Ten Environmentally Friendly Tips To Save Money and Energy

This summer season has been one of the hottest recorded throughout many areas around the globe. The average global temperatures for this year may exceed those of 1998. If that is case, it would result in two of the hottest years on record in the last 13.

The National Academy of Sciences recently released data involving 1,400 climate researchers around the globe. Roughly 97% make the claim that humans are the cause of global warming.

If you are concerned about the future of the environment, here are ten environmentally friendly tips you can take that also have a return on investment — they can help sustain the earth as well as your monthly global cash flow.

1. Fix your home's energy leaks. Over a fifth of energy consumption in the U.S. occurs within people's homes, says the Department of Energy. That's an average expenditure of $2,400 a year. Half of that figure goes to home heating and cooling, much of which results in waste. To prevent energy leaks, insulate ceilings and walls, and seal cracks and gaps. The simplest Cuyahoga County home remodeling fixes can make a tremendous impact. "Often people have so many small leaks around the home that it's the equivalent of having a three-foot by three-foot window wide open," says president of the Washington-based nonprofit Alliance to Save Energy.

2. Swap out your home's light bulbs. The common home has up to 46 throughout the house, says the Department of Energy. However only five of them are energy-efficient. These can slash lighting energy bills by 75%. Not a fan of CFs? Matt Patsky, the CEO of Trillium Asset Management, says new LEDs are much better. They can slash power consumption by 95% and emit a better light than traditional bulbs. They cost more, however prices are dropping rather quickly.

3. Turn the heat off in an empty house or a house when everyone is sleeping. Look into a programmable thermostat for residential heating.

"They typically pay for themselves in three months," says ASE's Ms. Callahan. They can drop your home heating and cooling bills by 10%, she says.

4. Evaluate your home's appliances. Replace any old ones with new, energy-efficient models. Today's more efficient models have an EnergyStar seal from the Department of Energy. They typically use around 30% less energy than older models that lack the seal, experts say. With respect to your TV: The larger the screen, the more power it is sucking up. The same idea applies to PCs. Take into consideration the number of refurbished computers you have around the home as well as how long they remain on and idle throughout the day (if not week).

5. Similar to the tip above: stop leaving your used PCs and home entertainment systems on standby overnight. Although the screen is black, they still use power. Power strips make it more convenient to switch everything off at one time.

6. Get the most from taxpayer green incentives. For instance, the government is currently offering to pay up to $1,500 of your costs on items like insulation other Medina County home remodeling investments that save energy. Your state government may be offering additional incentives. Look for deals like these at DSIRE, the Database of State Incentives for Renewables & Efficiency.

7. Get a hold on your hot water heater. It is by far one of the biggest energy users as well as easiest approaches to evaluate your home's energy financial risk management. Turn down the thermostat and wrap insulation around the heater and the pipes. Typically, they are set at around 140 degrees. According to The Energy Department, that is way too high. They suggest dropping it down to 115 to 120 degrees.

8. Invest in a more-efficient vehicle. Highly-efficient hybrids can be costly, but director of pricing and analysis at car experts Edmunds, Jessica Caldwell, claims there are numerous deals available at the moment that can bring the price down. You don't need to go hybrid or buy tickets to all of the upcoming green trade show exhibits. Caldwell says the Versa by Nissan gets around 29 miles to the gallon and has a price tag of $16,000. If a new vehicle is not an option, consider ideas like energy saving truck bed accessories. Extang, an affiliate of BedRug - maker of truck bed liners and truck bed carpet, claims that by purchasing an Extang truck tonneau, you save up to 10% in gas mileage.

9. Get an energy audit of your home's power consumption. By investing a few hundred dollars, experts using high-tech gadgets will analyze your home and offer insights as to what you can do to make your home more efficient. Getting a home audit can help you rethink your home heating and air conditioning, as well as identify potential sources of renewable energy, from geothermal heat pumps to solar water heating solutions.

10. Invest in an e-book reader. If you enjoy reading and read often, these little devices are very green. Books and magazines are not: they do a lot of damage to the environment, from cutting trees to manufacturing and distribution. The senior research analyst at the CleanTech Group, an environmental consulting firm, has calculated the figures. In essence, a gadget like the Kindle has about the same influence on the environment as about 23 books, or 280 newspapers, or 177 magazines.

