It’s all well and good having a beautifully designed home, but if it’s not energy efficient it will end up costing you money. When it comes to creating a greener home, a lot of us think of redesigning the building itself as being the best way to achieve this.
Of course, it’s most probably not practical to knock down your property and rebuild it to be more most energy-efficient. But that doesn’t mean you can’t do anything about how efficient your home is. Believe it or not, it’s all in the small details. At least, most of the time it is.
What that means is that when it comes to having a home that’s energy efficient, most of the time the smaller things have the biggest impact. Ask any energy efficiency expert and they’ll tell you that to make your home greener, it’s much easier than you would think. It may come with a little cost but making your home more efficient doesn’t have to be overly expensive.
Having your home additionally insulated is a great option. If you want to boost how well insulated your home is, having it re-insulated is a great idea. It may take some time to complete, but once your walls, roof and floor have been re-insulated, you’ll find it much easier to keep your home warm or cool.
Save on the use of electricity for lighting in two ways; let more natural light in and swap to using LED bulbs. The latter of the two is an easy fix, all you need is to order a few bulbs from your local lighting and ballast supplier and your home will be more efficient. As for letting more natural light into your home, this may be more tricky. Of course, you could have your windows enlarged or skylights added to upstairs. But the easiest thing to do is position mirrors strategically, so they reflect natural light into the room. The larger the mirrors, the better, as bigger areas will reflect more light.
Operate a no standby rule in your house banning appliances from being left on standby. They might use a minimal amount of electricity, but even so, that’s energy you could be saving.
For your curtains, select a design that’s thick and covers the entire window. This will help to keep cold drafts from getting in, leading to the need for more energy. For this, blackout curtains are best as they tend to be incredibly thick, so are ideal for blocking cold air. Not any styles of blackout curtains you like? Then why not consider making your own – there are plenty of tutorials and ideas online.
Who would have thought that energy efficiency and home design go hand in hand? Of course, there are plenty of ways you can design a new build home to be energy efficient, but for older properties, you have to be a little more creative. Believe it or not, energy efficiency often comes down to the small details, such as the curtains you have in place.