Fall has arrived!🍂 And out of habit, you adjust the thermostat to keep your home warm and toasty. Then you get your next electric bill and question your life choices. But you don’t need to be cold to save on energy costs. Instead, keep as much heat as possible in your home and curb unnecessary electricity usage with our helpful fall home maintenance checklist for energy efficiency.
Why are Energy Bills High in the Fall?
There are several reasons why your energy bills can be high in the fall.
- Heating your home: Many consumers overheat their home, instead of using energy efficient thermostat settings.
- Frequent appliance use: Whether it’s cooking heartier meals or adding a space heater to your home office or bedroom, your everyday cooking, cleaning and comfort habits automatically draw more electricity during the last quarter of the year.
- Extra light: Fewer hours of daylight mean more use of artificial lighting in your home.
But the biggest impact is your heating habits. According to the Energy Information Administration 2020 Residential Energy Consumption Survey, approximately 27% of a home’s annual energy consumption is for heating.
Use the list below to improve your home’s energy efficiency and safety.
Top 10 Ways to Cut Fall Energy Bills
- Get a Furnace Tune-Up
- Find and Fix Air Leaks
- Make Sure Your Home is Insulated
- Use Energy Efficient Thermostat Settings
- Check the Damper Flue in Your Fireplace
- Flush Your Water Heater
- Insulate Your Water Heater
- Clean Lint from Your Dryer Exhaust
- Landscape to Lower Heating & Cooling Costs
- Shop for Electricity to Keep Your Bill Low
Fall Maintenance Checklist for Improving Your Home’s Energy Efficiency
Get a Furnace Tune-Up
Heating and cooling your home makes up the biggest part of your electricity bill, accounting for over 50% of your energy usage. The biggest tip for your fall home maintenance? Schedule a maintenance appointment for your furnace.
During a furnace tune-up, the technician will:
- Check for burn marks on the side of furnace
- Check for (and remove) dust and debris
- Inspect the heat exchanger for holes and cracks
- Inspect for gas leaks (if applicable)
- Look for holes and rust spots on your flue pipe (which can indicate your furnace is not burning efficiently)
- Check for blockage in the vent and flue pipe
- Inspect the vent motor and vent pipe
- Inspect the condition of the evaporator coil
- Check the condition of the high temperature shut-off switch, burner safety switch and flue safety switch
To make sure your house is in tip top shape for fall, consider a DIY Home Energy Audit. Use our home energy audit checklist to check each area of your home!
Find and Fix Air Leaks
Keep warmed air inside and colder air outside by sealing your home. Check for air leaks around your doors and windows, plumbing cut-throughs for pipes under your cabinets, recessed lights, and electrical switches or wall sockets.
Add weatherstripping around your doors and caulk leaky windows. Add spray foam insulation around any plumbing cut throughs.
DIY Tip: Check to see if you have a draft by closing a door or window on a dollar bill. If you can pull it out easily, your weatherstripping needs to be replaced.
Make Sure Your Home is Insulated
Insulation keeps cold air out and warm air in (or the reverse in the summer). But insulation degrades over time, which affects its ability to do its job. Check the insulation in your attic every year and watch for degradation and compression in the material. You should not be able to see the floor joists in your attic. If you can, you need more insulation.
If you live in the central or northeastern United States, check the insulation in your basement as well. The ceiling in your basement should be insulated to keep cold damp air away from your main living area.
Pro Tip: Check this list of common energy wasting mistakes around the home. How many of these habits can you change?
Use Energy Efficient Thermostat Settings
When you’re home during the day, 68° to 70° F is the sweet spot for heating your home. Then, lower it at night to 65° F, and down to 55° F when away. Consider programming your thermostat to follow this pattern. (If you have pets at home, consider keeping the setting at 65° F when away, for their comfort.)
Many consumers use space heaters to supplement their central heating. If that’s your approach, make sure to properly size the space heater for the room you are occupying and follow safety practices. That means no extension cords, keeping the heater on the ground, and leaving at least 2 feet between the heater and the wall.
