realize that the cost of the
electricity used to run a light bulb is more than the cost of the bulb
itself. A CFL may be a little more
expensive than the traditional light bulb, but it lasts for 10,000 hours and
uses only 27 watts to generate as much light as 100-watt incandescent bulb.
Over the long haul, you will save money by investing in CFLs.
You can save money with an energy efficient home in many
ways, including the tax benefits that are available to you. Federal
tax incentives are out there for energy efficiency upgrades to existing
homes.
