Whether you are rich or poor, we could use a little frugality in our day to day life. After all, who wants to waste hard earned money on the electricity bills when there are several fun ways to spend it? Remember what your grandmother said? Yes ! the one who insisted you on wearing warm clothes instead of plugging in the heater- well she was a smart lady, who know how to live frugal and save money for rainy day.
With today’s modern facilities and energy saving appliances available, there is no excuse to be an energy waster. Conserving energy for our planet and pocket books. Let’s look at 10 ways on how to save money on the electricity bill- things that you can implement today and possibly see the results as soon as the next bill arrives.
Save money for smart home
By now, you must already know how to seal the home with caulking and weatherstripping, so we are not going to discuss this idea with you any more, here are some insightful tips on how to save money on electricity bills and how to go green. Improve the comfort levels of home by adding smart appliances in the home. There are several ways to make your home smart, energy efficient, well-oiled machine just by adopting some of the latest technologies.
You can install programmable thermostats, as they are the first step towards home energy conservation. Modern thermostats like Nest, help you to learn about your family temperature habits and mimic them by turning off and on heat or air when you are not at home or turning it up during the hottest/ coldest times of the day when climate control is a must. The environmental protection agency estimates that an average family can save up to $180 per year just by installing a properly programmed thermostat. You can make your whole home smart by using one of numerous whole home automation kits that are available in the market. This automation system helps you to control lightning, temperature and alarm and even window coverings from the phone. What a great modern facilities that will help you to save a lot on the electricity bills! Try to invest money in modern technology that can make your home energy genius.
Install ceiling fans
Your home often becomes stuffy due to poor air circulation. Ceiling fans allows air to be circulated efficiently in home, thus saving you a lot of money on air conditioning. You can actually turn off air conditioner a few degrees warmer when ceiling fan is pushing cool down air- this could add up a lot of savings by the end of summer. Though a ceiling fan doesn’t have a big impact on the actual temperature of the home, but it really makes you feel cooler when you sleeping under the fan. Why? Well, the reason is easy because the air flow on your skin is evaporating sweat and making you feel cooler. A ceiling fan can even help to lower the energy costs during winter months. Simply, reverse the switch present at the top of the fan unit, making the blades rotate in a vice versa direction, thereby pushing the hot air trapped near the ceiling down to the living space.
Change the lightbulbs
By now everyone knows that switching your lightbulbs to highly efficient LED bulbs is a plain smart thing to do. At first these new LED’s were considered as decorative nightmare with their harsh lightning arrangements and ugly bright coils. In fact it will make the room uninviting. However, the appearance of this technology has improved with time and there are a enough of options that look similar to light bulbs (hiding the coils inside) as they emit attractive light shades. Considering all the above-mentioned facts, 11% of its energy budget on lighting- it is definitely time to switch to modern LED’s that can reduce the lightning energy use by 50% to 75%. So, switch to warmly lit rooms and modern LED bulbs- it is the best of both the worlds.
Unplug the electrical appliances
Here’s a little known fact that even when appliances are not in use, they are still consuming power if they are plugged in. Look around the home, how many appliances are currently plugged in that are not in use? Your computer? Toaster? Lamps? Or your television? According to US Department of Energy these appliances are adding 10 to 15% of the annual energy bill. Unplugging all these unused appliances can add up to yearly savings of up to 220$. But the question arises:how to go around and unplug devices on a routine basis. You could decide to simply unplug the devices that you rarely use or you could buy a few power strips that allow you to turn off multiple devices with the click of one switch. Either way, unplugging the electrical devices is a smart option.
Substitute water heater with tankless water heater
This step is a bit more time consuming and is costly, but let’s understand about it anyway- afterall, the initial investment is worth it when you live in the busy household that consumes a lot of hot water, and it’s better than yelling at your kids, Hurry up get out from the shower. Tankless water heaters provide a lot of hot water as needed on daily basis. They are not only using a lot of wasted energy by constantly consuming a lot of power. Tankless water heaters only heat up the water when it is turned on. According to energy official website, a star rated tankless water heater saves a lot of energy for an average household. While these tankless units are more costly as compared to other counterparts, they typically last longer ( it’s lifespan is of 20 years), making the investment worthwhile. If you don’t wish to spend extra money on new water heater, consider turning down the thermostat by a few degrees on your present water heater- it’s better than doing nothing, and every little bit pays in a long run!
