Category: Energy Efficiency

How To Get Your Home Ready For Fall/Winter

Preparing your home for colder weather is a process that can make even the most responsible homeowner cringe. Thankfully, following some helpful tips can save you a lot of time, energy and money. Make the transition a bit easier as fall turns into winter, and the cold days of January and February set in.

Getting A Head Start

At the end of any warm season, preparing your home for winter is probably the last thing you want to do. However, you can always begin light to make an easier transition. By undertaking a number of small projects, you’ll be making winter more comfortable.

You’ll want to start by looking for outdoor improvements you can make while the weather is still warm. For example, clear space in your garage for a place to store summer-only amenities. Begin dismantling the tables and chairs that adorn your outdoor living spaces, clean and store any fixed door or window screens, and wash out your gutters. (Of course, with retractable screens that’s one less job to do!)

Maintaining your furnace or boiler, insulating your ducts and cleaning air filters are also crucial for getting ahead in the winter game. They’re usually a relatively cheap measure to take!

Winterizing = Energy and Cost Savings

Energy and financial savings are two benefits of preparing your home for upcoming seasons. Remember to check for and plug drafty windows, doors or vents. This step will save you money on your utility bills throughout the winter while making your home more efficient and environmentally friendly. If you’re still not convinced, imagine reducing your home’s energy use by 5 to 30 percent! It’s entirely worthwhile!

In addition, there are several products that you can use to accomplish such tasks. Felt, foam, rubber or tape, for example, are effective for weather-stripping your doors and windows all year-round. Another technique you can employ to make your home more efficient throughout the winter is plastic window insulation. Imagine saran wrapping your windows, only you’d be using self-adhesive, heavy-duty plastic wrap or shrink film. What makes this technique great is that it attaches with the use of a hair dryer. It’s that easy!

Safety Concerns

The onset of winter doesn’t just bring icy weather and slippery roads, it can also lead to household danger. You’ll need to closely monitor any products you use for heating you or your home. For instance, an electric blanket left running for too long could start a fire.

Icicles and slippery walkways and driveways can present other dangerous winter obstacles. Before it gets too deep into the end of the year, you’ll want to stock up on salt or cat litter that you can use to improve traction, and make sure to store a shovel in an easy to get to place to use for removing icicles.

Prioritizing Your Tasks

The best part about winterizing your home is the stuff you don’t have to do. Depending on how you’ve designed your living space, you might be able to cross a number of tasks of your list before you even get started.

You could have retractable screens that simply need to be retracted into their housings, or if you’ve insulated your home from drafts to save on air conditioning during the summer, the same techniques and products can be used (or might already be in place) for fall and winter. If you plan properly, and set aside a little time each week, you can have your home prepared for the next season with minimum hassle.

November 1, 2018
Tips For Shading Your Windows During The Colder Months
Have you ever considered shading solutions for your windows during the colder months of the year? While it’s true that problems with too much natural light in the house occur during the sunnier months of the year, you can run into the same issues if you don’t have the right practical design set up. Even as the hours of daylight diminish! This is how you can prepare the windows of your home for year-round protection:

Year-round Shading Solutions

Fortunately, methods used to block natural light during the warmer months can also be applied during the fall and winter. Retractable screen systems are sometimes considered warm weather-only products, but they can help protect your house from the certain elements all year long!

In terms of money and protecting the environment, fall and winter make it challenging to upkeep an efficient home. For example, the sun pouring in through your windows can throw your indoor temperature control out of whack. Especially if you’ve installed new temperature monitoring systems! Thankfully, window treatments provide an effective block from unwanted natural light, while also giving you another decorative option. As wonderful and life-nourishing as the sun is, it can sometimes double as an annoyance. Simply plan ahead to avoid any inconveniences!

Shading Strategies

Maximizing your home’s utility during the colder months is actually very easy. By following a few simple steps recommended by United States Department of Energy and the Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory, you will find that your energy bills are reduced and your living spaces are more comfortable.
- Exterior shading: Look for places outside your home where you can use overhangs, screens or natural shading elements. If you properly implement this strategy, it can further benefit you by protecting your home from wind, rain and snow.
- Prioritize windows on the west and south for shading. These are the directions where the sun will be at its most intense for the longest periods of time. By focusing more effort and resources here, you will be able to better manage the way light flows into your home.
- Consider glare: Glare can be just as big of an issue as temperature (although, they are often related). Check to see which surfaces in your home are hit the hardest by the sun and implement design ideas to alleviate that effect. For instance, if a cabinet is getting too much direct sunlight the color of the surface may fade. To fix that, you could use a retractable screen to block the window where the excess glare is coming from.
November 15, 2018
How To Decrease Winter Heating Bills

Tis the season! For many homeowners, saving money on energy while keeping your home warm poses quite the challenge. Don’t worry! With a head start on home improvements, you can decrease your monthly heating bills, maintain a toasty home and avoid repairs in the lowest temperatures of the season.

1. Tune-up or upgrade your furnace

You should begin with changing the filters in your furnace and having a technician evaluate its condition. The technician can then fix any problems causing inefficiency in your system. If you have an outdated furnace, you may want to consider upgrading to a more recent model with the Energy Star seal. These updated models produce the most heat in your home while using the least amount of energy so when monthly heating bills arrive you don’t have to worry!

2. Seal or replace your windows

Old windows can be drafty. If you have outdated windows in your home, replacing them altogether could be the most cost-effective option. Properly installed energy-efficient windows seal your home, preventing cold air from entering and warm air from escaping. If your windows aren’t too outdated, you may not have to replace them. Instead, search for areas around your windows where air is leaking and seal them up with caulk. Another way to keep hot air in is by wrapping windows in special plastic. These helpful kits come with tape strips that allow you to adhere the plastic sheets over the window frame. You can then use a small vacuum-like device to make the plastic drum-tight. This will prevent cold air from getting in through drafty windows, thereby acting as indoor climate control.

3. Use natural light

For the good of the environment, make the greenhouse effect work in your home by allowing sunlight to pour inside. By retracting your window screens during the day, you can naturally heat up a room since energy from the sun will be amplified by the glass on your window. This method is most effective with windows that get large amounts of sunlight. Disappearing retractable screens are invisible when not in use, ensuring that the most natural light possible light will enter your windows and heat the room during the day.

4. Block off unused areas

Why waste energy on rooms that aren’t being used? During cold winters, you can seal the doors, hatches or vents in low traffic areas. However, the best way to reduce air flow to these spots is by sealing them with new gaskets or door sweeps. Once these unused areas are properly sealed, the preferred areas of the house will receive a controlled concentration of heat.

5. Consider a programmable thermostat

Installing a thermostat to your home allows you to program certain features that best fit your needs. For example, you can program the system to increase the temperature of your home during the evening. Finishing work late? With this system, enjoy walking into a nice, toasty house and relax. To keep the cost of heating down, you can set the thermostat to decrease the temperature during the warmer daylight hours. This way, your furnace won’t be wasting energy heating the home when you aren’t there to enjoy it.

6. Rearranging furniture

Your furniture may be blocking important vents that carry warm air. By placing a bed or sofa over a vent, you are preventing heat to disperse about the room. This causes your furnace to work harder as it thinks it is not pumping enough warmth. Ensure that your vents are open and unblocked by rearranging your furniture. This will help your furnace waste less energy while allowing warm air to settle in your house.

Now you’re ready to relax, cozy up and enjoy the rest of the winter – the perfect time to watch a little (or maybe a lot) of Netflix!

December 15, 2018