Of course there are many more, but here are 10 quick and easy ideas:
1. Clean your refrigerator coils. Vacuuming the dust out of your refrigerator coils makes it run more efficiently and thus saves energy.
2. Turn off the water while shaving and brushing your teeth. Gallons of potable water are flushed down the drain while we brush or shave. If you use hot water, it is even worse as you spend the energy on heating the water as well as the water itself.
3. Change your heater filter. The cleaner the filter, the more efficiently your heater will run. At a minimum, it should be changed every season.
4. Insulate hot water pipes. The unused hot water in your pipes cools quickly in winter. Insulating the pipes means that there will be less time (and water) wasted waiting for your shower to heat up.
5. Check your weather stripping. Replace old worn out weather stripping to create tight seals around windows and doors. Keep the warm air inside this winter.
6. Carpool one day a week. Simple, but true. One day a week could mean a huge impact on your fuel costs. Don’t like to carpool? Try public transportation one day a week. Who knows, maybe you will see that it isn’t so bad-soon you can skip the fuel costs, the parking, the maintenance, just by using the mass transit system in your town.
7. Wash your clothes in cold water. Clothes rarely get cleaner in hot water. If you are a hot water junkie, dial it down slowly, try warm for hot and cold for warm.
8. Replace standard light bulbs with compact fluorescent ones. My favorite suggestion! If you want to know more, check out my earlier post on the subject.
9. Put master strips on major gadgets and appliances. Turning off the TV and DVD player rarely turns them all the way off any more. Unplug them at night or when away from home (or use a master strip that you can simply switch off). The clock on your VCR won’t read right-but does it now? Don’t forget about the chargers! Phone and gadget chargers still draw power, even when they are not charging anything. Unplug them when not in use.
10. Get a programmable thermostat. I cut our natural gas use significantly by installing one of these. It was easy to install, easy to program and cost about $30. Does your entire house need to be heated all day when no one is there to enjoy it?
Tags: compact fluorescents, conservation, Energy, Go Green, water
This is a good and useful list for folks to use to save money by saving energy. Welcome to the blog world. We are almost neighbors.