You can get help paying for many energy efficiency home improvement projects this year through hefty rebates. While many of the federal tax credits for energy efficiency have expired, Xcel Energy is offering 2012 rebates, and so are many other utilities.
If you’ve been aghast at heating bills during the cold winter months, you might consider a new high efficiency furnace qualifying in Colorado for a $120 rebate from Xcel Energy. Or perhaps you’d benefit from a more efficient water heater— a standard tank qualifies for a rebate up to $90 while a tankless water heater might get you a $100 rebate.
Experts agree that one of the most cost effective efficiency improvements you can make is to add insulation and air sealing, akin to throwing a blanket on your home. Xcel Energy is offering up to $300 in rebates for such improvements.
Rebates vary by locale. For information, check out the Xcel Energy website: http://www.xcelenergy.com/rebates. For more comprehensive information on rebates, check out the Database of State Incentives for Renewables & Efficiency at http://www.dsireusa.org/
If you have a fireplace that you don’t use, it may be one of your home’s biggest energy wasters during the winter. Your fireplace likely has a damper and if it is not closed, warm air can escape all day up the chimney. It’s like keeping a window wide open on a cold day.
Even if the damper is shut, it may not be tight enough to prevent air from leaking. Luckily there are plenty of options for sealing the leak. For example, inflatable rubber plugs allow you to seal the chimney, but change your mind down the road. You can also add caulking around the hearth.
If you do use your wood-burning fireplace, make sure you don’t close the damper until the fire is completely extinguished.
A variety of inserts are available to increase the efficiency of your fireplace. Most have tight-fitting doors and air-circulation features to blow the heated air back in your room. One of the most efficient options is to explore burning wood pellets.
If you are looking to replace your wood fireplace with a gas log model, you’ll face a choice of either a standing pilot light, which is lit all the time, or one with electronic ignition. The electronic ignition models are more efficient because they only burn gas when they are turned on.
Learn more about how to choose an efficient solution for your fireplace: http://www.energysavers.gov/your_home/space_heating_cooling/index.cfm/mytopic=12570
This year, consumers have more energy-saving light bulb choices than ever before and can save up to $100 a year on electricity bills with smart lighting choices.
Thanks to a 2007 law signed by George W. Bush, new lighting efficiency standards start phasing in this year. Manufacturers in 2012 must offer bulbs about 25 percent more efficient than traditional 100-watt incandescent bulbs.
Choices abound: consumers can get the look of an incandescent with a more efficient halogen incandescent bulb that can save $3 over its lifetime.
Compact Fluorescent Lamps (CFLs) offer the best bargain, using about 75% less energy and lasting up to 10 times longer. If you buy CFLs in a pack, you can get them for $2 or less each and each bulb can save up to $50 over its lifetime, according to the Lumen Coalition.
And the most efficient bulbs of all are Light-Emitting Diodes (LEDs) which can save more than 75% in energy costs and last up to 25 years. Their upfront cost is higher but they can save you money over their long life. More and more styles are coming on the market and it's worth doing a careful cost comparison, taking into account how long they last.
The new lighting standards will save our nation as much as $10 billion dollars a year and the amount of electricity generated by 30 large power plants, according to the Alliance to Save Energy.
If you are planning to do a retrofit of your business, check with your utility to see if rebates are available. Xcel makes it very attractive for small businesses to upgrade to more efficient fluorescent lighting, for example.
If you are considering a home retrofit, there are issues to consider such as the type of fixture you have, whether you want the bulbs to dim, and what "color'' of light you prefer.
Learn more about lighting choices at the Lumen Coalition: http://lumennow.org/energy-saving-choices/.
Don't forget your microwave oven.
According to Energy Star, you can reduce the energy used in cooking by up to 80 percent by using your microwave for small portions. Microwaves are much more efficient for defrosting that frozen meat or vegetables than heating up a whole oven.
Microwaves use high-frequency radio waves to heat water molecules inside food, and can reduce the cooking time and energy needed for preparing certain foods, especially in small amounts.
While you are cooking, be sure to keep the inside of the microwave clean so energy goes toward your food, not the oatmeal you forgot to wipe up this morning.
