Holiday Energy Use: These Tips Can Help You Cut Back Significantly

Everyone loves the holidays. Great food, family and beautiful decorations brighten up the cold months. But holiday energy use can really hurt your wallet. With the holidays coming, you want to save as much money as possible, right?

Fourteen Ways You Can Cut Holiday Energy Use This Year:

1. Replace traditional lights with LED holiday lights.
2. Use fiber-optic Christmas trees and other decorations.
3. Do not leave decorations on while you’re at work or asleep. A timer can ensure you don’t forget to turn them off.
4. Use decorations to light the room; turn of all other lights.
5. Candles are beautiful, cozy and scented to help you get into the season. Replace electric lights with candles when possible. Make sure you don’t leave them untended, however.
6. Utilize body heat. When your home is full of guests, turn down that heat! Programmable thermostats are also helpful.
7. Buy presents that do not require electricity to help cut down on your bills, and don’t buy presents that require batteries as they will be expensive to constantly replace
8. If you find you must use batteries, buy a battery charger and a package or rechargeable batteries.
9. Do you know about Energy Star-certified electronics? These TVs, VCRs, DVD players, and cordless phones use less electricity than other non-certified electronics. Look for other types of products displaying the Energy Star mark of excellence.
10. Gasoline is expensive. Bundle up and take a walking tour of your neighborhood’s Christmas lights.
11. If you have a large oven, take advantage! Cook as many things in your oven at one time as possible. Heating a full oven costs the same as heating an almost empty one.
12. Use the oven sparingly for larger kitchen projects; utilize smaller toaster ovens and your microwave when possible.
13. If you keep the lid on your cookware while you’re using it, your dish will cook faster and you can turn off the electric/gas stove sooner.
14. If you are going on vacation, unplug anything that can be unplugged for the duration of your trip. This means TV’s, DVD players, radios, computers, etc.

More questions about holiday energy use? Contact us today at Paschal Heat, Air & Geothermal.

Our goal is to help educate our customers in Springdale, Arkansas about energy and home comfort issues (specific to HVAC systems).  For more information about energy savings and other HVAC topics, download our free Home Comfort Resource guide.

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