Drape and open
Anybody can do this step and it doesn’t cost a fortune to implement. Your homes can cool down by 10 to 15 degrees during night by simply opening up your window curtains during night and letting fresh air enter in! add to this a ceiling fan may actually feel you like that you are enjoying at a hill station even during July. During daylight hours, a bright glaring sun can heat up the home drastically, causing us to switch air conditioner to the highest temperature. Instead try to install a blackout curtain panels for your windows or a black out shades. By closing the windows when the temperature is high, you block out the harsh sun rays and cool down temperature of your drastically without using the A/C. This facility takes us back to the smart automation system which would let us to control our window panels with a touch of the button-even when you are not at home. Now, you can enjoy the efficiency at its best!
Install solar panels
While solar panels are something that we can easily implement, but they are fast becoming more and popular among homeowners who wish to go green. Solar panels can be a bit costly option with some units running upwards of $10,000 but most of states have federal costs that reduce dramatically. You can research on the internet about the same. Here’s an quirky fact- Forbes cites that solar panels are equivalent to planting 88 trees in a year, drastically reducing carbon footprint, thus saving an average of 84$ on electricity bill. This sounds to be a win-win situation for you and environment. On the top of installation- you need to hire a professional to hire it, making upfront costs pretty high. This is why a lot of people leasing or financing solar panel system- low interest rate and increase in value of home making it worthy of second thought.
Research about home appliances
Are your appliances old and outdated? Do you still have a washer and dryer set that you got 13 years back as a gift from someone? These old but reliable energy appliances are energy-hog and are costing you a lot of money. In United States, the purchase of energy star appliances is on the rise. Want to know exactly how much money you can save by replacing your old refrigerator with other big appliance or with Energy star one? Well, check the handy calculator that provides insight about how much money you are wasting every month. Upgrading these appliances to energy appliances comes with great discount rate that reduces the upfront cost as much as by $100 per appliance. With so many energy star appliances plaguing the marker, it may be hard to find the one that is not energy efficient in the near future, forcing us to go a little bit green. Research the same witj local energy savings program and see what is offered- upgrading to more energy efficient appliances can save a lot of money.
Incorporate furnace filters in home
Furnace filters in home can be bit expensive option. With so many models, costing up to $ 20 needing to be changed every 3 months can be bit tedious. This makes us so much negligent about changing filters on timely basis and extending it up to 6 months, but this is a costly affair. The use of old, dirty filters causes our heating and ventilating system to run less efficiently, thus causing more strain on the system and costing us a lot of money. A strained ventilation system means short life span and definitely it is an expensive affair and cause un-timely death of home heating systems that just come and go every three months. You can even buy re-usable furnace filters that can be taken out for cleaning and then can be put to the place again. These filters can be bit upfront in cost, but are worth considering if the idea of buying every three months seems to be a costly affair. Replace dirty filters with the new one and let your breathe fresh gust of air!
Use cold water as much as possible
This is a option that no one really wants to adhere to! Do you wish to cold water bath? Well, no one wants to take it, so it is an option that is recommended for you, even if it saves a lot of energy and water heating costs. However, your clothes on other hand would be more grateful if they are washed in cold water and in fact it will last longer if you did. With wide availability of detergents that are best for cold water washing, most of the clothes can be easily cleaned in cold water, unless they are soiled. The absolute way to save your electricity bills is to wash your clothes on cold cycle in Energy star washer, so that you can give cold shoulder to the electricity bills whenever it is possible-your clothes and wallet will thank you for this deed.
Thus, frugality can be fun-especially when money that could be wasted on other energy bills can be used to get finer things in life, There are so many ways to reduce electricity bills- one among them is to use smart technology, changing lightbulbs to LED, installation of ceiling fans, unplugging of electrical devices, replacing dirty filters and adding energy star appliances, and the list is endless..