While cooking on the stove top, make sure your pots cover the burner completely to get full benefit of the heat.
And however you are cooking, use the smallest pan that fits the food so you aren’t heating up more pan than you need.
Your refrigerator is probably the kitchen’s biggest energy user, so make sure that you aren’t leaving it open unnecessarily as you are preparing your holiday feasts.
During the holiday season, people in the U.S. generate an extra 3 million tons of household waste. We waste three times as much food as at other times of the year, according to the Worldwatch Institute.
Here are 10 tips for reducing your food waste this season, provided by the Worldwatch Institute, an independent research organization:
1. Be realistic: The fear of not providing enough to eat often causes hosts to cook too much. Instead, plan out how much food you and your guests will realistically need, and stock up accordingly.
2. Plan ahead: Create a shopping list before heading to the grocery store. Sticking to this list will reduce the risk of impulse buys or buying unnecessary quantities, particularly since stores typically use holiday sales to entice buyers into spending more.
During the meal: Control the amount on your plate to reduce the amount in the garbage.
3. Go small: The season of indulgence often promotes plates piled high with more food than can be eaten. Simple tricks of using smaller serving utensils or plates can encourage smaller portions, reducing the amount left on plates. Guests can always take second (or third!) servings if still hungry, and it is much easier (and more hygienic) to use leftovers from serving platters for future meals.
4. Encourage self-serve: Allow guests to serve themselves, choosing what, and how much, they would like to eat. This helps to make meals feel more familiar and also reduces the amount of unwanted food left on guests' plates.
After the meal: Make the most out of leftovers.
5. Store leftovers safely: Properly storing our leftovers will preserve them safely for future meals. The U.S. Department of Agriculture recommends that hot foods be left out for no more than two hours. Store leftovers in smaller, individually sized containers, making them more convenient to grab for a quick meal rather than being passed over and eventually wasted.
6. Compost food scraps: Instead of throwing out the vegetable peels, eggshells, and other food scraps from making your meal, consider composting them. Individual composting systems can be relatively easy and inexpensive, and provide quality inputs for garden soils.
7. Create new meals: If composting is not an option for you, check out Love Food Hate Waste's creative recipes to see if your food scraps can be used for new meals. Vegetable scraps and turkey carcasses can be easily boiled down for stock and soups, and bread crusts and ends can be used to make tasty homemade croutons.
8. Donate excess: Food banks and shelters gladly welcome donations of canned and dried foods, especially during the holiday season and colder months. The charity group Feeding America partners with over 200 local food banks across the United States, supplying food to more than 37 million people each year.
9. Support food-recovery programs: In some cases, food-recovery systems will come to you to collect your excess. In New York City, City Harvest, the world's first food-rescue organization, collects approximately 28 million pounds of food each year that would otherwise go to waste, providing groceries and meals for over 300,000 people.
Throughout the holiday season: Consider what you're giving.
10. Give gifts with thought: When giving food as a gift, avoid highly perishable items and make an effort to select foods that you know the recipient will enjoy rather than waste. The Rainforest Alliance, an international nonprofit, works with farmers and producers in tropical areas to ensure they are practicing environmentally sustainable and socially just methods. The group's certified chocolates, coffee, and teas are great gifts that have with long shelf-lives, and buying them helps support businesses and individuals across the world.
One of the most important things to do when you crank up the furnace in the fall is to replace your furnace filter—and then check it every month.
If it has a gray furry look like a mouse pelt, you can be thankful you caught all that gunk before it entered your lungs. And that’s a good sign it’s time for a fresh white filter. Most sizes of standard filters are available at home improvement stores and even grocery stores. They vary in price depending on how much dust they can catch.
Replacing filters frequently allows the furnace to pull air with less labor and thus to use less energy. And it keeps dust and dirt from clogging up the heating system as well as your breathing tubes.
Fall is the ideal time for a furnace check and “tune up’’ as well. As the biggest user of natural gas in your home, your furnace will use about 5 percent less gas if it is clean, lubricated and property adjusted.
Make sure the furnace can do its job by checking that the vents are not covered by furniture, drapes or those old boots you forgot about. Letting warm air circulate freely will spread more warmth for less money.
