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Automatic
Programmable
Thermostats
Designing
a Zoned Heating System
Energy
Efficient Water Heating
Heating
Cooling Energy Tips
New
Furnance Can Reduce Heating
Costs
Test Your
Energy IQ
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Introduction
Heating and cooling your home uses more energy
and drains more energy dollars than any other system in your home.
Typically, 44% of your utility bill goes for heating and cooling.
No matter what kind of heating, ventilation and air-conditioning
system you have in your house, you can save money and increase
comfort by properly maintaining and upgrading your equipment.
Remember, though, an energy efficient furnace or air-conditioner
alone will not have as great an impact on your energy bills as
using the whole house approach. By combining proper equipment
maintenance and upgrades with appropriate insulation, weatherization
and thermostat setting, you can cut your energy bills in half.
All major appliances including gas furnaces,
boilers, air conditioners and heat pumps sold in California meet
the Title-24 energy efficiency "standards." If you are thinking
about purchasing a new central furnace, please check out our Appliance
Database that lists the most energy-efficient models. This database
will eventually be interactive allowing you to compare models.
Heating Tips
- Set your thermostat as low as it is comfortable.
- Clean or replace filters on furnaces once a month.
- Clean warm-air registers, baseboard heaters and radiators
as needed; make sure they're not blocked by furniture, carpeting
or drapes.
- Use kitchen, bath and other ventilating fans wisely; in just
one hour, these fans can pull out a houseful of warmed or cooled
air. Turn fans off as soon as they have done the job.
- Keep draperies and shades open on south-facing windows during
the heating season to allow sunlight to enter your home; close
them at night to reduce the chill you may feel from >cold
windows.
- Close an unoccupied room that is isolated from the rest of
the house such as in a corner and turn down the thermostat or
turn off the heating for that room or zone. Do not, however,
turn the heating off if it adversely affects the rest of your
system.
Heat Pumps
If you use electricity to heat your home, consider installing
an energy efficient heat pump system. Heat pumps are the most
efficient for of electric heating in moderate climates, providing
three times more heating than the equivalent amount of energy
they consume in electricity. There are three types of heat pumps:
air-to-air, water source and ground source. They collect heat
from the air, water or ground outside your home and concentrate
it for use inside. Heat pumps do double duty as a central air
conditioner. They can also cool your home by collecting the heat
inside your house and effectively pumping it outside. A heat pump
can trim the amount of electricity you use for heating as much
as 30% to 40%.
Heat Pump Tips
- Do not set back the heat pump's thermostat manually if it
causes the electric resistance heating to come on. This type
of heating, which is often used as a backup to the heat pump,
is more expensive.
- Clean or change filters once a month or as needed and maintain
the system according to manufacturer's instructions.
Gas and Oil Systems
Gas furnaces are rated for efficiency with an
Annual Fuel Utilization Efficiency number, or an AFUE. According
to the state's Energy Efficiency Standards, Title 24, the minimum
AFUE for central furnace systems now sold in California is 0.78,
which means that 78 percent of the fuel used by the furnace actually
reaches your home's duct work as heat.
The higher the AFUE, the more efficient the
furnace. AFUE numbers in today's furnaces range from 0.78 to around
0.90. If you are thinking about purchasing a new central furnace,
please check out our Appliance Database that lists the most energy-efficient
models.
Gas Furnace Tips
- Don't block registers, vents or heating units with furniture
or drapes. That makes your furnace work harder and uses more
energy.
- Consider installing a programmable thermostat. You can save
as much as 10% a year on your heating and cooling bills by simply
turning your thermostat back 10% to 15% for 8 hours with an
automatic setback or programmable thermostat.
- Using a programmable thermostat you can adjust the times you
turn on the heating or air-conditioning according to a pre-set
schedule. As a result, you don't operate the equipment as much
when you are asleep or when the house or part of the house is
not occupied. Programmable thermostats can store and repeat
multiple daily setting (six or more temperature setting a day)
that you can manually override without affecting the rest of
the daily or weekly program. When purchasing a new thermostat,
look for the ENERGY STAR label (www.energystar.gov) and one
that allows you to easily use two separate programs; an "advanced
recovery" feature that can be programmed to reach the desired
temperature at a specific time; and a hold feature that temporarily
overrides the setting without deleting preset programs.
Air Conditioners
It might surprise you to know that buying a bigger room air-conditioning
unit won't necessarily make you feel more comfortable during the
hot summer months. In fact, a room air conditioner that's too
big for the area it is supposed to cool will perform less efficiently
and less effectively than a smaller, properly sized unit. This
is because room units work better if they run for relatively long
periods of time than if they are continually, switching off and
on. Longer run times allow air conditioners to maintain a more
constant room temperature. Running longer also allows them to
remove a larger amount of moisture from the air, which lowers
humidity and, more importantly, makes you feel more comfortable.
Sizing is equally important for central air-conditioning systems,
which need to be sized by professionals. If you have a central
air system in your home, set the fan to shut off at the same time
as the cooling unit (compressor). In other words, don't use the
system's central fan to provide circulation but instead use circulating
fans in individual rooms.
SEER is the Seasonal Energy Efficiency Rating. SEER rates the
efficiency during the cooling season. Look for a SEER rating of
13 or above.
Evaporative Coolers
Evaporative coolers may be installed as an alternative
to air conditioning, particularly in climates with very dry air.
Evaporative coolers provide mechanical cooling to a building by
either direct contact of air with water (direct evaporative cooler)
or a combination of a first-stage heat exchanger to pre-cool the
air and a second stage with direct air contact with water (indirect/direct
evaporative cooler).
Cooling Tips
- Whole house fans help cool your home by pulling cool air through
the house and exhausting warm air through the attic. They are
effective when operated at night and when the outside air temperature
is cooler than the inside.
- Set your thermostat as high as comfortably possible in the
summer. The less difference between the indoor and outdoor temperatures,
the lower your overall cooling bill will be.
- Don't set your thermostat at a colder temperature setting
than normal when you turn on your air conditioner. It will not
cool your home any faster and could result in excessive cooling
and therefore unnecessary expense.
- Set the fan speed on high except in very humid weather. When
it's humid set the fan speed on low. You'll get better cooling.
- Consider ceiling fans to spread the cooled air more effectively
through your home without greatly increasing your power use.
- Don't place lamps or TV sets near your air conditioning thermostat.
- Plant trees or shrubs to shade air-conditioning units but
not to block the airflow. A unit operating in the shade uses
as much as 10% less electricity than the same one operating
in the sun.
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