Going green exhibits a change that is both healthy for the earth and the wallet. Take these tips to heart as well as the home, and start living a more environmentally friendly way of life.

New Monitors are Energy Scoreboards for the Home

NY Times

Intel's prototype for a home energy monitor gathers data from appliances. 

UTILITIES are gradually installing smart meters that can tell homeowners the price of the electricity they’re using at the time, including discounts for off-peak hours.

But those meters aren’t yet in all that many homes.

There will soon be new options, though, for consumers who want to save money by using energy more efficiently. Companies are coming up with dozens of computer-based devices that monitor electricity costs, outlet by outlet, inside a home.

Intel has created a prototype for a home energy monitor that gathers information beamed to it from the appliances plugged into wall sockets, said Joe Jensen, general manager of Intel’s embedded-computing division in Chandler, Ariz. This sleek touch screen can hang on the kitchen wall or sit on a countertop. It can show, for example, which appliances are on and what they are costing to operate, he said.

The panel communicates wirelessly with the outlets, turning appliances off or on when instructed, or suggesting ways to change energy use in the house, he said.

The Intel display is meant to entertain as well as instruct, Mr. Jensen said. Family members may use its built-in camera to leave video messages for one another. They can also run dozens of applications on the monitor, just as they would on a smartphone, looking up addresses in the Yellow Pages, tracking packages and checking for weather and traffic conditions.

Intel won’t be offering the home monitors directly to consumers. It is working with manufacturers that will use its designs and its processors to run their devices, Mr. Jensen said. A high-end version could cost consumers $400 or more, he said, but the company is working with a high-volume manufacturer on a cheaper version.

He said some of the cost might eventually be underwritten by utilities that could charge a small monthly fee for the unit, as part of campaigns to conserve energy.

Tenrehte Technologies, a company based near Rochester, has developed an alternative device, called the Picowatt, that lets people use their smartphones or laptop computers, for example, to control lighting and appliances like air-conditioners or roaster ovens.

The Picowatt, which plugs into an ordinary wall outlet, is small — slightly larger than a cellphone charger. But it can communicate with the Wi-Fi router on a home network just as laptops do, said Jennifer Indovina, chief executive of Tenrehte. Plug an audio system, for example, into the Picowatt, then plug the Picowatt into a wall outlet, and it will calculate information on energy use and beam it to the router, she said.

Each Picowatt hosts its own Web page on the Internet. The page’s address is generated based on the serial number of the plug.

The Picowatt, from Tenrehte Technologies, makes it possible to use smartphones or laptop computers to control lighting and small appliances.

“You can see current settings in real time,” Ms. Indovina said, “and what it is costing right now to run anything on that plug.”

The plugs will be on sale starting on Earth Day, April 22, at Amazon, Best Buy and other outlets, she said. The price will probably be $79.99, she said.

Once a Picowatt is plugged in, “it pulls the voltage to turn itself on and look for the router,” Ms. Indovina said. This process should be automatic, but because so many routers are on the market, she said, the Picowatt comes with a USB thumb drive and a CD to use as a backup during installation to help routers identify its signals.

Manufacturers are also making appliances that might someday be adapted to communicate directly with utilities or with smart meters when they are installed. General Electric sells a water heater with a built-in communications port to take advantage of utilities’ discount rates for off-peak use.

“When you get these variable rates,” said Kevin Nolan, a vice president of technology at G.E. in Louisville, Ky., “we will have a low-cost communications module that will hook into the heater and communicate with whatever smart meter you have in your home.”

Steve McMaster, the chief executive of Sam Six, a company in Portland, Ore., that develops software for utilities to make distribution and transmission of electricity more efficient, would like to see devices throughout a home fitted with computer chips so that they could use a wireless network to report directly to utilities.

“This is a cheaper way to get information back to the power stations, bypassing the need for physical installation of smart meters.” Mr. McMaster said. “The utility could talk directly to the oven for example,” he said, running it at a less expensive time of day.

The potential nationwide savings from such conservation are tremendous, he said. “By using the power that we have efficiently,” he said, “we could avoid the need to build power stations just for peak demand.”