Learn the Do’s and Don’ts of Saving Energy

• Don’t let the furnace or air conditioner salesperson sell you a unit that’s much bigger than you need.
• Do have the air ducts checked for leakage when installing a new heating and cooling system.
• Don’t think that “since heat rises, we only need to insulate the attic.” The floors over a basement or crawlspace, walls and windows also matter.
• Do use ceiling and portable fans to improve comfort in the cooling season. They use very little electricity and efficiently circulate air in the house. To make the house feel cooler by doing this, you can raise the thermostat setting for your air conditioner to 85F, and still maintain the same comfort as the lower setting.

Electricity Consumption – Discover the biggest users of your home’s electricity

Air Conditioning

If your home has central air conditioning, the air conditioner will most likely be the biggest user of your electricity. While it’s used only a few months a year, the annual cost of air conditioning can be much higher than the annual cost of your refrigerator, which is typically the next largest user.

In hot climates, the annual cost of air conditioning can exceed a thousand dollars. To get a rough idea of what your air conditioning costs are, do the following:

1. Get your electric bill for a summer month when you use air conditioning.
2. Get your electric bill in a spring month when you aren’t using air conditioning.
3. Subtract the spring month bill from the summer month bill—this will give you your monthly cost.
4. Multiply your monthly cost by the number of months you use your air conditioner. The answer will be your approximate annual cost for air conditioning.

Learn the Factors That Influence Your Energy Bills

Many factors can cause differences in energy bills, so comparing your bill to someone else’s is like comparing apples to oranges.

For example, the ages of your major appliances—especially refrigerators and air conditioners—can make a dramatic difference in your bill.

In addition, if your house leaks air like a sieve while your neighbor’s house was just weatherized and insulated, you will have much higher heating and cooling bills.

Other factors that can result in significant differences in bills are the number and kinds of lighting fixtures, thermostat settings for heating and cooling, the number of loads of laundry, old refrigerators out in the garage, and hobbies which result in electricity use.

Have an older home? Find out whether you should insulate or replace your furnace

Here’s how to decide whether you should insulate or replace your furnace. First, take a look at the situation in your house. Factors that will influence your decision are the age and efficiency of your furnace, and the amount of insulation currently present in the house.

Insulation is More Cost-Effective

In general, it is more cost-effective to upgrade insulation than it is to upgrade your furnace.

Older Furnaces are Worth Replacing

However, if your furnace is old and you are planning on replacing it, you might want to upgrade the furnace.

The average lifetime for a furnace is between 15 and 20 years. The efficiency of furnaces has increased over the years, so the older a furnace is, the more likely it will be inefficient.

The average efficiency of new furnaces has increased from 63% in 1972 to 98% in 2012.

Older furnaces, and furnaces which are used a lot are more cost-effective to replace than newer or infrequently used furnaces.

Insulating and Replacing the Furnace is Also Smart

Also, if you insulate your house at the time of furnace replacement, you might be able to buy a smaller capacity furnace and save money on the price. The same holds true for A/C and other heating and cooling equipment.

Part of the challenge of finding the right furnace for your home is that you need to find the right size furnace. A furnace that is too small will have to run more often, running up your heating bill and placing unnecessary wear on furnace parts. A furnace that is too large will cycle on and off more frequently, and will also prematurely wear out furnace parts.

So, choosing a furnace that is appropriately sized for your home is extremely important.

The most important considerations when sizing a furnace is the size of your home, and the weather in your area.

The heat output of furnaces, especially gas furnaces, is typically measured in BTUs (British thermal units). A good rule of thumb for home heating is that you need 25 to 35 BTUs per square foot in the moderate climates that are typical throughout much of California, while you may need up to 45 BTUs per square foot in colder climates, such as those found north of Lake Tahoe.

So if you live in Sacramento in a home that is 1,600 square feet, you will need (at bare minimum) a heater that provides 40,000 BTUs of heat, based on the calculation below.

25 BTU per square foot x 1,600 square feet = 40,000 BTU

However, there are a number of other factors that affect furnace sizing, such as:

• Orientation of your home: Does your home receive a lot of daylight in the winter, or is it in shadow?
• Layout of your home: Does your home have a few large rooms, or many small ones? How high are the ceilings?
• Windows and doors: How many windows and doors does your home have? Windows tend to allow more heat to escape than walls do, and doors that aren’t properly sealed will allow cool air to leak inside.
• Insulation: Older homes often have poor insulation, which means that a furnace will have to work harder to compensate for the amount of heat radiating outside.
• Furnace efficiency: Furnaces aren’t just rated by BTU output, but by their efficiency as well. This efficiency rating—sometimes referred to as AFUE (Annual Fuel Utilization Efficiency)—is given as a percentage, and estimates how much of the heat generated by the furnace will actually be delivered into your home. A new 40,000 BTU furnace with an efficiency rating of 97% will produce roughly 38,800 BTUs of heat per hour, while an older 55,000 BTU furnace with an efficiency of 70% will produce 38,500 BTUs per hour.

