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Best energy savers for the buck
Posted on 27. Jul, 2009 by GMS Editor in Featured, Newsflash, ShowOnLatestPanel
Andy Stone, 07.21.09, 04:40 PM EDT
Which home improvements save the most money?
Ben Franklin famously said that the only sure things in life are death and taxes. If he lived today, he’d add energy costs to the list.
But homeowners have ample, overlooked opportunities to cut their home energy bill from an average $1,500–without overspending. “Often the biggest bang for the buck is going to come from air sealing in the home,” says Edward Pollock, head of residential efficiency in the Department of Energy’s Building Technologies Program. “Depending on how old the house is, air leakage can contribute up to 30% of heating and cooling losses.”
The most obvious air leaks occur around poorly sealed doors and windows. But the biggest losses often occur in the attic, where electric wires and vent pipes route outside the house and create gaps for air to escape. As hot air escapes from an attic in the winter, it creates a vacuum effect that draws more warm air from the heated house below, adding strain to heating systems. The same vacuum effect can draw hot air into an air-conditioned house during the summer, making the A/C work longer.
Heating alone costs an average of $500 per year, with attic and basement air leaks accounting for up to $70 of this expense. But sealing the house can cost as little as $100, paying back the investment in less than two years. Extra attic insulation can cost $2 per square foot, and pays back within five years in energy savings.
