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Get Four
|  | JUNE 1, 2004
By Amey Stone and Carol Vinzant Lean, Green Tips for Energy Savings With the cost of utilities and home heating and cooling climbing, here are some fuel-economy ideas you might not have thought about Ideas for saving money on soaring energy bills typically range from the obvious to the inconvenient. Insulate your water heater? Been there, done that. Take shorter showers? Yea, right. Carpool? No thanks. Even though gasoline is above $2 a gallon nationally, experts say it would take a price above $3 for drivers to really change their gas-guzzling ways. Likewise, most people already know that diligently turning off lights and insulating the attic will reduce energy bills. But with heating and electric costs rising so rapidly, a new sense of urgency may be just around the corner. There are some new (and not so new) ways to cut back on your energy consumption that will help the environment in the short run, save you money in the long run, and are, well, hot (or cool) in their own right. Here are 10 ways to save energy that you probably haven't thought about: Buy a hybrid car. Have you ever ogled a new Toyota Prius or Honda Insight? Known as hybrids, these Japanese models combine a traditional combustion engine with electric power. Along with a sleek design, they offer high mileage (about 60 miles per gallon in the city) and low emissions. And given their increasing coolness, the price isn't bad either: Each has a sticker starting around $20,000. Second chance for diesel? O.K., so finding a gas station with a diesel pump can be vexing sometimes. But for a whole range of European luxury cars (diesel fuel is widely available in Europe, where gasoline costs $4 a gallon), going diesel makes economic sense. The fuel costs between 10 cents and 30 cents less than gas in most parts of the country (although it's higher in some places, too). It provides much better mileage than gas and burns cleaner (see BW, 5/31/04, "Diesel Deserves a Second Chance"). For those feeling especially adventurous, biodiesel fuel -- a mixture of diesel and corn oil, which makes the fuel even cleaner and cheaper -- is now available at close to 200 outlets in the U.S. Splurge on a high-end washer-dryer. Energy-efficient appliances offer lots of savings on your electricity bill. You may even be able to get a rebate from the government's Energy Star program for trading up (go to www.energystar.gov to look for local deals). Best of all, some of the trendy, expensive models are the most energy (and water) efficient. So go ahead, ante up for a $1,000 Bosch front-loading washer and feel good about it, knowing you could be cutting up to $110 a year from water and energy bills. Savings like that pay for the machine. Solar power your hot-water heater. For solar-power aficionados, hot-water heating systems are entry level. But you can knock 10% a year off your bill with an initial $7,000 investment in a solar unit to heat water. Brandon Leavitt, president of Solar Service, in Niles, Ill., says his customers save about $1 a day on their energy bills. Better yet, some states like Illinois will give you a rebate of up to half the cost of the unit. Leavitt says the systems pay for themselves in about 10 years (less, if energy prices rise) and end up with a 10% return on investment over their 30-year life. Check out the federally-funded National Renewable Energy Laboratory's Web site to learn more about solar power. Light your home with energy-efficient bulbs. Looking for a smaller-ticket item? Tubular compact fluorescent (CF) bulbs aren't the epitome of chic, but they use one-third the power of regular bulbs and last up to seven years. The Energy Dept. estimates that the average family spends $160 a year to light their home, and using CF bulbs can cut that bill by 75%. Try IKEA for popular varieties for as little as $4, spend a few bucks more for round-looking bulbs, or splurge on $36 bulbs that mimic natural sunlight.
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