Costly Mistake #1 - Keeping the interior doors closed

Have you ever noticed?

1. Doors that slam shut by themselves whenever the air turns on?

2. A rush of air felt under a closed interior door when the air is on?

3. A resistance felt like someone is pushing back when you open an interior door and the air is on?

4. Or an increase of allergic symptoms when at home?

If you answered “yes” to any of the questions above, you likely have high room pressures. Isn’t a high room pressure a good thing? Actually, no, and the answer is because the air the goes into the room becomes trapped behind closed doors and cannot circulate back to the return, making your AC system work harder? How much harder? Studies in Phoenix homes have shown a 15% reduction in the heating and cooling bill by installing room pressure relief measures.  The takeaway… keep your doors open.

Resources:

Is It Best To Close Bedroom Doors At Night?

http://www.greenintegrateddesign.com/blog/should-you-leave-your-interior-doors-open-or-closed

Watch our video on closing interior doors at the link below.

http://www2.abc15.com/web/knxv/lifestyle/sonoran-living/sl-sponsors/green-id-shares-tips-to-conserve-energy-

Costly Mistake #2 – Using pleated filters

Pleated filters are promoted as allergen-reducing and dust-reducing filters at Home Depot and Lowes, but it is at the expense of a shorten life of your air conditioner.  Using pleated filters cause your AC unit to work much harder than it needs to because is it so much harder for the unit to “breath” properly. Imagine breathing through only 1 straw, we would run out of breath pretty quickly and that is what is happening to your AC unit with the pleated filters.  Not enough air is allowed to pass through the filter, so the capacity is reduced, the unit becomes stressed and it sounds like a wind tunnel every time the unit kicks on.  Us energy auditors like the cheap throw away filters, or a 4” HEPA filter which provides even better filtration but without sacrificing airflow.

Resources:

See a video of us showing three different options for air filters at the link below.

http://www.abc15.com/lifestyle/sonoran-living/sl-sponsors/green-id-explains-how-to-save-money-and-energy-with-he-proper-air-filter-in-your-home-

Costly Mistake #3 – Going solar before looking at efficiency.

Did you know making energy efficiency improvements to your home is 5 times more cost effective compared to going solar? That means that for every $1 you reduce your energy bill from energy efficiency upgrades like duct sealing, air sealing and insulation, you would spend 5 times more money making the same $1 reduction with solar.  It’s not that we don’t advocate for solar, it just makes sense to look at efficiency first and get the guts of the home up to par before going for the bling.

Costly Mistake #4 – Adding more insulation to your attic when it already has enough.

The cost savings for adding insulation to our attics has a point of diminishing returns. That is, at some depth of insulation, the cost savings we get for that extra depth dramatically starts to taper off and eventually levels out.  Is your home has R-19 insulation or less, you will ride the wave of great cost savings when going for extra insulation.  However, if your attic already has greater than R-19, you will still see benefits to adding insulation in your attic, but not as dramatically as before. Your money may be better spent on air balancing, shade screens or duct sealing depending on what the results are from a home energy audit.

Costly Mistake #5 – Failing to insulate the interior attic hatch

That 2x3 sheet of drywall has likely been left bare, void of insulation since your home was built. Heat always goes in the path of least resistance which would likely be the attic hatch.  By purchasing a 2” thick sheet of foam board and gluing 4-5 of them on top of the attic hatch, you will have stopped the flood of heat gain coming into your home through the attic hatch.

Looking for more energy savings ideas? Schedule a home energy with Arizona’s leader in personalized home performance, Green ID. We look forward to seeing how much money we can save you!

The advantages of going with a smaller, custom home builder in Arizona are many:

1.       Your floor plans, layout and design are all customized to your vision along with your architects.

2.       You get more bang for your buck than you would with a Pulte, Toll Brothers or publically traded builder.

3.       You have more control throughout the process.

However there are definitely disadvantages from an energy efficiency standpoint that may not be as obvious until you are already living in your home such as:

1.       Custom home builders many not have the resources to pull all the trades together to create an efficient home.  Yes the architect may be LEED certified but even LEED for Homes has deficiencies that an architect may not catch unless they are also BPI certified such as how insulation should be installed, not just how much you are getting.

2.       Because architects are working much more closer with homeowners, things that are best for efficiency may conflict with a homeowners desired.  For example, it is best to have subterranean returns in the Phoenix area with air handlers and ductwork located inside the home.  Unless your architect designs your home from day one, they may have to start from scratch because there was no space left to put the air handler or ductwork inside and the homeowner did not want to give up any livable space for an AC unit.

3.       A smaller builder (company is not publically traded) will likely sub his trades out which is a recipe for an efficiency disaster.  This was how homes were built for the last 100 years, you have the framer, electrician, HVAC, plumber and drywaller all working separately which is the main cause of inefficiencies in a home. 

Here is a punch list we created as a best practices list to prevent the source of inefficiencies that cause hot rooms, high utility bills and poor air quality from occurring. 

