November's Sustainable Living Tip
Turning down your thermostat during the heating season is the easiest way to save energy. Lowering your setting by one degree for eight hours every night will save one percent on your heating load. For the average Maine household, that will conserve 25 gallons of fuel oil over the season, keeping 550 pounds of carbon dioxide out of the atmosphere!
But once you've taken the easy step of lowering your thermostats, what else can you do to save energy? Read on for our "greatest hits" list of the most effective ways to enjoy more heat with less waste.
"Greatest Hits" More Heat, Less Waste Ideas
- If you have an oil boiler or furnace, clean and tune it up every heating season. Watch your technician inspect and clean your boiler once, and you'll have a good understanding of why this is necessary every year!
- If you have a natural gas or propane system, have it inspected annually. These fuels burn more cleanly than heating oil, so you won't have the same loss in efficiency over the course of a heating season. But have a trained professional inspect your system to make sure it is in proper working order nonetheless.
- Close your flue. A chimney that is open directly to your house, such as in a working fireplace (not a wood stove), is your largest single source of heat loss. Whenever you don't have a fire in your fireplace, the tighter you can close your flue, the better.
- Cover your windows (part 1). Windows intentionally let energy into your home (in the form of light), but they also unintentionally let energy out. Between September and March, the night is longer than the day here in Maine. If you have curtains or blinds, close them whenever sunlight is not coming in.
- Cover your windows (part 2). Installing storm windows with good weatherstripping will greatly improve the insulating value of your windows. In older homes, one of the easiest approaches is to install custom-made interior storm windows. These can be made to fit snugly, preventing wind from blowing around loose double hung windows. Install them in the winter, then remove them in warmer weather. Storm windows improve comfort as well as saving energy: they stop cold drafts and they cut down on noise. Interior storm windows are especially helpful in older apartment buildings in urban environments.
- Cover your windows (part 3). Pay special attention to your indoor humidity levels in rooms where you install insulating drapes or interior storm windows. Your window glass will become much colder, potentially leading to condensation issues. If condensation is a problem, exterior storm windows are a better solution. They will keep your window glass warmer, reducing the condensation problem. Remember, condensation forms when warm moist air reaches a cold surface.
- Seal your attic hatch. If you have a hatch or door to your unheated attic, make sure it closes securely and has weatherstripping all around it to prevent warm air from escaping up into your attic. For ceiling hatches, a good design is to install weatherstripping around the edge of the hatch and use latches to press the hatch closed on the weatherstripping. Warm air that gets into your attic and reaches the underside of your roof decking will melt snow on your roof, leading to ice dams. Keep warm air out of your attic!
- Seal your foundation walls, windows and doors. If you have a bulkhead door, make sure it has weatherstripping around it. Cold air that seeps in below your house will get sucked up into your home. A tube of caulk and spray foam will go a long way toward preventing frozen pipes, cutting down on cold drafts, and lowering your heating bills.
- Wrap your ducts and hot water pipes. If you have air ducts or hot water pipes in an unheated part of your home (such as your basement or garage), make sure they are wrapped securely in insulation all the way from the heating source to the destination.
- Add a mud room. Every house in Maine needs a room for taking off muddy boots! Enclosing a porch so that it acts as an "air lock" will keep cold air from pouring into your home whenever someone comes or goes. It will also cut down on the drafts coming in and around your door all winter long, since wind won't be blowing directly against your exterior door. If you can't add a mud room, an exterior storm door with proper weatherstripping is a good alternative.
- Hang dry your clothes. You're probably aware that an electric clothes dryer is one of the most power-hungry appliances you can use. But did you ever consider how much air an automatic dryer sucks out of your home? It's about equivalent to leaving a kitchen window wide open. When an automatic dryer runs, it blows hot air out of your home. Cold outside air finds its way in to replace the air that the dryer is sending out. A better alternative is to invest in a high efficiency washing machine that spin dries clothes, then hanging them to finish drying overnight on a wooden drying rack. Drying clothes indoors works especially well during the winter because indoor air humidity levels are low.
- Clean your screens. Fall is a great time to take down the screens in your windows on the southern side of your house. Clean them and put them away for the winter. Unless you plan on opening your windows, the screens are useless and simply shade sunlight that would otherwise be helping heat up your home. While you're at it, clean your windows, too. You won't notice a huge difference on your heating bill, but every little bit helps! You might also prune branches or bushes that are shading your southern exposure.
- Look for leaks. As the weather turns colder, air flows more quickly through any gaps in your exterior walls or ceilings. It's easy to feel for cold air leaking in on lower floors, but sometimes more challenging to find how hot air is leaking out upstairs. Just remember that cold air comes in downstairs, and hot air leaves upstairs. If you feel cold air blowing in under a door or around a light switch on an exterior wall, you know that an equal amount of hot air is being squeezed out of your house somewhere else. Spider webs are a good tip off for places where air is leaving. Spiders like to build webs where they will catch dinner, so they look for places where air currents send small insects. Once you find a leak, a bit of caulk is often all that's needed to fix it. If you have access to your attic, you may find that your electricians and plumbers cut holes for their handiwork. These holes are probably letting warm air up into your attic, which can lead to ice dams. You can safely use spray foam to seal gaps around any plumbing or modern electrical wire in good repair. If you find frayed wires or knob and tube wiring (i.e. two wires running through ceramic tubes and wrapped around ceramic knobs), you'd be well advised to call an electrician to replace it. (Knob and tube wiring is safe if properly installed, but often is not properly installed. Hire a professional to inspect it to find out.)
- See how low you can go. Save energy and money by lowering your thermostat even more. The lower you go, and the longer you stay low, the more you save. If you don't believe it, try experimenting yourself. Most households can safely (i.e. without freezing pipes) turn down their thermostats to 55 degrees at night and during the day when no one is home. You might be able to go even lower. Just make sure everyone in your household is ready for the experience before you touch that thermostat!
