New Year, New Energy Efficiency Goals

New year is here and it is the perfect time to shake things up and try a new hobby, reorganize your life, or finally admit that you do not need 12 different coffee mugs. But if you’re looking for a goal that benefits both your house and your wallet, improving energy efficiency is the way to go. Maybe you’ve even thought about adding solar panels to the mix. Whatever your style, setting smart energy goals for the new year can make your home feel cosier, cheaper to run, and a little bit kinder to the planet. Let’s take a look at how many new energy efficiency goals you could add to your bank.

1. Start with the easy wins. Before you jump into the big upgrades, let’s talk about simple steps, the low hanging fruit of the energy world. You could swap all the old bulbs for LED bulbs and turn off the lights you’re not using. You can make a point of unplugging charges that are eating energy, like tiny invisible gremlins. You could also seal off the random drafts that sneak in around windows and doors. These are the tiny habits that add up fast. Think of them as the warm up before the real workout.
2. Do an energy audit. It sounds scary, but it’s not. They’re basically a home checkup. You can do one yourself or get a professional to poke around and tell you where you’re losing heat, wasting money, or unintentionally calling me outdoors. This helps you to figure out which upgrades will make the biggest difference, because nobody wants to spend money fixing the wrong thing.
3. Upgrade your insulation. It’s like the sweater of your house. If it’s thin, patchy, or old, your home loses heat faster than you can say ‘did someone leave the door open?’ Adding or replacing insulation in the attic, walls or crawlspace can dramatically reduce your heating and cooling costs. It’s not the flashiest of upgrades, but it is one of the most powerful.
4. Give your appliances a performance review. It’s New Year, which means there are new sales for appliances across the board. They might be working hard, or they might be hardly working. Older refrigerators, dishwashers and washing machines can be energy hungry monsters in disguise. If your appliances are loud, slow, or older than some of your favorite socks, it might be time to upgrade to energy efficient versions. They use less energy, save more, and often come with snazzy features.
5. Smart home technology is your new best friend. If you want to feel like you’re living in the future, smart tech can help. Smart thermostats, for example, learn your schedule and adjust heating and cooling to save energy automatically. Smart plugs can cut power to devices that you forget to turn off, and smart bulbs that you control the lights from your phone. The best part is that these gadgets make saving energy feel effortless and almost quite sneaky.

Energy efficiency goals don’t require massive lifestyle changes, just small smart steps that snowball into big savings.