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Home Heating and Cooling Strategies to Deal with High Priced Oil
Sun 18 Mar 2007 - 16:28
Home Heating and Cooling Strategies to Deal with High Priced Oil
By Paula Stone
Did you get your heating bill this month? Did it knock your socks off?
A friend of mine said hers was nearly $500 dollars. Mine was $200.
What's the difference between my house and hers?
Built during the first energy crisis in 1976, my 2100+ square foot house is built on a small footprint...36' X 24". It's earth sheltered, it faces south and gets good heat gain in winter and shade in summer, it is heated by a propane heater on the ground floor, supplemented by a wood stove for the coldest days. We can cook on the wood stove if the power is off. There is air conditioning provided free by the higher altitudes of our mountain location and the plenum effect of our stacked three floors.
Her house is in a city in a location where she gets little sun. The basement is unusable, except as a media room. The windows and insulation are poor even though her house is newer, bigger and more expensive. She has a conventional gas heating system and electrical cooling system that are both inefficient and expensive to run.
I work from home and don't...and wouldn't commute. If disability forces me to move to a house without stairs at some point, I will go to an underground house.
Envision money leaking out of your bank account. That's what a typical conventional house does. It's more than bad karma that is sucking money out of our pockets to run our homes. It's bad science that will cost us
lots of money from now on and into the foreseeable future.
Sound familiar? Most conventional houses in the US are power hogs...really bad science. I hate bad science that costs ME money!
So what can we do to save money? There are three viable strategies.
1. Use less power and gas with more efficient systems including heaters, appliances, thermostats, light bulbs, air conditioners, hot water heaters, etc.
2. Increase insulation in a poorly insulated structure. One of my neighbors has a cold kitchen in winter and a hot one in summer. Why? Because the kitchen is directly above her garage and the floor of the kitchen is not insulated. She's been reluctant to pull down the sheet rock in the garage and fix the problem, but this month's bill has changed her mind. New sheet rock and insulation aren't that much money and it's a one-time expense. Her heating and cooling bills come EVERY month.
Insulation can make a difference. Even upholstering the walls can help. Another strategy is to put cabinets or shelves with doors all over the inside walls of the perimeter of your house. Are your windows and doors in decent condition? Plastic can make cheap storm windows.
You can landscape to shade your house in summer or build a porch or pergola to shade the windows. An earth berm and evergreen windbreak can buffer your home from winter winds or hot sun.
These strategies are old science that people used in every structure that was built before the advent of cheap and readily available heating and cooling. If it's going to cost more to heat and cool, maybe it's time to bring back some of these ideas.
3. Build structures that are good science. Few builders bother to do it. To do so they would have to learn something new! Conventional structures in this country suck resources the way frat houses suck liquor on the weekend.
Homes here are overly large, too fragile, and use poor quality systems. Consumers can demand higher quality or learn what to ask for.
Houses on small footprints are more energy efficient. Smaller houses are MUCH cheaper to run, heat, cool, and buy. If floors are stacked over each other, they can be heated and cooled more efficiently through a plenum effect.
Earth sheltering is a good strategy. Under ground temperatures stay around 55 degrees. Fully underground structures need small amounts of heating and dehumidifying. Some may not need ANY heating or cooling. Best of all they are storm and fire resistant.
Radiant floor heat and earth heat pumps make heating and cooling conventional structures more efficient and cheaper. Houses with lower ceilings are easier to heat and cool. You can add solar collectors to your house or yard, too. The idea of selling MY excess power back to my local utility when I don't need it is really exciting to me.
In cold climates consider an inglenook or small warm room like the Scandinavians.
Being cheap isn't really fashionable, but some of us care less about fashion than good science. Save some money to invest in something else.
Paula Stone is a former Realtor and Black Belt homebuyer and seller. She works with her husband Ron in his mortgage business. You can contact them as well as find great Free Mortgage and Real Estate information for All States at their alabama mortgage website at http://www.alabama-mortgage-specialists.com
Article Source: http://EzineArticles.com/?expert=Paula_Stone
http://EzineArticles.com/?Home-Heating-and-Cooling-Strategies-to-Deal-with-High-Priced-Oil&id=493437
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