As you can see, while it’s possible to make a rough estimate based on only weather and the size of your home, there are many other variables should be considered as well. That’s why it’s advisable to have a professional furnace installer take a look.

If you have questions about what furnace is right for your home, call the furnace experts at Gilmore. We’ll come out to your home, examine it and your existing heating system, and then sit down with you, answer your questions, and explain what the right heating solution is for your home. At Gilmore, our goal isn’t just to keep your home warm, but to give you peace of mind as well. So when in doubt, call Gilmore!

Last Wednesday, PG&E detected what it described as a “high-pressure problem” in a natural gas regulator in Folsom. As a consequence, natural gas leaks developed throughout eastern Folsom, prompting as many as 80 surveyors to fan out across the area in order to find and fix the leaks. As of last count, more than 60 leaks had been found and repaired.

As repairs were being carried out, multiple homeowners in Folsom and Fair Oaks reported that they had received natural gas bills that were much higher than normal. Some individuals reported that their bills had tripled in the space of one month.

A spokesman for PG&E released a statement in which they claimed that the increases were the result of price hikes that occurred in August 2016 and January 2017, amounting to a 13% increase, as well as a surcharge that had been instituted for high volume users. However, this doesn’t seem to account for the extreme increases that many are reporting, ranging from an increase of 35% reported by one person in the Fox 40 report linked above, while another homeowner alleged that the gas bill for her home in Folsom had increased from $80 to over $300.

Obviously, the suspicion among many residents is that the natural gas leaks are being factored into their gas bills, but it’s difficult to say whether it will be possible to find any evidence for this. However, the controversy has escalated to the point where one state lawmaker, Senator Jerry Hill, has stated that he wants to launch an investigation of the Public Utilities Commission.

In light of these high gas bills throughout the Sacramento area, if you’re looking to eliminate your natural gas use and cut your electricity bill as well, the folks at Gilmore can help. We install efficient electric heating solutions. Call Gilmore and find out how we can help you cut your heating bills!

Comfort—it’s why you have a central heating and air system. But if all rooms don’t cool or heat equally, your home may be a candidate for system balancing.

System balancing is all about carefully balancing airflow throughout your home.

Balancing your system means measuring and adjusting the volume of airflow into each room through a system of ducts in your home. Creating this balance is critical to maintaining comfort. As hard as this may be to believe, it’s not uncommon to find systems 30% to 50% low on airflow.

A number of tests using specialized tools are used in balancing your system:

• Air balancing hoods measure the amount of air at each grille.
• Hygrometers measure system temperature and humidity.
• Manometers measure system pressures.

Static pressure is one of the key vital signs of your comfort system. Think of it like a doctor’s visit. Someone always checks your blood pressure. That’s your system’s static pressure. Measuring static pressure helps identify any significant blockage or leakage. Cracks in your home’s infrastructure, such as pet doors and poorly sealed windows and doors, all contribute to temperature loss or gain.

By measuring airflow, a certified technician can see your system’s performance, and then diagnose, repair, and balance the duct system for maximum performance. Many systems have dampers located at specific duct points. These dampers slide open or shut to increase or limit the airflow through certain ducts. Adjustments can increase balance.

Ductwork must also be checked for leaks, holes, and crushed areas.

Your ductwork must be manually checked for any holes or crushed areas. The more accessible your ducts, the easier it is to perform balancing. Leaking in your ducts leads to a loss of air supply, which will directly affect the temperature in your home.

Because rooms are different sizes, different amounts of air are needed to heat or cool one compared to another. This sometimes means adjusting registers. A small room may only need its air register opened halfway to heat or cool it, while larger rooms may need registers fully opened to achieve the same temperature. The end result:

• The same temperature in every room
• Cleaner air
• Better humidity control
• And real energy savings with the equipment you have on hand

If the rooms in your home aren’t cooling evenly when you run your air conditioner, with one room sweltering while the next sends you running for your sweater, then your central AC system is due for system balancing. Call the experts at Gilmore to schedule a system balance for your home, and start enjoying the full level of comfort that your AC has to offer.