You can make a real difference in cutting pollution by making a simple change that won't cost you anything and, in fact, will save you money on your heating bills.
What’s the change?
Wash all your clothing in cold water.
Heating the water for each load of wash accounts for nearly 90 percent of the energy used by your washing machine. The Sierra Club estimates that one household can eliminate 1,600 pounds of annual carbon dioxide emissions simply by washing all the clothing in cold water.
Worried that your clothing won’t get as clean? New detergents are made to work just as well in cold water as in hot water. And they don’t generally cost any more. So you’ll end up saving money and saving energy as well.
In fact, Proctor & Gamble has teamed up with the Alliance to Save Energy to get the word out about the value of converting to cold water washing. The groups hope to educate 100 million U.S. households by Earth Day 2013 about cold-water washing, and they want to convert 70% of washing machine loads to cold water washing by 2020.
Here are some other tips from the Alliance to save more energy while doing your laundry:
• Do full loads of laundry. Running the washer for a partial load wastes water and energy.
• Do not over-wash clothes. Use a shorter cycle for clothes that are only slightly soiled..
• Clean the dryer lint filter after every load. A lint-free filter improves air circulation and quickens drying. Dirty filters can become a fire hazard.
• Separate light and heavy items before drying. Lightweight items take less drying time, so don’t mix your underwear and t-shirts with your towels. Consider line-drying your towels, if not all your laundry.
• Don't over-dry clothes. Take clothes out while they are still slightly damp to reduce the need for ironing — another energy user. If your dryer has an auto-dry feature, use that instead of the timer.
Rather than pay for an expensive gym visit, consider putting some muscles to work in your yard this fall. You can save energy, improve your personal habitat and burn calories all at the same time. Roughly 20 percent of what we send to landfills every year is yard waste and ALL of it can be recycled. Think of the impact of eliminating one in every five trash truck trips in your community.
If you haven’t started yet, this is a good season to start to compost your yard waste, including raked up leaves, pruned twigs from bushes, and those annual plants transformed from glory to finished after the first hard frost.
To make compost, alternate layers of materials by whether they are dry or green. Plants lose up to 75 percent of their volume in composting, so you can recycle a lot in a bin or corner of your yard. Many people include kitchen wastes such as coffee grounds, eggshells and fruit and vegetable trimmings. Composting is easy and results in a way to feed your garden either as a soil amendment or a mulch. There are many resources available to get you started. Colorado State University Extension offers a wealth of resources including a composting fact sheet.
While you are working in the garden, try raking by hand. The energy savings may surprise you: A leaf blower emits 34 times as much hydrocarbon pollution as a typical auto, per hour of operation. That’s more than a weedeater, which emits 21 times more, and a gas lawn mower, which emits at least 10 times as much!
If you don’t have your personal computer set to go to sleep after a brief period of inactivity, chances are you are letting it suck energy and money for no reason.
Many PCs have a sleep or power-down mode – but often, you have to set it through your operating system software. ENERGY STAR® computers consume 15 Watts or less power when they are put to “sleep’’, which is around 70% less electricity than a computer without power management features.Setting your computer to go to “sleep’’ saves much more energy than using screen-savers.
And while it may seem that it takes a burst of energy to start up your computer, the machine uses more when it’s running idly for long periods of time. Guidelines from the Department of Energy suggest you turn off the monitor if you aren't going to use your PC for more than 20 minutes and the whole system if you are leaving it for more than two hours. And if you plug everything into a power strip and flip off the switch while you are away, the computer won’t be using “vampire’’energy even when it is turned off.
Finally, when you are considering buying a new personal computer, remember that desktops use up to three times as much energy as laptops. Besides selecting a portable model, remember that selecting an ENERGY STAR rated model will ensure maximum savings.
Are you prone to letting your inner race car driver loose on the highway?
If you slam down on the gas pedal to speed around other cars and then pound on the brakes to slow down, you might be wasting money as well as putting yourself in danger. You can decrease the mileage your car gets by about a third through speeding, rapid acceleration and rapid braking, according to the Alliance to Save Energy. That can add up to about $900 a year in wasted gas.