1.       Ask the general contractor to have a thermal barrier outlined for your home. Your home will already have an insulation barrier from the insulation contractor and a sheet rock barrier separating the conditioned space from the outside/ attic, but these two trades MUST be married together as one.  Are you planning to have coffered ceilings, arches, columns or plant shelves in your home? Make sure these areas are drywalled in to separate the attic from the interior walls of the house. Your thermal barrier will outline exactly where the boundary is defined.

2.       In two story homes with air handlers in the attic, make sure the HVAC contractor caps and seals off the duct chase to the first floor. If it is not capped and sealed you will have a large area of interior wall open to the attic.

3.       Put returns underground when the post-tension slab is being poured.  Traditionally returns are located in the ceiling and return ductwork is in the attic.  Our attics are dusty and reach temperatures greater than 150 degrees in the summer. Any ductwork located in the attic has to fight the heat from the attic plus if the ducts are leaky, your attic air will be mixing with the inside air of your house, making the AC unit work harder than it has to.

4.       Air handlers should also be located in closets inside the house.  Less heat = less stress on the units.  Yes, you will have to give up some livable space but your wallet will thank you when your neighbor is replacing their AC unit years before you have to.

5.       A HVAC sizing calculation called a Manual J calculation should be done to make sure your AC unit is sized properly for your home.  Bigger is not better in this case and you can get away with a smaller unit or a unit entirely, your architect is not cheating you, he is doing you a favor.

6.       Jump ducts or passive returns should be installed in every room. To help with air circulation.

7.       Stay away from fiberglass batt insulation. The rolled batts are not our friend here because they are extremely hard to install correctly. 

8.       All flex to collar connections should be sealed with mastic. All drywall gaps around the register boxes should be sealed shut.

9.       R-30 insulation in the attic is code and that is 10” of cellulose, not 8” as the insulation companies would have you believe.  R-38 insulation is Energy Star standard and is the level we recommend.

10.   West facing walls should have minimal windows or should be shaded by canopies or vegetation.  Good solar heat gain consideration should be taken into account by the architect. 

Just like car manufacturers come out with a design only car that is not meant to drive but for conceptualization and to push the engineering team, I wanted to see how many incandescent light bulbs it would take to actually heat a home... in the case that your heater goes out in the middle of winter and you find yourself with nothing but 500 illegal light bulbs and way too many power strips. 

Incandescent bulbs light bulbs only convert 10% of their energy use towards putting out actual light, the other 90% is wasted and converted to heat.  So let's say that a 60 watt light bulb puts out 54 watts of heat to a room per hour (60 x 90%). Here is a chart on how many kWh of heat is produced from different quantities of light bulbs

So to compare a furnace produces 75,000 BTU of energy per hr for a mid-size home or roughly 22 kWh of energy.  So we would only need between 500 light bulbs to produce the same amount of heat as our furnace is supplying.  At $1.50 per 60 watt bulb, it would cost an initial investment of $750 for 500 light bulbs.  When we hooked up all our power cords in a fire safe manner and plugged in our lamps, 500 light bulbs would draw 30 kWh, which is 8 kWh MORE than our 75,000 BTU furnace.  Plus our furnace would last about 20 years longer than our bulbs.  BUT if you are in a jam and have no heat, now you know how many bulbs you need to keep warm at night! 

It can seem like you can't go wrong with solar hot water heaters. Electric hot water heaters are the second biggest energy user in a home, always keeping the water hot and ready for your use... Did you catch that? Electric water heaters... not gas water heaters, your gas water heater is typically the largest gas appliance in a home if you have natural gas service. The thing is that in Arizona, our natural gas cost is relatively cheap compared to propane or even other cities like Chicago. Plus our winter climate does not demand a lot of natural gas usage from our furnaces... It simply does not get that cold during the winter in Phoenix.

You may get free hot water from a solar water heater but solar water heaters always have an electric water heater backup tank that WILL kick on if the water temperature doesn't reach it's 140 degree set point, which is happens more frequently than your rep may be aware of.  We have received lots of feedback from homeowners who had a solar hot water systems added to their existing gas water heater where their electric bills actually went up! 

By adding another water heater that is electric powered, your electricity use will unfortunately go up. It's an important distinction your solar hot water company rep may be blind to or may not disclose to you.

Solar hot water heaters use the sun to heat the water used for doing dishes, showers, laundry and in bathrooms and they are ideal for all electric homes with 3 or more occupants.  Solar tax credits and rebates make solar affordable for everyone but it may not be suitable for everyone.  Installing solar water heaters to homes may seem like a great idea but if your home uses natural gas for water heating, the old saying, "the grass is always greener on the other side" can apply to your water heater.  Do yourself a favor and stick with your existing gas water heater and put the money towards insulating your walls or sealing your ductwork instead.

