Reducing the Cooling Load Reduces Noise

Although it may only be March, summer temperatures have arrived and the hum of air conditioner condensers can be heard on nearly every residential street. Some are louder than others, but as the temperatures continue to soar, things are only going to get noisier for some homeowners.  The warmer the weather is, the harder the air conditioner has to work in order to keep the home cool. Unless you have other barriers in place, your air conditioner can suffer and so will your energy bills.

Insulating to Reduce the Cooling Load

The cooling load on your air conditioner will affect its ability to operate not only quietly but also efficiently. Reduce the cooling load and you will reduce the noise and save money! Insulating is an easy way to reduce your home’s cooling load and there are two areas in the home that can benefit greatly from this affordable service:

• Attic Insulation: Adding insulation to the attic is the first step towards reducing your air conditioner’s cooling load. I fresh thick layer of attic insulation will help your home retain more cold air within the home this summer. This will increase your comfort and reduce the number of cycles your air conditioner will have to make on even the hottest days.

Insulate Areas that Seem Out of Reach

Are you looking for a way to save money without spending a lot of money? Improving the insulation in your home is a great way to invest a little and get a big return. However, if your old home is lacking insulation in areas besides the attic and crawl space, you may find is more costly to install more traditional forms of insulation in the finished walls of the home. These areas can’t be neglected but they also can’t be torn down and rebuilt at a reasonable cost. You need to look into blown-in insulation instead. Ease of installation and flexibility are what this type of insulation has over the traditional batts and rolls.

Leaky House Loses

Blown-in insulation can be installed quickly into nearly any space. A fresh layer can be spread over old batts and rolls in the attic or crawl space. Leaky walls can be packed full within a matter of a couple hours and the results will last for years and years. You will eliminate leaks and drafts that are common in homes that suffer from heat loss in the winter and heat gain during the summer. This could help you conserve the heat and cooling that you pay so much for every month and with the savings you will recoup the lost cost of the insulation installation within a couple of seasons. Don’t let a leaky house hold you back from saving big bucks

Go Green with this Winter’s Savings

Though the snow may be falling now, so far this winter has been very mild by comparison to years past. This has left many homeowners with much fuller pockets than usual and that money needs to be put to good use. That means that we need to find good investments to ensure that this money is well spent. Investing this money in your home is a great place to start and spending it in improving the homes energy efficiency is even better! Going green has many benefits for the environment and for your wallet. Take a moment to look at your last energy bill. Odds are the cost was much lower than you were paying at the same time last year. How would you like to pay that much on your energy bills every year! Making energy efficient upgrade could make that possible!

3 Wise Energy Efficient Investments:

• HVAC Replacement: Replacing the furnace and air conditioner could be your best bet at this time. Air conditioners are out of season and therefore at amazingly low prices, and if your furnace and air conditioner are in bad shape, replacing them could be all that your home needs to make low energy bills a common occurrence in your home.

Cheap Ways to Improve Comfort and Circulation

Circulation problems within the home are an all too common problem. They also often lead to temperature variances from room to room. This can disturb comfort and tracking down the problem could be difficult. What if there was a way to improve your problem without spending much if any money? Well, there is! These three simply steps could drastically improve the circulation and comfort in your home. Try at least one in your home and see if you notice a difference.

How to Boost Comfort this Winter:

• Ceiling Fans: Reversing the direction of your ceiling fan can help improve the comfort in your home. By having the fan pushing air clockwise, hot air that rises to the ceiling during each heating cycles will be pushed down back into the room. This will make the room feel warmer to its occupants and help eliminate temperature variances from room to room.

Protect Your Home While You are Away

The winter season is a popular time to go on vacation with the family. You pack up your belongings, head to where it’s warmer, and leave the winter chill behind! You lock up your home and assume that all will remain safe, but you make one disastrous mistake. You shut off the furnace. Many homeowners do this to conserve a little energy and save some money on their energy bills. However, doing this will leave your home vulnerable in the icy cold weather. All you need is one extra cold night and you could experience an expensive home disaster.

Water Damage from Burst Pipes

When the furnace is off, there is nothing stopping the temperature in the home from dipping below freezing. When this happens, the plumbing system is at risk of freezing. Even one frozen pipe and be a major problem. This is due to the fact that once a pipe is frozen, it may burst! The pipe is forced to expand by the presence of the ice, but as the ice begins to thaw, the water pressure will burst through the pipe and cause a major water leak. If you are out of town, there is nothing there to stop the water from flowing into your home and causing major water damage.

Tax Credits are Coming to an End!

Home improvement projects have been very popular over the past couple years and a special emphasis has been placed on those improvements that also increase the energy efficiency of the home. The federal government has been offering tax credits on many of these improvement projects, but if you don’t act by the end of this year, you could miss out on savings for some of the most popular green improvements. Unless you are looking to install a geothermal heat pump, a wind turbine, a solar energy system or a fuel cell, your time is almost up! Don’t miss out on these savings, and call a local contractor today!

Tax Credits that Expire December 31^st 2011:

• HVAC System Replacement:  Old, inefficient heating and cooling systems are a major source of energy waste in the home. Replacing a furnace with a 95% AFUE rated unit will get you $150 back, and replacing an air conditioner with a 16 SEER rated system will get your $300 back.
• Insulation: Adding insulation to your home will not only increase your savings but it will also increase your comfort. As an added bonus, you will get back 10% of the cost up to $500!