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Back at the beginning of the year we discussed how to keep energy costs down and now that we are in the thick of the summer season (and the fact that my bill had a significant increase last month) means that it’s time to talk about it again.

The fact that my bill went up by $45 unnerves me. My LGW has an awesome website that has a tracker that compares the previous year’s and June/July had an increase of 100 kwHrs, which brings my total KwHrs to 1507. This upsets me because I have been making sure that the thermostat stays higher then last year, so I am not sure what the increase is all about.

So here are 5 things you can do to decrease your energy usage during the summer months:

1. Clean your air filter…this you need to do about once a month for most filters but others are rated for up to 3 months. I know I have said this before but your air conditioner needs to breathe and with a dirty filter it can’t breathe properly. Most air filters are a couple bucks a piece, unless you use the more expensive allergen filters, so there should be nothing keeping you from doing changing the filter on a regular basis.

2. Turn on your fans…you can lower the temperature of a room several degrees just by turning on the fan and it costs far less to run a fan all day then it does to have your a/c running. Also make sure that your fan is running in the right direction. According to Bob Vila your fan should be rotating counter clock-wise in the summer to provide a breeze and correct movement of the air in the room. He agrees with the fact that using the fans is beneficial and even says that you can save up to 40% on your cooling bills just by turning on the fan.

3. Use the grill…who would have thought that the old grill would save on a/c costs, well it does cause it keeps you from heating up the inside of your house. The simple fact of leaving off the oven or stove not only saves your KwHrs but keeps the house cooler and keeps the a/c from compensating and over cooling the house. Now I am sure that some people will disagree with me on the use of a grill because of the charcoal or the cancer causing grill marks, but if that’s the case just use the microwave.

4. Close the blinds…what a strange thing to do in the beautiful summer time but it helps to again not heat the house. If you are really gun-ho use some tin foil on the windows that face the east. If the blinds are closed and those windows are in the back of the house, no one will ever know and your a/c will thank you.  The less sun that comes in your windows the cooler the house will stay and the less the a/c will be on which in turn lowers your bill.

5. Raise the thermostat…no brainer right?  Well it’s easy to make it a no brainer especially if you install a programmable one.  Keep it warmer in the house when you are away at work or school and at night and have it a little cooler when you are home in the evening.  Of course the best thing to do is open the windows at night but in more humid climates that might not be an option.  I know around here the humid nights make it more miserable to sleep then sleeping with the windows closed and the thermostat a little higher.  If you are going to make it warmer in the house during the day, just make sure not to make it to warm or you will lose all your savings while the a/c runs for and hour to cool the house back down again.  Remember that a few degrees can make all the difference.

Take and use these tips and report back to what your savings are…I know I will.

In January I talked about myNovember MLGW bill, today let’s talk about December and January’s.  These bills will give you an idea of a “normal” winter bill is for us.  This is the first winter that we have spent in this house, so after the previous tenants telling us the average bill was $150, I was floored to get our bills. 

In November our bill was $152.75 with an electrical usage of1090kwh and a gas usage of 62ccf.  According to MLGW our bill was much lower then the normal bill of my Memphis neighbors.  I knew that the bill would be higher then our summer bills since gas is more expensive then electricity but I wasn’t prepared for December’s bill.

December’s bill was $219.01, more then $50 more then november, ouch!  The usage was 1086kwh and 95ccf, so it was obviously the gas increase that helped to bump the bill past $200.  Again MLGW’s website and bill analyzer said that our bill was much lower then our neighbors.  But I was still worried about January’s bill since I knew it would be getting colder so that ment more heat. 

January’s bill suprized me, it was only $218.43, it was actually less then December’s but then I read the fine print.  The cost of gas had gone down by $0.14 per ccf.  Our gas consumption actually went up to 110ccf and the electricity usage went down to 1003.  I think it’s great that our changes like unpluging laptops and making sure computers are turned off are making a difference in our electricity usage, but even keeping our thermostat down in the middle 60’s didn’t help. 

As you know in February I have turned down the thermostat even further, and had an energy audit.  What the audit found was that the insulation in the attic was doing a lousy job of keeping the house warm.  So until the Landlord gets that taken care of, we might not see a big difference in our gas consumption.  The problem with February is that the weather is all over the place.  One day it can be 70 and the next it will be 28, so it’s not a month that has an a “normal” average.  

The average temp in November was 53, in December was 53 and January was 42. As you can tell December has the same problem as February, one week it was in the 70’s and the following week is was below freezing.  So there were more heating days in December then November even though the average was the same.

Have you been keeping track of your energy consumption?  If you live in Memphis, MLGW has a great new website that really breaks down your energy costs.  How much energy have you saved this month?

Next month I am going to work on the energy efficient part of my program. I thought I would would give you the low-down on my normal energy consumption. My electric bill is between $125 and $150 a month. In December our bill was $153.75, that breaks down into 3 seperate charges. The first is Natural Gas at $57.80, second is Electricity at $89.06 and third is other charges like mosquito/rodent fee and the like.

Energy consumption was 1090 kilowatt hours and gas consumption of 62 ccf or 620 cubit feet of gas. The average high was 51 and the average low was 32, pretty normal month for December, we had a few really cold days but February is yet to come. I would say that December is the warmest winter month that we have, and February is the coldest. January has already been quite warm but as they say, “if you don’t like the weather wait a few minutes”. The weather is always changing in Memphis and it looks like on the 10 day forcast we have more fluctuating weather patterns coing our way.

I already do some energy saving. Like I always run the dishwasher full and without the heated dry. I also keep the thermostat down at 66 degrees in the house which means my pretty little feet are ALWAYS in socks and not showing of my pretty painted toes. But my house was built in the 50’s so there is single pane glass windows and no weather-stripping around the doors, so I am sure that there are ways that I can improve on my MLGW bill each month.

Next month I will start working on the little projects around the house, so we should see and improvement on Feburary’s bill.