If you are looking to upgrade your existing gas water heater, look into a tankless water heater instead. For larger families, a 20 gallon storage tank is available for reserve water.  Tankless water heaters are super efficient, only turning on when you turn on the hot water and instantly heating your water.

Do you live in an older home that needs an insulation upgrade? Having a thick insulation layer is like wrapping your house in a blanket to keep it warm in the winter and cool in the summer.  There are 3 general types of insulation, cellulose which is recycled newspaper, loose fill fiberglass which looks like pink snow, and rolled fiberglass batts (think Pink Panther) which are itchy and difficult to install correctly. Read more about the problem with fiberglass batts and why how your insulation is installed is almost as important as how much you have in a previous post.  

So let's get to how to blow insulation in your attic.  Here are all the steps.

1. Find how many bags you will need
2. Rent an insulation machine
3. Find a helper
4. Plastic off your attic hatch
5. Learn to walk around in your attic
6. Start at the back
7. Load the insulation machine
8. Blow your insulation
9. Communicate your status
10. Clean up

You will need:

1. Dust mask
2. Ladder
3. Headlamp 
4. Tape measure
5. Extension cords
6. Duct tape
7. Plastic covers

1. How many bags of insulation will I need for my attic?

To calculate how many bags of insulation you should buy you need to know three things.

1. The square footage of your attic. This is usually the same as the square footage of your house. If you have a two story home, you can find the foot print if the attic on Google Maps and use their scale to get the length and width of your attic. If you have an addition with a flat roof you should not include this in your square footage calculation unless you plan on cutting an access (typically there is insulation present, but a smaller hole can tell the same thing).

2. The current depth and type of insulation you have and the depth you want to be at. If you don't know and don't want to go in your attic to measure the insulation depth, you can assume 4" which is about the point you can see the floor studs. Use Energy Star's R-value map at this link to find the zone you live in and what R-value they recommend for your zone. In Phoenix, R-38 is Energy Star standard.

You can find the current R-value of your insulation from the manufacturers specifications or use BPI R-value table I simplified below.

Cellulose R-3.2 per inch

Loose fill fiberglass R-2.8 per inch

Rolled fiberglass batts R-2.6 per inch

3. The insulation manufacturer's specification chart. You can find this information on thel bags of insulation themselves. Each bag of insulation is stamped with an R-value chart that tell us what depth in inches gives us a desired R-value, how many bags per 1000 sq ft are required to reach that R-value. For your convenience I've included some R-value charts here. Notice that the insulation bags Lowes and Home Depot sell are much smaller and have a high bag count than the bags an insulation contractor will use.

So let's say you have a 2100 sq ft single level home with 4" of cellulose (R-12.8) and you want to insulation your attic up to an R-38, which is 12" of cellulose, an R-value difference of (R-38 - R-12.8 = R-25.2) 25.2. On the insulation manufacturers label on every bag you'll find that for an R-25 you'll need 28 bags per 1000 sq ft. So if you have 2100 sq ft, take 28 x 2 = 56 bags for 2000 sq ft. For the last 100 sq ft, take 1/10 x 28 bags = 3 additional bags rounded up. So you'll need 56 + 3 = 59 bags total to blow your attic up to an R-38 value. Now Home Depots bags cost $9 per bag so you'll spend about $560 on your insulation. If you choose to have a professional do it, after rebates and tab credits you'll probably be in the $900 - $1200 range and save around $100 - $150 per year on your utility bills.

In this video I review two types of fiberglass insulation in this Scottsdale home. During our home energy audit we reveal why fiberglass batts are not bad, but so easy to install wrong. Fiberglass batts are a common cause of hot rooms in the summer because a bridged batt is like having zero insulation present… That’s right, a 9” batt is like almost nothing.  Read more about why that is true, here.  For the definitive guide to the types of insulation, check out the Energy.gov's blog.

Phoenix in the fall, winter and spring is a beautiful time to enjoy the outdoors and do all the things that we couldn't necessarily enjoy during the sweltering months of June, July and August. Even though our energy bills are not very high compared to the summer months, the fall and winter months are a perfect time to find some hidden opportunities that would not always be as obvious the rest of the year. 

Look at your base load- your base load energy use is the energy that your family uses all year round regardless of heating and cooling. It includes the refrigerator, water heater, doing laundry and dishes, re-circulation pumps, the pool pump and lights. You can find your base load usage by averaging the three lowest months of your energy use. If all the lights and ceiling fans are on in your home, that is wasting energy. 

If the refrigerator is older than 1997, it is a good idea to replace it with any refrigerator built after 2003. The difference in energy usage is significant, with older refrigerators using more than two times the amount of energy.  If your refrigerator is in the garage, look into downgrading to a smaller unit. 

Changing out your recessed canned lights to LED air tight fixtures can be done in small increments and if your home has more than 10 canned lights, it is worth stopping that leakage. 

The cooler months in Arizona is also a perfect time to do some of that attic work you may have been putting off plus your energy auditors and installers will be grateful.