Weatherize your home – Fix Leaky Ducts – Reducing Air Leaks

Save up to 10% easily on cooling or heating costs by reducing air leaks and weatherizing your home.  Gain yearly savings up to $400 when you seal and properly insulate heating and cooling ducts in your home.

Add weather stripping around windows and doors to reduce air drafts.  Caulk or use expandable gap filler foam around air ducts, plumbing openings, wall openings, etc.

A $50 Black & Decker Thermal Leak Detector can help you pinpoint air leaks.

Expanding on the National Geo article, the Energy Star site has a good Air Seal and Insulate article that will help you improve the “envelope” or “shell” of your home. Filling in all the gaps around windows, doors, ducts can save lots of money and it’s a job everyone can do on their own. You could hire someone to do a home energy audit, who would use sophisticated heat leak detection equipment. The better bet is to start with the obvious culprits or low hanging fruit.

You could pay a professional or handyman upwards of a $1000 to do the entire house but see the payback in just a couple years.

Great Stuff Gap Filler insulating foam sealant expands to fill those bigger cracks that caulk cannot handle.

Use weather stripping to seal up drafty areas around doors and windows.

Insulate Electrical Outlets and Switches

The Ace Electrical Outlet Seal Pack is a cheap way to insulate electrical outlets and switches. This is one hidden area that I did not realize could leak cold air into a building especially if you have drilled holes for TV or computer cables.

Solatube – Green way to Brighten Dark Rooms

Solatube is a Green way to Brighten Dark Rooms by installing this Solatube Daylight solution that channels light from outside into a room. Why waste energy turning on the lights when you can have natural light. We saw one the other day and saw what a big difference it makes. The company has independent dealers in local areas who sell the products.

The company also sells Solar Star Attic Fans that help keep your attic cool using sun power.

Be sure to read: Air Duct Cleaning and Vent Cleaning

Posted on April 11th, 2012
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