Do a good deed and send your customers these 3 easy tips to help them save money and energy in the new year. Hopefully that good karma will come right back at you in the form of new and repeat customers.
1. Clean Dirty Coils
Cleaning your dirty coils will help increase the efficiency of your heating system, saving you money. As discussed in 5 Common Energy Efficiency Myths, once refrigerant has turned in to gas and collected heat from inside the home, it travels to the condenser coils where heat is transferred into the air blown over the coils. At that point, having clean condenser coils really makes a difference. As noted in Goodway Technologies’ blog post Coil Cleaning Equipment: Dirty Coils Cost Power and Efficiency, according to research conducted at Southern California’s Edison’s Technology Test Center, dirty condenser coils can reduce energy efficiency by about 60%. You are in luck, because we make some products for taking care of this exact issue, like the CoilShot® Condenser Cleaning Tool with CoilShot® Coil Cleaner Tablets or HD CoilShot®-HD Coil Cleaner Tablets.
2. Resist the Urge to Plug in that Electric Space Heater
In the dead of winter, when the snow is blowing outside and you can’t fight that chill, warming up next to a toasty space heater sounds pretty good. However, you might want to think twice before plugging it in. Electric space heaters can pose a significant danger. According to this Energy.gov page , “The U.S. Consumer Product Safety Commission estimates that more than 25,000 residential fires every year are associated with the use of space heaters, resulting in more than 300 deaths. In addition, an estimated 6,000 people receive hospital emergency room care for burn injuries associated with contacting the hot surfaces of room heaters, mostly in non-fire situations.” In addition, electric is expensive–often more so than other heating sources like natural gas (5-common-energy-efficiency-myths). An alternative is to have your favorite contractor install a heat pump. The idea is to move heat instead of producing it, so it can cost you 75% less to get warm with a heat pump than with conventional heating (www.energy.gov). The best heat pump for you will vary due to many factors, like the climate you live in and whether you have ducts or not.
3. Splurge on a Nest Thermostat, to Save Later
While the Nest thermostat will cost you a pretty penny up front–we have seen them for around $200–you can micro-manage your energy consumption, so you can save on energy when you are sleeping or out. The great part, the Nest website explains, “The Nest Learning Thermostat automatically adapts as your life and the seasons change. Just use it for a week and it programs itself”. Another good feature, Nest will give you feedback on the amount of energy you are using in Energy History and the Home Report, so you can really see the results.
So now that you have some good tips on what to do and what not to do this year to save money and energy, you might as well make that your new year’s resolution—it’s practically in the bag.