Even if you only drive like a jackrabbit around town, you can lower gas mileage by about 5 percent.
One of the best ways to cut your gas bills is to slow down. Mileage decreases rapidly above 60 miles per hour, the Alliance says. Each 5 mph over 60 equates to paying about a quarter per gallon more for gas.
Refrigerators account for nearly 10 percent of your total home electricity bill and run all the time, so paying attention to these big units are worth your time.
You can give your fridge a longer life if you keep the coils clean—check out whether they are behind or underneath the unit and save money by using a vacuum on them regularly.
If your refrigerator dates to the 1980s, a new model can save you $100 a year in electricity savings. If your fridge is even older—dating to the 1970s, you can save about $200 a year by replacing it. And if you have an old fridge in the garage keeping a few drinks cool, it's likely costing you much more in electricity than it's worth. Not every fridge is the same—be sure to look for the Energy Star label and compare estimated electricity costs as you shop.
Refrigerators will continue to improve. New efficiency standards approved by the Department of Energy will drive more innovation while ensuring that fridges use only one-fifth the energy they used to. Once they take effect in 2014, the new standards will mean a typical fridge will use $215 to $270 less per year in electricity than a comparable 1978 unit.
Over 30 years, the new standards will save roughly enough energy to meet the total energy needs of one-fifth of all U.S. households for a year, according to the DOE. Over the same 30-year period, and taking into account up-front costs, consumers will save up to $36 billion.
More efficient refrigerators will cut CO2 emissions by an amount equal to the pollution of about 67 million cars, and reduce other pollutants dramatically. U.S. refrigerator manufacturers have already begun making investments needed to meet the 2014 standards.
While a big refrigerator or air conditioning system might seem like your home’s biggest energy user, a recent study found that much smaller devices eat more power in many homes.
Turns out that the 160 million set-top boxes in the U.S. last year consumed about 27 billion kilowatt hours of electricity, or the annual output of nine average ( 500 MW) coal-fired power plants. The power costs consumers more than $3 billion a year, according to the study by the Natural Resources Defense Council and Ecos.
A big problem is that the boxes that bring you cable and digital recording ability use just about as much power when they are off as when they are on. We spend $2 billion a year as a nation powering the boxes when they are not in use. Plugging them into a power strip and leaving them off when you’re not using them can help save power and money. And convincing your cable or satellite provider to replace inefficient boxes with newer ones that hog less energy will save you more.
The average food on your plate travelled 1500 miles to reach you. But especially this time of year, you can slash the amount of oil and gas it took to get that food to your table and enjoy the freshness you are adding! You’ll get the best nature has to offer if you eat locally. It’s not too late to convert some of that thirsty bluegrass in your backyard to some fast-growing crops you can harvest in the fall. Farmers’ Markets are bursting this time of year with melons, corn, fruit and just about every kind of green vegetable you can imagine. And when you meet up with friends for a meal out, look for restaurants that serve locally grow food. Here’s one of many websites to help you get started on the local eating path: www.localsustainability.net .
There’s an easy way to save money and help the environment, and you can do it every day:
Drink tap water and not bottled water.
An average of 38 billion water bottles per year-- 85 percent of those consumed in the U.S.-- end up in the trash, according to American Water. It takes more than 1.5 million gallons of oil to make these bottles.
Consumers can enjoy water from the faucet for less than a penny a gallon on average, and tap water is subjected to rigorous testing to make sure it is safe. Bottled water costs 250 to 10,000 times more depending on the brand, American Water estimates. So make friends with a reuseable water bottle, ensuring it doesn’t contain harmful chemicals, and then refill it over and over and over.
Banish vampire energy!
When you squint and scan your living spaces, do you see little dots of light sprinkled like stars? While you can be lucky they’re most likely not miniature electronic spies watching you, they are more than likely energy vampires! That’s right, all those little green, red, blue and white lights signal that those electronic devices you turned off are still sort of on, sucking electrical current. They aren’t using as much electricity as if you were watching the plasma TV or video chatting with your friends on Facebook, but the vampire energy really adds up. The Department of Energy estimates that 5 to 8 percent of your home’s total electricity use each month is blinking away. That could add up to nearly a whole month’s bill! Luckily there’s a simple fix: buy some power strips at your local hardware outlet and plug several electronic devices in before connecting the strip to an outlet. Then when you aren’t using the devices, simply turn the switch off with a tap of your foot. It’s just as easy to turn the power supply back on and enjoy your gadgets. But you won’t be feeding the energy vampires any more.
