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Whether you’re decorating for Christmas, Hanukkah, Kwanza, or your own holiday tradition, remember to follow these tips to keep your home and family safe, and your utility bill low.

When deciding on lights to decorate your home, there are mainly two choices (unless you’re going to start counting mini-bulbs): incandescent lights and LED lights. Research has shown that even though LED lights can be more costly upfront, at least $10-$15 more than incandescents, they are the best choice in the long run.

LED lights use less energy, which can mean savings of $1 to $11, depending on how many lights you are using and how often they are used. They are also more durable, even after 4,000 plus hours of use, however, incandescents generally lose their brilliance within 2,000 hours.

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Other benefits to using LED’s include the fact that they are better for the environment, they don’t have glass covers or filaments that can break, and they run much cooler, reducing risk of fire. The only way that incandescents stack up is in brightness, normally five to six times brighter than the LED’s.

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Safety rules to remember about lights:

According to Consumer Reports:

• Christmas trees are involved in about 300 fires each year that result in 14 deaths.
• Make sure the lights’ wire has a holographic “UL Listed” tag.
• Discard any strings with broken sockets, frayed or bare wires, or loose connections.
• Plug no more than three strings of lights into an extension cord.
• Turn off holiday lights when you leave home or go to bed.

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A big problem that many homeowners face in terms of duct issues, is the distribution of air itself. If a duct segment is off its alignment, it exposes a hole that causes air to escape, heating the area that the leak is going through twice, or just getting lost completely. And if one area is getting too much air, then other areas of the home aren’t getting enough. On top of the irregularity of the air distribution, when areas of the home aren’t getting the proper amount of air, the central heating system works harder to make up for the wasted air, in turn costing you more on your electric bill.

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Home air ducts are usually constructed out of a thin, lightweight metal that are easy to rearrange, repair and, replace in the event of home remodeling. Newer homes may not have as many problems with leaky air ducts as older homes, but getting into the habit and mindframe of checking the ducts can help avoid leaks. So, before you blame the irregularity on the central heating itself, make sure you get the whole picture. Getting ahold of the inside wall plans of your home is a must for checking the ducts; it helps you see through the walls without getting a sledgehammer. Leaks are most likely to occur when the ducts turn or when there is a long stretch of duct with minimal support. Ducts are secured pretty tightly, but these areas are what you need to look out for most. Once you’ve located the potential leakage spots, take care and be aware. If one room or area of the home seems a little too well heated, while others are scanty, the first thing you should look into is getting an air duct testing crew to come and check it out.

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The air duct testing team uses a test that measures the pressure of the air in the ducts by blowing fans through them. If a leak in evident, they’ll notice a drop in the pressure as the air escapes through the crack. As well as being able to tell if a leak is present, the test can also determine where the leak is, how big it is, and with a little math, how much the leak is costing you. Problems with household air ducts don’t happen overnight, but when they do strike, it’s good to know what to look for and how to fix it.

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One of the whole ideas of a heated blanket is that it uses very little electricity and is extremely effective in keeping someone warm on a cool night. However, we can’t just walk around all day wrapped in an electric blanket with a big orange extension cord plugged in to the outlet. It’s easy to say that a heated blanket isn’t practical for all day usage.

With a central heating system, we have the means to warm the entire house, but we only really need the whole house warm for a few hours. In between work and sleep, there’s not much we do at home that we’d need to be totally toasty warm for, so it’s a good idea to go easy on the heating while no one is at home.

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The ideal answer to the electric blanket vs central heating is that they should have symbiotic relationship. Hopefully we have enough mental wiggle room to be able to vary our usage of both appliances. In theory you could keep the heat off, as well as the heated blanket for a good six or seven hours at  least a day, keep the central heat on for a few hours in the evening for dinner and homework time, then switch over to the heated blanket while sleeping.

Hohm is actually a pretty cool site.  I went on and compared the houses of a couple of my friends and it was interesting to be able to report back to them who “won” the challenge.  If nothing else, it’s fun to spy on your neighbors, right?  It’s ok, we all do it.  Check out Hohm at http://www.microsoft-hohm.com/

• Power to us for our massive amount of renewable resources!  (Get the pun?)  Washington state is the largest producer of hydroelectric power in the nation.  And get this– In November 2006, Washington adopted a renewable energy standard that requires all utilities serving at least 25,000 people to produce 15 percent of their energy from renewable sources by 2020.
• If you’re thinking of leaving on a jet plane, you’re not the first.  Washington is among the highest users of jet fuel, mostly due to the military bases in the area.
• Your South King County heat pump might just be run on power from the Columbia Generating System, which generates 1/10th of the state’s power.  And you might also have a gas furnace like 1/3 of the state who uses gas as their primary source of home heating.

While I have provided you with some scintillating facts, I’m sure that you will want to read even more yourself.  Head on over to the U.S. Energy Website for more thrills.

Become one of the millions of people who are taking part in the ENERGY STAR pledge.  They are pledging to reduce the amount of energy that they use both at work and home.  Whether its your lightbulbs or your heating system, take a look at the ENERGY STAR Pledge website for more information about how you can save energy too.

Did you know that you can get a $250 Puget Sound Energy rebate and up to a $1500 Federal Tax Credit just for putting in a new ENERGY STAR Heating or Cooling system?  You can read more about it here on our website:  Tax Credits for HVAC Equipment

Next week in our series on ENERGY STAR:  Take The ENERGY STAR Pledge

Source: www.energystar.gov

Which makes us wonder… how many bulbs would it take to heat your house without a furnace?  That would be an interesting study to do.  Anyone up for trying it for us?

Replacing your old heating and cooling equipment with new energy-efficient equipment is guaranteed to save you money on your utility bills.  However, you need to make sure that the company that is installing your new equipment is doing it properly.  Improper installation can reduce system efficiency by up to 30%!  Make sure you ask the following questions before committing to a company:

• How did you size the equipment for my home?  If the system is too big or too small, it will work harder than it should and shorten the length of its life.  You want to make sure that a heat loss calculation has been performed on the house by your contractor to determine exactly what the right size of equipment is for you.
• Do I have any leaks in the duct system?  The contractor should evaluate the duct system to identify leaks and then seal them.
• How do you ensure a proper refrigerant charge?  If your cooling system has an improper refrigerant charge, it can cause failure of components, which results in costly repairs.
• Do you have a Quality Installation Checklist?  A contractor that has a checklist to ensure that the installers are doing the install correctly is definitely a company you should look for.

Next week in our series on ENERGY STAR:  Rebates and Tax Credits

Source: www.energystar.gov