PART I—How To Determine if You Live In An Energy Efficient Home
How energy efficient is your present home? The best determination of your future use of energy is the history of what you have used in the past. There are many factors which make up this history. The type of thermal package of the home, weather conditions (severe or mild summer or winter), number of people living in the home, types of appliances and mechanical systems to control the interior climate of your home, and your personal preferences of what is comfortable to you or your fellow family members.
Do you know the efficiency rating of your heater and how much energy it consumes during an average winter heating season? Some homes use fuel oil for heating and nothing else so determining the yearly heat cost is fairly straight forward. Otherwise the process may be a bit more complicated.
Going backwards through last year’s utility bills that include your heating costs or averaging the bills for the last five to ten years will give you an idea of the amount of energy your home consumes for heat. Once you have gathered the utility bills you can back out the dollar amount your heater uses to produce heat.
You may also have appliances that operate using the same energy source as your heater. If you are able to locate the sticker that generally comes attached to new appliances it will give you the projected annual operating cost. (This amount is based on a standard energy cost that may be different in your area.) If this information is not available to you contact the manufacturer, give them the make and model number of the appliance and ask them for the projected annual operating cost. Total up the yearly operating cost (a 12 month period) for all of your appliances that operate using the same source of energy as your heater. Subtract this total from your grand total and the remainder is the cost to heat your home in this 12 month period.
If you are unable to obtain the appliance manufacturer’s projected annual operating cost information you can figure your heat cost another way; add up your utility bills for just the months in a twelve month period that your heater was not on. Remember to use only costs from utility bills that supply energy to your heater and the appliances that operate using the same source of energy as your heater. If you did not have your heater on for six months then add up the total for these six months and divide the grand total by six. This will give you the average monthly operating cost for your appliances. Multiple the monthly average by 12 to get a base cost for appliances for the entire year. Add together the utility costs for all 12 months and subtract from this grand total your yearly appliance operating cost. The remainder is the cost to heat your home in this 12 month period.
Copyright © 2006, by Dennis Maq & Siti M Crook, Energy Efficient Home Team™
Do you know the efficiency rating of your heater and how much energy it consumes during an average winter heating season? Some homes use fuel oil for heating and nothing else so determining the yearly heat cost is fairly straight forward. Otherwise the process may be a bit more complicated.
Going backwards through last year’s utility bills that include your heating costs or averaging the bills for the last five to ten years will give you an idea of the amount of energy your home consumes for heat. Once you have gathered the utility bills you can back out the dollar amount your heater uses to produce heat.
You may also have appliances that operate using the same energy source as your heater. If you are able to locate the sticker that generally comes attached to new appliances it will give you the projected annual operating cost. (This amount is based on a standard energy cost that may be different in your area.) If this information is not available to you contact the manufacturer, give them the make and model number of the appliance and ask them for the projected annual operating cost. Total up the yearly operating cost (a 12 month period) for all of your appliances that operate using the same source of energy as your heater. Subtract this total from your grand total and the remainder is the cost to heat your home in this 12 month period.
If you are unable to obtain the appliance manufacturer’s projected annual operating cost information you can figure your heat cost another way; add up your utility bills for just the months in a twelve month period that your heater was not on. Remember to use only costs from utility bills that supply energy to your heater and the appliances that operate using the same source of energy as your heater. If you did not have your heater on for six months then add up the total for these six months and divide the grand total by six. This will give you the average monthly operating cost for your appliances. Multiple the monthly average by 12 to get a base cost for appliances for the entire year. Add together the utility costs for all 12 months and subtract from this grand total your yearly appliance operating cost. The remainder is the cost to heat your home in this 12 month period.
Copyright © 2006, by Dennis Maq & Siti M Crook, Energy Efficient Home Team™
posted by Siti | 5:30 PM
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