Want a Free Vacation? Tips for Electricity Savings You Can Bank On
Money has rarely been tighter, which can make you feel more stressed out every day. It’s the perfect scenario for needing a vacation, but who can afford a weekend away? You can, if you follow these small changes and stick with them for a year. Some of them you can install with the help of a licensed electrical contractor, but the rest are switches you can make yourself. Whether you’d like a few days away with the kids or a romantic weekend away from home, you can bank enough money from electricity savings to pay for it by the end of the year.
Changes to Make with Your Electrical Contractor’s Help
Even the handiest handyman (or -woman) needs help with some jobs, especially when it comes to installing electrical appliances. It’s much safer to trust a licensed electrician to do a professional job than to do even a competent amateur job. You’ll know the job is done right, and you’ll save money by avoiding the inevitable redo that shoddy jobs call for. Some of the ways your electrician can help you save money are:
- Installing a hot water heater timer. You’re not home all the time, and you definitely don’t take showers all hours of the day and night. Why spend money heating water you’re not going to use. An electrician can install a water heater timer for a savings of about $25 per year.
- Get a smart meter. Check with your electricity company to find the availability of these meters in your area. If they’re available, your electrician can install them, replacing your old meter. These new, more sensitive meters have the ability to shut off power to your home for a short time, lightening the power load in times when it’s needed most for the community. Most electric companies offer a reward for using these meters, and you can achieve up to $140 a year in electricity savings by using one.
- Install smarter switches. Outdoor lighting can be a great safety feature on a house, but it costs a lot of money to have those lights running all night long. Have your electrician switch out the traditional lights for ones with a motion sensor switch. The lights will go on when anything moves around your property, and go back off when all is calm. Smarter switches can work inside the house, too. Set timers on the fans in your home, including a timer that will turn each fan off after a certain length of time. Adding these two details to your home can net you around $100 a year.
Changes You Can Do Yourself
Some changes are so simple you can do them yourself. You’ll save a surprisingly large amount of money making these easy changes, without ever having to consult a professional:
Buy Energy Star appliances. If you’re in the market for a new refrigerator or stove, do your research to find the most energy-efficient model that fits your lifestyle. Energy Star models show their average savings right on the label. These appliances can save you between $35 and $600 a year.
Service your air conditioner. This simple task doesn’t take a professional to complete it. If you hose out the inside, straighten the fins, lubricate the motor, and change the filter, you can save up to $65 next year.
Kill energy vampires. According to the Department of Energy, 75 percent of the electrical use by home electronics happens when they’re shut off. These appliances are always in stand-by mode, which takes a constant source of power to maintain. Unplugging your computer, stereo system, and television can cut around $100 from your bill each year.
Change your furnace filters. Yes, it’s time-worn advice, but that doesn’t make it useless. Changing a furnace filter is almost always a matter of sliding the old one out and sliding a replacement in. It takes about a minute, and saves you about $5 a month, or $60 every year.
Read MoreResidential Electrical Safety Tips for the Holidays
The holiday season sees a higher electrical usage in residential properties than almost any other time in the year. With lights and other decorations being added indoors and out, additional appliances being used to prepare holiday meals, and multiple new gifts being plugged in at the same time, homeowners need to be extra vigilant to keep safety in mind. Not only is higher residential electrical usage a source of higher utility bills, it’s also the source of accidents and fire damage that’s not often seen any other time of the year. Common sense and preparation are key to electrical safety during the holidays.
Cords
Most people reuse strings of lights and other holiday decorations over and over each year. While most decorations are meant to last for years, it’s crucial to inspect each one before using it. Cords can snap or wear, especially if stored in extreme temperatures, and fraying wires are a certain fire hazard. Once you’ve determined that all your cords are in good condition, take care when stringing them over your house of property. Make sure none of the cords are pinched underneath or behind heavy furniture or hidden under rugs where they can be stepped on and damaged, and always use tape to secure cords in place, never nails or staples.
Lights
Strings of lights may be the most common of all holiday decorations, but they can also be the largest source of power usage and fire hazards. When decorating your outside property with light strings, always plug the lights into a GFCI outlet to protect your property from damage due to electricity coming in contact with moisture. Never connect more than three strings of lights together, and wrap all connections with plastic wrap to keep snow and ice away. Drape lights over bushes carefully, making sure branches don’t come in contact with light bulbs. Consider replacing your old traditional strings of lights with the newer LED lights. LED holiday lights have a wide range of advantages:
- LED lights are brighter than traditional bulbs
- They come in a large variety of attractive colors
- They use much less power, making them less expensive to use
- LED light bulbs are cool to the touch when in use, reducing the danger of fire damage
Always use a wooden or fiberglass ladder when hanging holiday lights, and always turn off all lights before leaving home or going to bed.
Cooking
The holidays often mean parties and family dinners, and this calls for cooking larger amounts of food than during the rest of the year. Many people have small appliances, such as deep fryers, slow cookers, stand mixers, and blenders that only get used once a year. This additional usage can cut down on counter space, which can turn your kitchen into an electrical danger zone. Always plug appliances into an approved GFCI outlet. Do not string cords through dishwater or puddles, and keep them away from other appliances. Use one appliance at a time, or at least one per cooking area. Inspect each appliance, including the plug and cord, before using it, and unplug each one as soon as it’s no longer in use.
Other Tips
Keep residential electrical safety in mind throughout the holiday season while enjoying the time with friends and family. During cold winter days, keep electrical space heaters away from rugs, curtains, gifts, and holiday decorations. Test your smoke alarm and replace the batteries if needed. Avoid overloading electrical outlets with too many plugs; instead, use a power strip with a circuit breaker built in. Keep all electric cords out of reach of small children and chewing pets, and only allow responsible adults to plug in new toys and gifts for children to play with.
