Get an Energy Audit!

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Consumers Energy e-mailed me for a free Energy Audit and I jumped at the chance! (we were not special, they did this for all of their customer)  We wanted to know how we were doing energy usage wise and also to save money and energy on heating, cooling and water.

The auditor Sue arrived and went to work while I played with Baby Bear.  

While we played:

•  She replaced all of the faucet nozzles with aerating heads to save on water and to keep the pressure high out of the faucet
•  She gave us a new shower head too in Baby Bear's Shower  
•  Wrapped 9 feet of pipes in the basement with insulation all

Best part: at no charge

The number installed was 0 in anything that we already had in our home.  You can see the things that were change and how much money we save annually and over time!

We have only lived in our house for less then one year and we have tried to make it efficient so we were excited to find out that there were other simple things that we can do to save energy and money.  Since living there we have discovered that the windows are newer but there still is a draft in the winter and our living room has a large door wall that gets hot in the summer sun and heats up the room.  We love the fact that we only turn on the AC in the hottest days (because we did install ceiling fans in all of the rooms and we get a great cross breeze). We had to purchase all of our kitchen appliances, so we chose energy star appliances to save water and energy.

The Recommendations

(We have a two year home warranty, so we don't want to replace our ancient furnace yet, but when we do she wants us to get) 

• a furnace that is AT LEAST 90% efficient but should be more then that
• A chimney pillow to stop the drafts that can occur inside our chimney.  It is a pillow that blows up and fits under the chimney damper and can be removed when the fireplace is in use (saves 10% energy loss)
• More insulation in the attic (saves 13% more efficiency on heat and cooling costs)
• Seal and insulate the rim joist in the basement with foam

Yearly Upkeep for efficiency 

• Drain the water heater and wash out the sediment from minerals that can build up inside
• Clean the AC compressor to make sure there is no leaves 
• Get out furnace tuned up once a year 

Here is the graphics on how our house rates

They even rate our energy compared to other houses. 

We are sadly only slightly above average.  Most of this is due to our ancient furnace and air conditioner.  

This was only a small energy audit.  They also do one at a cost that will analyze where the drafts are and how to fix that.