Carbon Contest

Heating and cooling make up between 40 and 70% of a home’s annual energy bills. Stopping air movement is the first step you need to take to create a more even tempeture in your home. Once you’ve sealed up the holes in the outside of your home, adding insulation will greatly increase the comfort and savings on your heating & cooling bills. Insulation does slow/stop airflow through the material which is itself a great insulator, but it does not stop air flow at the edges. So again, let me stress that you should seal the cracks and holes first BEFORE adding insulation.

Behind heating & cooling, water heating is the next biggest energy consumer in the typical home, about 20%. Being such a sizable portion of a home’s total, there is plenty of room for savings. If your water heater is less than 15 years old you will probably be better off by utilizing water saving technologies and behaviors.

Low-flow showerheads, faucet aerators, shorter showers and washing clothes in cold water will cost very little to implement, but save hundreds of dollars each year on your water and energy bills. Since that is not the emphasis of this guide, we'll write about that in another paper to be published soon.

Buying Criteria / Research

In the first half of this piece we looked at the overall, most fuel-efficient vehicles, which had both two and four seaters, gasoline-electric hybrids and turbo diesels. Since most people look at classes of vehicles when making their purchase decision (SUV, sports car, family sedan etc.) I’ve decided to split up our study a little bit.

For the past several years the Toyota Prius has held the title as the car of choice for the environmentally concerned driver, but is it really the best option? In the following paper, I’ll present a quick look at the top ten most fuel efficient cars (rated by the EPA) and show why it MIGHT be a better idea to buy a different car in order to reduce one’s carbon footprint.

Here are the top ten cars from the EPA’s Fuel Economy Guide with expected fuel expenses and carbon emissions.

When you start your search for more efficient lighting products for your home, please do not just go to the store and grab a package of compact florescent light bulbs (CFLs). You may not choose the best bulbs for the application and then think that all CFLs produce poor quality light.