Summer 2013 Newsletter
Give us a call today: 215-346-7160Cut Your Energy Costs
Modern technology provides many comforts, such as keeping our homes warm in the winter and cool in the summer. Of course these comforts also come with a price, but there are always ways to conserve energy and lower your utility bills. If you’re interested in reducing your energy costs, we have some quick tips to help you in the process:
1. Seal Up Your Home
If you have installed a new HVAC system but aren’t feeling the effects, check your door and window frames. Poor insulation is a serious efficiency problem, but it can be improved easily. You can easily seal cracks with some caulk and weather–stripping, or you can upgrade your doors and windows to help reduce air loss.
2. Unplug Your Appliances
This is a common and effective tip that people still tend to ignore. Some electrical appliances are still using energy even when they are turned off. Power strips that cut off the flow of electricity to devices not in use are great, but unless you have a power strip in every outlet you should be unplugging some devices. The time spent doing so is worth the potential savings.
3. Upgrade Your Light Bulbs
The next time you replace a bulb, go for the energy efficient ones. While they may cost more out of pocket, the savings they provide over time will make switching out your bulbs one of the easiest, most effective ways to cut energy costs.
4. Maintain Your Cooling System
Even energy efficient air conditioning systems can lose efficiency if not well–maintained. It’s up to you to make sure that they are running at maximum efficiency. Take advantage of regular maintenance, and don’t let your system work harder than it should. Simply changing your system’s air filters each month will make a difference in maintaining efficiency.
5. Get to Know Your Thermostat
You can turn your heating and cooling system down when there is nobody home, and installing a programmable thermostat will make it easy to set more consistent temperatures at varying times throughout the day.
6. Cut Back on Appliance Use
Cooking dinner or drying your clothes may not us a lot of energy but it does heat up your home. When it’s warm, hang your laundry to dry. Prepare cold salads for dinner. If you really want a hot meal, try a crock pot. The less heat you’re creating, the cooler your home will be, which means less work for your AC system.
When summer comes around, you want to be able to enjoy yourself instead of worrying about energy costs. Use these tips and start saving now.
Have you heard of ductless air conditioning?
Ductless mini split air conditioning systems are not new and have, in fact, been around for a very long time. They offer homeowners several very important benefits and they are a great option in a couple of unique applications.
How Ductless Mini Split AC Systems Work
First and foremost, ductless mini split systems actually offer both cooling and heating. Having one convenient system to heat and cool your home is an important benefit for homes that don’t have a lot of space for two different systems.
As their name implies, ductless mini split air conditioning systems don’t use ductwork to provide cooling or heating in your home. Instead, they use wall–mounted units in each room or area of your home. These units are sleek and can be installed so that they are out of the way. Each unit circulates the air inside of its area and either cools or heats it—depending on the needs of the homeowner.
Each wall–mounted unit is connected to a single outdoor condensing unit through a series of electrical wires and refrigerant tubes. In cooling mode, the wall–mounted units pull air in, extract the heat from the air and the push the newly–cooled air back into your home. The refrigerant carries the heat to the outside unit where the heat is exhausted.
Benefits of Ductless Mini Splits
Ductless mini split air conditioning systems have a number of very attractive benefits. First, they are ideal for renovation projects on older homes or building that don’t have the necessary attic, wall or floor space for bulky ductwork. They can be mounted on the wall where they provide highly efficient cooling and heating.
Second, they avoid the energy loss that is commonly associated with ductwork. As your cooled air moves through ductwork it naturally absorbs heat through the walls of the ducts. This is an unavoidable inefficiency of traditional forced–air systems and heat pumps. But with ductless mini split AC you can avoid that.
Finally, they also offer home owners zone control. Zone control is when a homeowner can adjust the temperature of certain parts of their home independently of each other. With a traditional central AC system, you have to cool your entire home to stay comfortable, even if you’re only using a couple of rooms. But because ductless mini split AC systems have multiple units in different areas of the house, you only need to run the units that are in the areas that you’re using. This allows homeowners to potentially reduce the amount of energy that they use to cool and heat their homes.
If your current air conditioning or heating system has started to need more frequent repair or if it has stopped working entirely, it probably wouldn’t hurt for you to check out ductless mini split air conditioning systems. If you’re getting ready to build a new home or renovate a historical building, a ductless mini split AC system could be a good fit.
