According to the US Energy Information Administration, household customers make up about 47% of the total annual electricity savings from utility energy efficiency programs. The statistics demonstrate that all households can play a part in the quest to reduce greenhouse gas emissions and make the earth a more habitable place. People will not only contribute to reducing toxic emissions into the atmosphere but will also be saving money for themselves and their families when they actively make efforts to reduce their energy consumption rates. If the improvement of the energy efficiency of your home is one of your concerns, here are some tips to contemplate adhering to.
- Replace air filters in your home regularly
Dirty filters make the systems in your home work unnecessarily harder and longer. Replacing your dirty filters will ensure that air circulates more freely in your home and improves the heating system. It would help if you tried to replace them every 3 months to ensure that you breathe cleaner air and make your home more energy-friendly.
- Assess your home
The US Department of Energy has instituted a national rating system called the Home Energy Score, which assesses a home’s present energy efficiency and provides a list of ways to enhance the score and save money. Therefore, when you see homes for sale signage and are tempted to buy, engage the services of an energy assessor to assess the home energy score of the homes you are interested in. The recommendations of the score will guide you on how to improve your home’s energy efficiency.
- Unplug your chargers when not in use
One common but terrible practice among many people is leaving their chargers plugged even after charging their electronic devices. When chargers are left in their plugs after charging, they continue to consume electricity even when there are no gadgets attached to them to make use of the electricity. You will reduce your electricity bills if you always remove your charging devices from their plugs after charging your phones and headsets, among others.
- Use ceiling fans
Ceiling fans are awesome for cooling bedrooms and living rooms, particularly at night. When you don’t need to cool your entire house, you should try to use ceiling fans which will be enough to cool only the places you intend to cool. On the other hand, central cooling systems completely cool homes and consume more energy. Resorting to the use of ceiling fans will help to reduce the energy consumption of your home.
- Change all CFL lights to LED
LED lights are more efficient than their CFL counterparts and do not contain any harmful gases. It would help if you considered fitting all your lighting systems with LED lights known to last up to 20 years! When you do this, you don’t only make your home more energy efficient but also save money on the number of lights you would buy over some time.
As you know by now, improving your energy consumption at home is not too difficult, making it a sanctuary of energy efficiency. It will be very helpful if you try to implement some if not all the suggestions above.
This is a contributed post.