How many people conserve energy at home? Is there a concern here? If you do conserve how?

I confess I am not very energy efficient. At any given time I have my T.V on with sound coming through my stereo, two computers running, and most of the lights on in my house. Since I live in the South my a/c runs quite a bit. Add that to the fact that I live in an old drafty house makes me quite the consumer of energy...glad I don't own a car (alleviates a little guilt)

for the most part I guess I conserve somewhat. I keep the air conditioner set at about 75 in the summer and in the winter I keep the heat set at 69. but then there is the other side to it. I also have 2 computers 2 refrigerators 4 tvs and more radios and Cd players than we need. So I guess so much for conserving anything.

While it doesn't seem like we conserve, technology has helped decrease the amount of power we need to for each device that we have on.

While a computer may sit on all day, it goes into suspend mode. This takes a lot less electricity. Compared to computers of the past, this helps computers consume less energy. Then again, there are a heck of a lot more computers.

As for lights, we do leave them on quite a bit. But, we prefer not to have it super bright, so we use lower wattage bulbs, and lights with dimmer switches. So we save a bit there, I guess.

Mike

As far as energy use in our home is concerned, we could definitely be more conservative. We do turn off lights with the exception of the room that we are in, and we use compact flourescent bulbs to conserve energy, but we also have two computers and a television that are almost always on when we are at home. I'm not sure how much gas we actually use, because our apartment management company takes the amount that is used by the entire building and divides the cost up equally amongst the tenants, which I actually find quite annoying, but that's life.

We have put extra insulation in our home. We are careful about shutting off lights when leaving a room, Those little converters you see on many of your appliances and radios etc. take a fair amount of juice. Also we put many flourescent lights in the kitchen.

Our house is terribly energy inefficent. It's 30 years old and tends to be too cold in the winter and too hot in the summer. I once considered replacing all the single paned windows, but after finding out it'd cost over 5K, I dismissed the idea.

I make it a habit of turning off the lights when I leave the room. But I hear that constantly turning a light off and on can actually shorten the bulb life, so I might be saving a little on electricity, but spending more on light bulbs.

Lemme put it this way: the a/c in my house is always on at 67; my dad's from the north and likes it cold.
well, So do i,

Even in the winter, scarcley is our heater ever working. we can tolerate down to 57; after that, turn up the heat.

L. Zeved

1. We use no lights during the day, we open the blinds instead.

2. We reduced our bulb wattage in most of our lights and use florescent when possible.

3. 74 in the summer, 68 in the winter.

4. If it is between 74 and 68 outside we kill the units and open the windows.

5. We *try* to lump all of our errands into one trip instead of multiple trips out.

6. Only do full loads in the clothes washer and dishwasher. Anything else is done by hand.

7. Use cold water for the clothes washer and do not heat dry the dishwasher.

8. Take showers in 10min or less.

9. Conserve laundry by rehanging clothes if they've not been worn long or are not soiled. We do not do this with underwear.



We are not always consistant, but we do try to keep the above in mind and stick to it. We're getting better with it and when we can afford to will also start replacing our appliances with ones that conserve better.

Man, I wish we could do that down here.

We end up having our windows open more during the winter than any other time of year.

Sure 74 sounds ok, but add subtropical, swamp-like humidity, the nearly-invisible sand gnats that fly through your screens and bite you, and the occasional stench of the paper mills, and you'd have the AC going.

If anyone really wants to save money on HVAC bills, get a digital programmable thermostat. We had $300 gas bills one year back in Illinois, so we spent the $40 and put a digital thermostat in the apartment we were renting. Simply by setting up the thermostat to lower 10 degrees while we were at work or sleeping saved us over $50 a month! It's great, too, because the house warms up right before you wake up, and again right before you get home from work. You can set an entirely different program for weekends, so you can sleep in.

Mike

I bet we would! That sounds awful! We have skeeters and ants. Skeeters are too big for the screen and the ants get in regardless. I've live in the South all my life so the humidity doesn't bother me much.

Mmm... paper mills. International Paper, by chance? They smell Na-ha-STAY!

I recently moved in a 1975 house. My wife opts for the more costly temperature settings. I have searched for ways to decrease use including buying energy efficient light bulbs.

I would love to pop up a solar panel or two. How about a tax credit for that?