Read More5 Lighting Tips for Electric Energy Savings
A light bulb is a light bulb, right? Not any more. Gone are the days of incandescent bulbs in all regular lamps and one kind of fluorescent bulb in utilitarian settings. Today’s light bulbs are greener, come in a huge variety and, most importantly, save energy and money. Whether you’re shedding light on a home reading corner or in a restaurant kitchen, you can find a bulb that uses less energy while having less impact on the environment.
Home Lamps
Replace all of the bulbs in your home lamps with CFL bulbs. These compact fluorescent lights are much more energy efficient while giving off the same amount of light. Unlike the older halogen bulbs, which can get hot enough to cause a fire. CFL bulbs save energy without the danger. You can find CFL bulbs in a multitude of sizes and shapes, from common lamps to unusual ceiling spots. They come in a variety of light colors, from warm tones to the starkest blue-white.
You’ll also get a large amount of savings by replacing older bulbs with LED lights. These lights are very bright and give off no heat whatsoever, so they’re safer to use where children will be in the area, and can be extremely energy-efficient.
Outside Lighting
Businesses and homes rely on outside lighting both for security and for esthetics. While a building that’s lit all night long might be safer and look better, it can turn into an energy suck in very little time. This doesn’t mean you have to pull out your outdoor lighting system, only that you should adjust your lighting methods. Set a timer for your outdoor lights to go on and off, and make sure to adjust it as the seasons change. Save even more money by installing a motion detector for all your outdoor lights. It will serve as an even better security method by adding the element of surprise, while still allowing visitors to admire your landscaping.
Lamps
Find the five lights that are used most often in your home or business and replace them with ENERGY STAR products. Each light with an efficient substitute can save you a significant amount of money in a year, and replacing the five most-used ones can give you a surprising amount of savings. Increase the savings by replacing the rest of the lampshades in the home with translucent shades. More light will stream through into the room, allowing you to switch to a lower wattage bulb, giving you even more electric energy savings.
Fluorescent Tubes
In rooms where utility is more important than looks such as a nursery, kitchen, or craft room, change up your traditional lighting and install fluorescent tube lighting. While not fancy, these lights give off much more light while using less energy than comparable incandescent bulbs. If you already have fluorescent lighting in your utilitarian rooms, change the ballasts to newer, energy-saving versions to give yourself a break on your electric bill.
Rearrange
Don’t light an entire area of the house if you normally only use one small portion of a room. It’s customary to turn on the lights when you come home at night, or when it gets dark, but there’s nothing wrong with having a few dark rooms in your home. Most people have their favorite spot or two that they like to curl up in at the end of the day. Instead of lighting the entire room, add a smaller lamp with a pinpoint light if you usually read or crafts in that seat. With the light being closer to your eyes, you can use a more energy efficient bulb with a lower wattage while still having enough light to enjoy your relaxing activities. Install tiny strings of bulbs along stair risers to light the way without needing a hall light turned on, and place small reading lamps just above each pillow to allow for reading in bed without using excess energy.
Read MoreLED Lighting Benefits
Traditional incandescent and halogen bulbs are fading away, and being replaced by LED lights. Business owners may balk at replacing all their bulbs with the new style, because they originally cost many times what the older bulbs did. Such a large outlay will be worth it, in the long run. LED lighting has a number of benefits over the old traditional bulbs, and your business can profit from all of them.
Savings
LED bulbs can save your business hundreds of dollars a year in a surprising number of ways. Most obviously, they use significantly less power, so your energy usage will go down immediately. They’re much more robust, so if they’re dropped they’re more likely to bounce than break, saving wastage and breakage costs. They give off a much cooler light, not heating up the immediate area like incandescent and halogen bulbs do. In steamy South Florida, that means lower stress on the air conditioning unit. LED lights last up to 40 times as long as a traditional bulb, or longer, meaning you may not have to replace any of the original bulbs we install for many years.
During Operations
Unlike traditional bulbs, manufacturers can produce LED bulbs in a rainbow of colors very easily, making signage and emergency lighting economical and bright. They will instantly turn on and off, and when hooked to a dimmer switch they can be dimmed to a wide variety of levels. Unlike ordinary fluorescent and halogen lights, LED bulbs have no problem working in the cold. The three weeks out of the year that combine to serve as winter here in South Florida will have absolutely no effect on any of your bright business signage.
Make it Green With LED Bulbs
Environmentally aware business owners will love LED lights for their tiny impact on the environment. Unlike halogen bulbs, LEDs contain absolutely no dangerous mercury. They reduce energy usage, lowering your business’ carbon footprint immediately. LEDs don’t give off any UV radiation. Every little bit helps when it comes to global warning, and LEDs reduce the amount of CO2 given off from your lighting by up to 90 percent. The long life of these bulbs, combined with the low breakage figures, means that there will be much fewer bulbs filling up local landfills.
Aesthetics
The way your business looks is important if you deal with the public, and LED lighting can give your business a clean and modern look that clients will notice. The availability of multiple colors of lights gives you the option of building signage in a rainbow of hues, as well as installing task lighting in attractive pink or soothing blue shades. Their small size means they can be embedded into sidewalks for unobtrusive lighting at night, while their relative brightness means you can replace older general room lighting with cheaper but better looking task lighting. LED is colorful, versatile, and simple to adapt to any lighting situation. As a business owner, it’s worth spending a little more now to reap the benefits for years to come.
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