How America Heats Our Homes: According to the US Census, approximately 47% of homes use natural gas for heat, and 40% use electricity for heating, with the remainder of homes using fuel oil, propane or wood. With either gas or electricity as your heat source, you’ll use electricity to blow the heat through your home.
Check the Damper Flue in Your Fireplace
According to the Department of Energy, 80-90% of the heat produced in a wood-burning fireplace is lost up the chimney. And, the air flow may pull additional heat out of your home and up the chimney.
Make sure your chimney damper fits securely, and always close the damper or flue when you are done using the fireplace. During fireplace season, closing glass doors can reduce the amount of heat you lose up the chimney. In the off-season, consider adding a chimney balloon or flue blocker to your chimney to reduce heat loss.
Safety Tip: Have your chimney inspected and cleaned prior to every heating season. The inspector will check for soot buildup, bird nests or other foreign materials that could cause a fire.
Flush Your Water Heater
Water heating is the second most energy-intensive part of your home, after your heating and cooling. It accounts for around 18% of your energy bills! Maintaining your water heater helps lower your operating costs.
Over 85% of homes in the U.S. have hard water, which means there’s dissolved calcium and magnesium in the water. When calcium is heated solid deposits of calcium carbonate can form. These deposits can build up in your water heater, resulting in sediment that lower’s your water heater’s energy efficiency and increases your energy bill.
Flushing your water heater removes that sediment and is an important part of water heater maintenance.
Insulate Your Water Heater
Your hot water tank holds a reserve of water that it heats up to a set temperature (usually 120* Fahrenheit). When you turn on a hot water tap, water is released from the tank supplying you with hot water from the faucet.
However, the tank must keep its reserve warm at all times to ensure that water is hot when you turn on your tap. And if it’s in an uninsulated space like your garage or attic, you could be losing heat through the water tank, making your water heater less energy efficient. A water heater blanket traps that heat inside the water tank.
How can you tell if you need a water heater blanket? Feel the outside of the water tank. If it’s hot, heat is escaping, which makes your water heater inefficient.
Clean Lint from Your Dryer Exhaust
Of course you clean the lint trap, every time you use the dryer. But there’s also likely lint buildup in the exhaust duct. This lint is highly flammable, which causes a safety issue. And it can make your dryer work harder to dry your clothes, which impacts your electricity bill.
If your clothes are taking longer to dry and are hotter than normal when you take them out? Your exhaust duct may be clogged.
To clean your dryer exhaust duct, first unplug your dryer (and if it’s a gas dryer, turn off the gas.) Then pull the dryer away from the wall and disconnect the hose at the dryer. Once disconnected use your vacuum to remove loose lint at the connection point. Then use a dryer vent cleaning tool to clean the hose. This video shows all of the steps to cleaning your dryer vent.
Landscape to Lower Heating & Cooling Costs
A shade tree can help keep your home cool in the summer, and lets in the sun during the winter. And a bank of evergreen trees or shrubs, planted upwind of your home, can help block wind that will find its way in through cracks in your home.
Fall is the best time to plant a new tree. The cooler temperatures can help the tree establish roots before the winter. Keep your new tree well-watered and mulch the roots for added insulation before the cold sets in.
Shop for Electricity to Keep Your Bill Low
After you’ve taken care of your home maintenance chores, spend a little time looking at your electricity bill. If you are in a deregulated market, like Texas, Ohio, Pennsylvania or Connecticut, you can shop for your electricity supplier. Lock in the lowest available rate by shopping for electricity online.
If you have already shopped for electricity, check your expiration date and mark your calendar. Once your contract expires, you’ll get service on a much higher rate. Make sure you shop for a new electricity plan and lock in a new rate before your contract expires.
Pro Tip: Fall is one of the best times to shop for an electricity plan. Electricity rates tend to drop in the spring and fall, the so-called “shoulder season” for electricity. Compare electricity rates in your area to see if you can get a better deal.
Save this to your Pinterest page so you have this check-list! And check out this list of other items to include on your fall home prep plan.
