Ways to save energy?

[james.hendrickson]

Hi Guys,

Okay - saving money is closely associated with saving energy.

What are some ways you can save energy in your day to day routine.

A couple are really obvious:

1) turn off the lights in rooms that you don't use or turn off the lights when you leave the house.

2) turn down your water heater

3) keep your thermostat at 68 so you don't expend a lot of energy in the morning or evening with heating/cooling.

Any others?

[GoodSteward]

2) turn down your water heater

I actually have done this, and I am not sure it helps with a household of 5. I know the hot water doesn't last long enough for a lot of things like several showers in a row. It might be saving me power, not sure. I was told to turn off the hot water completely at night and the middle of the day when you don't need it. They make timers for this. I would like to try one of those inline hot water heaters that only heats water as you use it.

3) keep your thermostat at 68 so you don't expend a lot of energy in the morning or evening with heating/cooling.

I live in South Ga, so this will kill our electric bill. lol For us it would need to be the other direction, turn the AC up to higher 70s and heat to mid 60s. Same principal, though. I have looked into that Nest thermostat that learns your patterns and adjusts during the day for you.

- Don't leave outside lights on during the day
- Turn off electronics in the house that are not in use and don't have to stay on(TV, computers, etc). It adds up.

*Anything producting heat sucks up energy.
- Was dishes by hand.
- Dry clothes outside or on racks.

[Fishindude77]

* Good windows
* Good weather seals and thresholds on all exterior doors
* Add insulation when and where practical
* Change furnace filters periodically

[Singuy]

Living in FL here and this is what we do to make sure our electric bill is not stupid high.

1. Turn keep A/C at 86 if no one is home, turn it down to 79 when we are home.

2. Only keep A/C under 86 in rooms we use

3. When we do have cold weeks..I found it's really hard to warm up the master due to high ceilings and high squareft. I use an indoor propane heater which raises the temp by 1 degree every 5 mins while the A/C will hit Aux and can't heat up the room worth a crap. Once room is at temp, we shut off the propane heater and than use the central heat pump to keep temp so AUX wouldn't turn on. Aux uses 10x more power than regular heat pump.

[Fishindude77]

I live in a mostly heating area, but we do have some summer warm spells. It's in 90's for next couple days which seems miserably hot to me. We would be really uncomfortable only having the indoor temp at 79 degrees, prefer it around 70-72. Can't imagine that those extra 7 degrees of cooling cost very much more, if the house has a good thermal envelope?

[feh]

Some of these things depend on your local climate. Things we do:

drive a fuel efficient vehicle
drive less
hang clothes instead of using dryer
open windows instead of using A/C
keep temp in house as high as tolerable in summer
keep temp as low as tolerable in winter (wear a sweatshirt)
turn off lights not being used

[DaveInPgh]

Although it is not saving energy, I do a couple things at work that reduces my energy usage at home.

Probably 95% of the time I spend on personal finances are done at work, which reduces reduces the time my laptop is powered on. I also charge my cell phone while at work, and really need to charge it at home during the week.

In some work situations, these things might be considered theft. However, these type of things are permissible at my work.

[bjl584]

I did a few things around the house to save on heating/cooling costs.

Installed window film barrier on all of the basement windows.
Switched to all LED lighting
Put in room darkening window blinds
Put in a programmable thermostat
Installed weather stripping around the garage doors

I still have more to do.
Next spring I plan to install new garage doors. Replacing the wooden ones with triple wall vinyl
Longer term I'm putting in all new windows in the house.

[disneysteve]

1. Turn keep A/C at 86 if no one is home, turn it down to 79 when we are home.

2. Only keep A/C under 86 in rooms we use

We have central air so can't control the AC room by room. Living in NJ, if we put our AC up to 86, we'd have mold growing on the walls from the humidity here. I'm surprised you don't have the same issue in Florida.

We keep our AC at 72 during the day and lower it to 71 at night. If we are away for the day, I might bump it up to 75. If we go away on vacation, I put it up to 78. Any higher than that and the moisture gets out of control even with the dehumidifier running 24/7.

After 22 years in our house, I can confidently say that the biggest and most noticeable savings on the utility bills has come from replacing old, inefficient appliances with new high efficiency ones. Replacing the AC, furnace, and refrigerator made a huge difference.

Turning lights off really isn't such a big deal anymore with CFL and LED bulbs since they use such a tiny amount of energy to begin with.

[Singuy]

Living in NJ, if we put our AC up to 86, we'd have mold growing on the walls from the humidity here. I'm surprised you don't have the same issue in Florida.

I hear that mold can be a problem without the A/C on but so far I haven't had ANY problem being in FL all my life. My parents never have the A/C even on, and also with the windows open..letting all that moist air in and nothing...no mold anywhere. My current house was foreclosed for 4 years with no ac on and had 0 mold problems in any of the bedrooms or walls unless if water got in. I also had my old house upstairs heat up to 92+ degrees during the day and for 7 years straight, I still never encountered mold.

So I'm not sure how to make out of it...I hear everyone is afraid of mold, therefore turning their a/c down low but I have yet to encounter such problem.

[disneysteve]

I hear everyone is afraid of mold, therefore turning their a/c down low but I have yet to encounter such problem.

That's not why we turn the AC down. We do that because it's disgustingly hot and humid if we don't, but the mold is a secondary concern.

I've also heard that the heat and humidity isn't great for electronics, wooden furniture, etc. Not sure how true that is.

[bjl584]

That's not why we turn the AC down. We do that because it's disgustingly hot and humid if we don't, but the mold is a secondary concern.

I've also heard that the heat and humidity isn't great for electronics, wooden furniture, etc. Not sure how true that is.

it's horrible for anything made of wood.

it also wreaks havoc on drywall.

[DaveInPgh]

That's not why we turn the AC down. We do that because it's disgustingly hot and humid if we don't, but the mold is a secondary concern.

I've also heard that the heat and humidity isn't great for electronics, wooden furniture, etc. Not sure how true that is.

Heat & humidity can also have a negative impact on body odor.

[greenskeeper]

The most efficient (cost) way to run an HVAC system is to determine when you want the system to be occupied (when you are home) and when you want the system to be unoccupied (when you are away).

Looking at the weather forecast or using the worst case scenario for setting up the occupied vs unoccupied times will give you the "time for recovery".

Quick example.

If I like my house to be at 72F when I am home, and know that the system takes 2 hours on a 90F day to get to 72F I would set the occupied time to start 2 hours before I come home. That means the system is turned off from the time I leave the house until 2 hours before I get home.

Turning the thermostat up or down during the day helps but you are still running the HVAC system when no one is home.

Worries about mold....unless you are talking about a basement (use a dehumidifier set to 60% or lower) or a completely sealed off house you aren't going to have problems with mold by not running the A/C (open windows)

[sv2007]

Get a programmable thermostat and keep the house less comfortable when nobdy's there. This saved us a lot when we worked full time; back when programmable thermostats weren't this cheap. Today, there's just no reason not to get one.

Replace windows and patio doors with low-E glass; this may take a few years to pay off, but in the end you'll save money if you live in your house for the next 3-5 years.

Switched all lightbulbs to LEDs. We did this when they hit the $7 price mark; now they are like $2-$3 each, no reason not to do it.