Everyday choices are the foundation of our energy usage and financial expenses. You already know that if you make wise choices in the grocery or department store you can save money and get what you want. The same is true of energy choices. You don’t have to go without air in the heat of the day or stop using your dryer. Although cutting back when it’s least painful is not a bad idea. If you are motivated to get this done, then I have some suggestions.

The government website, Energy Awareness, offers a number of materials and resources. When you go there, ask for the CD Rom “Power Kit of Energy Awareness Resources,” which is instructional and helpful in the real world. They also offer a book, “Go Green”, which gives some great ideas for saving energy.

In a nutshell, here’s what they suggest (with a few of my own thrown in):

Change your bulbs to CFLs. Read my post on “The Scoop on CFL Bulbs” and then go to your local hardware or lighting store and get help selecting the right kind of CFLs. They come in all shapes and sizes and light spectra. Your supermarket may sell CFLs, but if you don’t know what you are looking for, it can be confusing. In fact, I have made a few mistakes myself in buying CFLs and ended up with the wrong brightness in one case. In another, I bought a cheap bulb that started to buzz from the third day. By the end of the week, I had a light show in my bedroom. So read up on them and ask the store personnel for guidance.

Also, they sometimes give away free CFL bulbs at energy fairs, lighting show and climate change conferences. Keep your eyes open for these events in your area. And it doesn’t hurt to check for CFL rebates with your local utility company. In the long run, these bulbs will save you a bundle (you’ll be surprised! My own bill went down almost $20 a month!)… so they are worth the extra effort.

Put an insulating blanket, found at hardware stores, on your electric water heater. Also lower the thermostat on the heater to the lowest tolerable heating level. 135 degrees seems to work for us… and it has saved us money, too. Don’t turn the heater off, though, because this is counter productive. Heating it up over and over again several times a day is a big mistake. It will end up costing you more.

Install a programmable thermostat for your heating or cooling source. This might be the single most important upgrade you do. Programming the unit to power off after you leave in the morning and to heat up an hour before you return is a big money saver. Also having the unit power down at night after everyone is comfortably asleep and then fire up an hour before waking is another energy saver. You’d be amazed what 8 hours a day while you are at work and another 5 or 6 hours overnight can cost you.

Call your local utility company and order an energy audit for your home, office or apartment. This I recommend highly because it is super informative. You will be shocked to find out how much energy you are losing as well as wasting. Then you must perform as many of the audit’s suggestions as you can. Insulation is a huge factor so pay attention there. Check into rebates available from your utility company that come with the upgrades made after the audit. Remember that money you spend now is money saved in the future.

Check into federal and state tax incentives and credits for improving your energy efficiency. The 2008 federal tax credit offered up to $2,000 for adding qualified solar water heating and photovoltaic systems to your home. This credit may still be offered. The Obama administration is adding more incentives every day so check the government and state sites for what they currently offer.

Replace broken appliances or upgrade older ones with Energy Star. There are tax credits and rebates offered for doing this, so shop around. Also, when you purchase a monitor, computer, TV, DVD player or even a new phone, make sure it is Energy Star approved. These products are proven to reduce energy usage by a large margin, saving you big money over time.

Get power strips for all of your plug-in appliances like phone chargers, stereos, DVDs, TVs and computers. These not only organize all of your electronics in one place but they also make it easy to turn everything off and be sure things are off. If you plug everything with a black transformer box or digital readout into a power center, then you can turn everything off at night with a single flip of a switch. This saves you energy in a big way. You probably have no idea what electronics in your home are turned off at night and which ones are silently sucking you dry.

This is an idea I love but have had trouble doing. If you can do it, you should put all of your outdoor lights on a motion sensor so they work only when you need them. Too often we turn on outside lights and just leave them burning, burning up our money at the same time. These motion sensors turn on when somebody enters the area. They are great for security. Another idea: use solar outdoor lights; let the sun light your path in the dark and save even more.

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