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Summertime and the livin' is easy… (if you know how)

Summer is upon us and all the glory that it brings wraps around you like a hammock on a lazy afternoon. Butterflies, bees, birds chirping. You mow the grass and the sweat drips off your brow.

The problem is, the sweat is dripping off your brow in your living room. You mowed the grass hours ago. There is no difference between outside and inside as far as your parched brow is concerned. What to do?

Perhaps you have an air-conditioner, but you've been trying not to use it as it costs you a fortune to run it these days and even then, it doesn't seem to work real well. So, some tips for your predicament:

  • Have your air-conditioner serviced; dirty coils and the wrong charge have a dramatic effect on efficiency and performance. You may see up to a 30% improvement. Have the servicing done by a reputable dealer. See www.EnergyLogic.net for advice on picking a contractor.
  • Change your furnace filter every month. This is important whenever the system is running, whether winter of summer. A dirty filter slows down the airflow through the system and creates all sorts of performance problems.
  • Inspect the duct system for problems. Leaky ducts reduce the performance of your system more than almost any other issue. Colorado has notoriously bad ductwork. Unfortunately, care must be taken with sealing ducts and without guidance we only recommend sealing the return side of the system.
  • Use fans, whether ceiling or other. But only use them when you are in the room with them. Fans give you the feeling of being cooler without actually changing the temperature of the air. When you run a fan in a room that you don't occupy, you simply add the heat from the motor to the room. Buy EnergyStar® fans for the best performance. Fans that are controlled by the temperature of the room make no sense for the reasons above.
  • Change light bulbs out to compact fluorescents; they burn much cooler. You will be ahead of the game all the way around. You'll save year-round, over the life of the bulb and in the summer, you'll add that much less heat to a room.
  • Use evaporative coolers and whole-house fans. Both are cost-effective methods of keeping a house cool without spending a fortune. Evaporative coolers have come a long way in recent years and with proper maintenance are a great choice.
  • Don't install powered attic ventilators of any kind. Powered attic ventilators are a band-aid approach to a problem that can create serious problems in a home. The right answer is to install proper attic insulation (R-38). With that done, there is no benefit in having a power ventilator. In fact, then they will only use energy, and still potentially cause other problems.