With electrical energy costs rising every year, it makes sense to do what you can to limit the power your household is using. While updating an entire house can significantly lower your energy usage, smaller changes can add up to surprisingly large savings. Contract a professional electrical contractor to come up with a plan for small, gradual changes to make on your home. An experienced electrician can alert you to spots where you’re wasting power as well as newer technology to waste older, power-hungry versions you already have installed. Any one of these changes can result in enough electrical energy savings to lower your monthly power bill, and combining a few could end up saving you hundreds of dollars every year.
Save on Heating and Cooling
Your HVAC system is one of the biggest energy users in your home, giving you lots of leeway in which to save money. Even small changes in your habits can add up to large electrical energy savings every month. It’s common knowledge that you should set your thermostat around 72 degrees F in the winter and 78 degrees in the summer. This is the average good compromise between comfort and energy savings. That’s a great idea, but what about the times you aren’t even in the house or actively using the space? When the whole family goes to school and work, there’s no sense in keeping your living space at an optimal temperature. The same goes for winter nights, when everyone is snuggled under blankets. Changing the indoor temperature during these down times is a great idea, but who can remember to do it every day? When your electrical contractor installs a programmable thermostat, you can set the ideal temperatures for multiple times each day, and it will automatically change the temperature for you. No more having to remember changes every morning and night.
Save on Electric Lights
Electric lights are, in most homes, the biggest drain on the electrical budget. They’re everywhere, in every room, and it’s easy to forget to turn them off. This can add up to double-digit wastage every single month. The best way to combat this problem is to have your electrician install a programmable light timer. Find ones that work on multiple lights, and set them to go off when you know the house is empty. If you have an outdoor light for security reasons, set a timer there to go off after a few hours, or install a motion sensor for even more savings.
Turning the light off will save you money, but you’ll find even more electrical energy savings when the lights themselves save you money, even when they’re on. According to Energy Star, if every home in the country replaced one bulb with a more efficient one, we’d collectively save about $600 million in energy costs each year. LED light bulbs might seem pricey at first, but considering the fact that they use a fraction of the power compared to traditional bulbs, plus they last for years, they’re really a power bargain.
Save on Electric Appliances
Even the most frugal person can miss out on savings by skipping a trick or two. One way to catch every spot you miss to get the biggest savings possible is by having your electrical contractor install an electrical usage monitor. This device checks where the electricity is going in your home and how much of it is wasted. The programmable system will check:
- Energy vampires, those appliances that suck power even when they’re turned off
- Large appliances such as refrigerators and space heaters that use more power than they should
- Random lights that are constantly left on when they shouldn’t be
- Sudden periods of higher than average usage, which can indicate wasteful behavior or changes in your electrical usage
Once the system is installed, a quick check once a day will tell you where your power is going, and what items you can change in order to save even more money.
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