Environment
2008-10-01 15:56:00
Expensive cold winter ahead
QUESTION: I have the original furnace in my house when it was built…can I afford it?
ANSWER: If you have a lot of money that you want to waste, stay exactly where you are. You don’t have to do a thing to accomplish that! A recent survey of over 700 US homeowners about their home heating and cooling equipment maintenance habits was conducted, with the survey’s results showing that a significant proportion of the homeowners who participated in the survey actually neglect to even change their furnace filters the minimum recommended number of times per year. Almost half of them do not get their systems professionally cleaned and serviced annually. In addition, many of them run their systems at less than peak efficiency by opening windows or doors while the systems are operating, and many do not have programmable thermostats to efficiently regulate their systems on a daily basis. In today’s world of increasingly high, getting higher energy costs, that’s wrong, and very expensive! No kidding! You might be able to “afford it”…but I can’t!
Consumers can keep their heating bills a little more manageable throughout the upcoming winter heating season by acting quickly, and now is the perfect time to begin preparing for that through investing in energy efficiency improvements. If you are still living with one of the older, not very efficient furnaces in your house, there’s never been a better time to get that energy hog replaced with a new high efficiency heating unit. A quick call to your heating and air conditioning service company can give you the information you need to decide if that’s something you should be thinking about. If your furnace is very old, you’re going to pay for a new furnace in the high cost of the extra wasted fuel! Paying for a new furnace and not actually getting it makes no sense at all! But there are many folks doing exactly that!
There are also several quick and easy home improvements you can do to ensure your home is heated efficiently. For example, you might want to invest in a programmable thermostat. These thermostats are available through the HVAC company that does your heating and air maintenance program, or at any home improvement store, if you think you can install it yourself. But, I want to caution you that these are not the same quality of thermostat. A programmable thermostat will automatically turn down the temperature while you are not home during the day or sleeping at night, saving much high priced energy. Not paying that extra money to the gas company is kind of like finding money.
Have your heating system tuned-up by a professional. This single act in the spring and/or fall can save you a ton of your hard earned dollars by allowing your equipment to run as efficiently as it was designed to run, and prevent those high cost surprises at the worst possible times. That’s never fun, and in the coldest part of the winter season coming up you don’t want to suffer a breakdown and have to deal with that problem then. You can’t get repaired what you don’t know about, so make that phone call and “git-r-done” now, while it’s still pretty comfortable outside! That’ll change too soon for me! Brrrrr…
Keep all heat registers and air ducts clear of obstructions. You should also make sure to change your furnace filter monthly. There are the really cheap filters that you have probably used most of your life, and then there are some very good filters available that clean your circulated air supply with more dense materials, thereby helping you to lose most of that stuff floating in the air that you see when you view a shaft of sunlight coming through your window. Those “floaters” can cause you lung and breathing problems by breathing them in constantly while they’re floating through the air inside your home. You’ve probably seen them!
Make sure there is adequate insulation in your attic, walls, basement, crawl spaces, and floors. You should also make sure the accesses to your attic are insulated and weather-stripped, and that you have covered or closed your attic ventilation system in the cold weather season to prevent mother nature from installing a layer of very frigid air in your attic spaces. Have your heating and air company check any duct work located in an attic or crawl space to make sure that it is sealed air tight and insulated. Seal drafty windows with a system that will keep the cold air outside from getting in, or you can even install a plastic window sealant kit, and use caulking or weather stripping to fill in any cracks around windows or doors. If you are shopping for new home appliances, look for ones that are highly energy efficient. Those are available, cost a little more, but they are, in this age of really high energy costs, well worth the extra cost in future usage savings.
Some good tips for the winter time are to keep a flashlight and extra batteries on hand. A battery powered NOAA Weather radio and a portable radio to receive emergency information is a good idea, since that might be your only link to the outside in certain weather conditions. Extra food and water, high efficiency foods, such as dried fruit or candy, and foods requiring no cooking or refrigeration can save your life in some conditions. Extra medicines and extra baby items are a good idea, if apropos. First aid supplies, heating fuels that you can use if the normal supply is interrupted for days, during and after a severe storm, would be good. Make sure of the condition of your emergency heating sources, such as your fireplace, wood stove, space heater, etc. Learn how to use all of them so that you don’t set your house on fire! Make sure there is proper ventilation, that you have a fire extinguisher that’s full, and that your smoke and carbon monoxide detectors are working and have fresh batteries in them. Test them regularly to ensure they’re working as they should.
Saving your money should be important to you, and it should also be important to those who serve you in all of these areas. Even though winter hasn’t revved up yet, we have had some indications that the weather can be pretty brutal, as well as unpredictable. Do not wait to act in your self interest until everyone else in your town is acting too. Call your heating and air conditioning professional for those maintenance and repair prevention calls before you actually need those services. That means right now, today, in some cases. More next month….
