Efficient Heating and Cooling is the 2nd Step of Being Green
Our heating and cooling needs far exceed what we may require for basic lighting and appliance use, so even a small improvement with heating and cooling efficiencies can add up to substantial savings.
Since it is generally necessary that we do provide heating or cooling to our homes, there are rarely any options for 'doing without', so it's definitely in our best interest to see how we can most efficiently perform our heating and cooling.
Depending upon where you live and the type of home construction, the method for heating or cooling your home may have limits.
Many older homes are heated by water or steam through the use of radiators or baseboard heaters. The fuel source would be coal, oil or gas via a hot water or steam boiler. Most coal and oil fired boilers also provide the domestic hot water, while those with gas fired boilers often use a separate gas fired water heater.
Most newer homes utilize forced air heating and cooling systems. During construction, space is provided to run the duct necessary to deliver the proper cfm (cubic feet per minute) of air to each room. The most common fuel source is natural or propane gas, although plenty of oil fired systems are also in place. Still in last place, but moving quickly to the front are heat pump systems, using either air source or ground source systems.
One of our goals is to help you eliminate the use of less efficient fossil fuels for heating and cooling your home so that you are not impacted by the demand or fear of oil and gas availability.
Here are a few tips that will help reduce the load on your heating and cooling systems so that they do not have to work so hard, resulting in further reductions of your heating and cooling costs.