Rossmoor New Special
Make Your Home More Efficient, Comfortable and Healthy – And Save Money!
Most people will say that the #1 cause of greenhouse gas pollution is cars on the road. In truth, according to the U.S. Department of Energy, residential buildings cause the greatest amount of emissions, more than cars and light trucks combined. If you think about it this makes sense – we use lighting, we condition our home, we heat and cool our food, etc.. And all this happens 365 days a year. Multiply that usage by the 130 million homes in the United States and you can appreciate the magnitude of our energy and water consumption at home.
But lowering your energy consumption isn’t just about the environment; there are several personal reasons for reducing your consumption.
- Financial: over the past 50 years, energy prices have steadily grown by more than 5% each year. Energy costs are going to keep going up, so doing home efficiency work today is a good investment
- Comfort: Most people don’t realize how much room for improvement they have in their home. When it’s hot or cold outside they are resigned to being uncomfortable or needing to crank up a noisy furnace. That does not have to be the case. An efficient home can comfortable throughout the year.
- Health: Many homes have the heating and cooling duct system running through an attic or other “unhealthy” area. Typically these duct systems will be in disrepair and can distribute dirt and contaminants throughout the house.
- So as a homeowner, what should you do? There are two levels of efficiency work – the first is the low-hanging fruit, easy do-it-yourself measures; the second are measures that an experienced contractor such as Advanced Home Energy (AHE) can do for you.
Easy things YOU can do to save energy at home:
- Lighting accounts for about 10% of your energy bill. You can replace your regular incandescent bulbs with new energy efficient compact fluorescent lamps (CFLs). These CFLs consume ¼ of the energy for the same light output. Modern CFLs have excellent light quality, look like regular bulbs and last 10 times longer than incandescent bulbs.
- Water heating accounts for about 13% of your energy bill. You can turn down you water heater thermostat to 120 degrees. Typically, if the hot water coming out of your tap requires you to mix in cold water, then you can turn down the thermostat.
- The refrigerator accounts for 7% of your energy bill. Fridges manufactured before 1980 use almost 2x more energy than modern Energy Star refrigerators. Consider upgrading. Also, keep the freezer full (use jugs with water) because it will work more efficiently
There are other effective energy efficiency upgrades that are more technical and difficult and require the services of a licensed home performance contractor such as Advanced Home Energy (AHE). AHE is a licensed contractor who specializes in providing construction services that improve the comfort, health and efficiency of a home. We diagnose all the components of a building to identify the areas for greatest potential and then create a work package that is tailored to the unique issues of the building and needs of our clients. Then as we do the work we test our progress and make sure that we are using our time well and making a difference. We stop once we have reached our target.
This process which we call testing-in and testing-out is analogous to a doctor’s visit. The doctor does a complete physical, makes a recommendation, a health care solution is implemented, and the progress is monitored until the treatment has worked. A house, like your body, is a system with interdependent parts: the building shell, the furnace and air conditioner, the duct delivery system, the lighting system, and so on. By looking at all these parts AHE can figure out how to make the entire system work effectively and efficiently.
For more information, please attend a free presentation at 2pm on June 24th. AHE along with PG&E and EBMUD will be providing a presentation and free give-aways for helping make your home more efficient.
For more information on Advanced Home Energy visit www.advancedhomeenergy.com or call (510) 540-4860.
