The winter holidays are a great time to reconnect with family and friends over shared meals, and to showcase your Dayton area home with festive lighting and decorations. While the additional cooking, heating and energy usage can do a number on your utility bills, there are ways to help reign in those costs. Read on for our holiday-season energy savings tips to find out more.
Entertaining
- Use your microwave or slow cooker when possible, and give your oven a break. Both use significantly less resources, resulting in holiday-season energy savings of 75 percent or more.
- Resist opening the oven door to check on meals and use the window instead. Opening the door, even briefly, can lower the oven temperature by as much as 25 degrees.
- Avoid pre-heating the oven for slow roasting meats, and turn it off several minutes before the recommended time, letting the residual heat complete the cooking process.
Lighting
- Replace your old lights with energy efficient LEDs. In addition to using up to 70 percent less energy, they are safer, more eco-friendly and last longer than incandescent bulbs.
- Use a timer to limit the number of hours your lights are on.
Heating
- Install a programmable thermostat and set the unit to between 66 and 68 degrees for times your home is occupied and you are awake. Adjust the unit to lower the temperature by several degrees for times you are away or asleep, saving 1 percent on your energy bills for every degree below your set point.
- Schedule annual preventive maintenance to keep your heating system working efficiently, and perform monthly filter checks, changing when necessary.
- Adjust the dial on your hot water tank to 120 degrees to cut costs by as much as 10 percent.
Safety
- Check your lighting to verify whether it’s rated for indoor or outdoor use.
- Check all cords and plugs annually, replacing any that are worn or frayed.
For more ideas for holiday-season energy savings, contact the experts at Ace Hardware Home Services. For three generations our family-owned and operated business has been providing quality service to residents of Dayton and the surrounding area.
Our goal is to help educate our customers in Dayton, Ohio about energy and home comfort issues (specific to HVAC systems). For more information about energy savings and other HVAC topics, download our free Home Comfort Resource guide.
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