I'm sure you've all heard some of these before, so it may not be anything new. Also, I can say, these didn't always come at once. We took steps gradually to become more efficient. Another factor is we have a relatively small home. We have big gorgeous windows that let in a lot of light during the day and also work to keep the house breezy and cool in the summer.
Steps we've taken and that have worked for us:
1. Lights: Energy efficient light bulbs...everywhere. To keep costs down, buy them in bulk when they are on sale.
I found an excellent rule of thumb while reading a fiction book. RULE: Rooms that are lit up in a home should be less than or equal to the number of people in the house. So, for a family of four this means that at any given time there are only four rooms that have lights on. Usually we have less because we are most often in the room with someone else. Learning and getting used to this rule will really start to point out how often we leave lights on. Bathrooms and staircases are some of the worst!
Always use natural light when you can! Do "light checks" before you leave the house. That's my job. Dana takes the kids to the car and I run around quickly making sure everything is off and unplugged.
2. Plugs: If it's not in use it's unplugged. Start with the kitchen. Right now in our house the only items plugged in are the refrigerator and the stove. Every other item is unplugged (yes, this includes the microwave which is actually on our bar in the basement...more on this later). This one takes some getting used to, the habit doesn't come right away.
When your phone, iPad, etc is done charging. Remove the plug from the socket! Don't let it sit there all day long with no purpose besides draining tiny amounts of electricity that add up! I found through research that they can increase your monthly energy usage by 10%. That's huge for something so small. Also, be mindful of not letting your item sit fully charged for longer than it needs too.
In high energy traffic areas like home office and around the television. Use the surge power chords. Turn all items off with just a switch of the button when you are done! (Honestly, our house is still working on this one!)
Home computers running all day but not being used can really consume the energy too. In the past, we would keep ours on all day. It was so nice to jump on and jump off when I needed to. Let's be honest, waiting, even for your computer to start up, sucks when you are busy cooking dinner, wrestling your child out of their play clothes and keeping the cats from bothering each other. Now that I have an iPhone, my husband an iPod, I find that I am using our home computer less and less. Sometimes it is off for days at a time! (Never did I ever think that would happen!)
If you are going out of town, even for a night. Unplug everything that you can: including alarm clocks and wireless routers which are often missed in the "plug checks".
3. Thermostat: In the summer, when we use our air, we set it to 65-68. In the winter we keep the heat at 72-75 turning it down at night or when we leave. This takes some getting used to. If you need to do some tweaking in this area, try starting with just a degree or two at a time.We are also blessed with a wood burning insert for our fireplace. On a cold winters night we like to snuggle together in the living room in front of the fire. Popcorn, hot chocolate and our favorite adult beverage while watching Doctor Who makes for some fun family memories.
4. Appliances: Of course having energy efficient everything makes a huge difference. The switch and cost of this can take time. Around Valentine's Day, I finally gave in to my husbands persistent pleading that we buy a toaster oven to use in place of our microwave and toaster. This is when we noticed the biggest drop in our energy bill. Instead of warming up the oven for little items like pizzas, hoagies, and nachos we now use the toaster oven that uses half the time and half the energy. (I really should work for an infomercial) Now, the oven is only used for those comfort food dishes that are best heated up in the fall/winter months and baking. We LOVE our toaster oven!
Get rid of unnecessary items that use electricity. Example: We decided about a year ago that we both didn't need alarm clocks. Now, with having an alarm clock on our phones we don't really need one at all...
5. Teach Your Kids: Like every lesson, learning to change the way we live and mold new habits take time in the beginning (sometimes even stomping feet and tears). Invest that time with your kids. Don't do the work for them. If they forgot to turn a light off but now they are deep into a movie or playing? Guess what, time to pause or stop and they can go and shut the light off. At the time it seems like such a small deal. It would be so easy to just flip the switch yourself and continue on with laundry, dinner, bug slaying, etc. The goal here is to teach your kids that you will hold them accountable and maybe next time (x1,000) they will remember to shut the light off knowing they don't want to be interrupted in play later and soon it will become their habit.
Tell the Why? For a child, knowing the reason behind what you are asking them to do can make all the difference. It's not just "Big Bad Parent" mode telling them one more thing they need to do because they were told so. We do this because it helps save our family money so that we can use that money to do fun things like go out to eat. We do this because being a good stewardship of our environment and home is not just good practice, but for us a form of worshiping God who blessed us with everything we have. It teaches self-control and being aware of the effect we as humans have on our surroundings. So much more I could go on and on!!
Set a family goal for your energy usage and plan a reward if you make it!
Consider a Home Energy Audit. Sometimes these can even be done for free or very low cost so check with your energy company. We had one soon after we moved in and it really helped us to know what the problem areas of our house was and what we could do to fix it. (Still saving for those new windows *sigh*)
This is what has worked for us. I can't think of any other way to end this without sounding cheesy, so I'll leave with a quote from LeVare Burton of Reading Rainbow: "Don't take my word for it" *wink*
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