CHOOSE ECO-FRIENDLY PAINT!
Sometimes all it takes to brighten up your life is a new coat of paint on your walls. Do you ever ask yourself if the chemicals in paint are harmful to you and your family? The smell alone should clue you in that many paints contain harmful vapors. According to the EPA, the amount of pollutants inside a home is bad news compared to the more spacious greater outdoors. The paint on your walls contributes to these harmful pollutants, which can cause a plethora of health problems. Thankfully there are many eco -friendly paints on the market today to choose from. So when you are ready to paint that accent wall, home office, or baby nursery, head to your local paint supplier and ask about your options for low VOCs or no VOC paint. After all, you should be able to add color to your space without adding volatile organic compounds, otherwise known as VOCs.
But wait! There is one more very important and easy step to cleansing your indoor space and cutting down on indoor air pollution. When the weather is nice, open all your windows and let Mother Nature’s breeze in. Never underestimate the serenity of fresh air; your lungs will thank you. Just make sure your heat is off before you let any chilly air in!
Let the sun shine in!
Maybe you’d like to make a family game of turning off the lights in your home that aren’t in use and getting everyone in the habit of helping out. You’ll be surprised at how much you can save on your energy bills. Ten 100- watt lights left on for just an hour use one kilowatt hour of electricity. Multiply that 500 times and you have an entire month’s average household electricity use. Those overhead cans and upright torchieres, the chandelier above the dining table—even the bathroom globes -- they’re all using electricity and ticking pennies onto your bill every minute. Just get in the habit of thinking about flipping off the light switch when you leave a room or no longer are using even part of a room. Maybe it will help you to remind yourself of the connection between your electricity use and your bill by taping reminders near the switches. Maybe you want to come up with rewards for family members who do the best each month!
It's easy to take our household appliances for granted because they tend to be so reliable they keep on working until they, well, break down. But you can help prolong their life with simple cleaning this spring. Ridding your appliances of household dust will extend their life and improve their energy efficiency, Plus, the cleaning can alert you to more serious issues that might require repair or replacement. You can get in the habit of cleaning the clothes dryer's lint trap every time you turn it on.
In the kitchen, you can remove dust from the refrigerator's coils with a vacuum cleaner and clean the electric range reflectors to improve performance. And changing the furnace filter every month or so in cold weather can make a big difference.
It's also a good idea to have your furnace professionally checked every year. Your household appliances cost you about one-third of your monthly utility bill so keep them happy and humming and they'll work harder for you and charge you less. What a deal!
Switch to CFLs!
That’s right, a single CFL (compact fluorescent light) can save you $65 in electricity costs over its long life. If your house is still full of those quaint incandescent bulbs like Thomas Edison invented more than a century ago, you may have noticed that they literally give off more heat than light. Switching your light bulbs , especially the six or seven you use most, to energy-conserving compact fluorescents (CFLS) can make a surprisingly big difference in your energy bill. And retailers around the nation are offering them at low incentive prices because utilities know what a big difference they make. You may have heard the new twirly lights contain mercury. Some do, so it’s a good thing numerous hardware chains now offer a free recycling service.
Fix that leaky toilet!
U.S. homes may be wasting more than one trillion gallons of water each year, according to the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency. A minor toilet leak can waste up to 10,000 gallons of water in one month in one home! With 36 states expected to face some kind of water shortage by 2013, that’s not only bad for your wallet, but bad for the community.
You can see if your home is leaking by checking your water meter before and after a two-hour period when no water is being used. If the meter changes at all, you probably have a leak. Check your toilet for leaks by inserting a few drops of food coloring in the tank. Wait 15 minutes. If food coloring appears in the toilet bowl, you have a leak. Leaky toilets are most often the result of a worn toilet flapper. Replacing the rubber flapper is a quick fix that could save a home up to 200 gallons of water per day, according to American Water.
