little cut powerbill trick ive learned..

[slim rem 7]

  leave your lights on in the areas you going to be in..beats the heck outa 1500 watt heaters to keep the house warm enough to tolerate..power bill dropped by almost 150 bucks this month..it about as cold a month as i can remember,,in a good while, for my area..right now theres 7 lights on in a three room area.34 degrees out side..
 a couple of sweat shirts is all i need,to be plenty warm...
    then our bed room is heated by thermostat,an  kept at the right temp to sleep an snuggle..you might want to try it if you in a money push right now..slim
 ps..for this to work,, you leave them on all the time..it don t work as well if you cut them off at night an ever let the house get cold..also i don t have the option of heating with wood here.wish i did

[magooch]

Regular incandescent light bulbs are heaters.  And it certainly is easier to keep a house warm than it is to try to reheat it if it is allowed to cool down.  You must reheat the walls, furniture, flooring etc. and not just the air.

[Graybeard]

We've gone to compact flourescent lights here so little to no heat out put from them. We keep all lights turned off in all rooms where we are not in at that moment in time. I've shut down all outside night lights as well.

We have a heat pump for our primary heat and it does an OK job tho in the high ceiling part of the house not as well as in the normal ceiling height areas. In the living room at night I do sometimes run an electric heater with a thermostat to add just a bit extra.

I do turn the heat down at night when we sleep as I actually prefer to sleep in a cool not warm area but when I'm up and about I really do want the house warm in winter. I prefer not to bundle up during the times I'm just sitting around tho I admit that in a tight money situation you can indeed save a lot by setting that thermostat lower and using a bit more clothes. We tend to sit around with a t-shirt not sweat shirt on and more often than not I'm barefoot tho I do have high top fleece lined house booties I wear at times.

These days in winter my thermostat varies from a low of 70 at night to a high of 74 in the morning to warm the house back up. It then goes back down most times but at night when the sun goes down and the cold starts to invade again it goes back to 74 until bed time.

I used to drop it back down to 66 or 68 at night but these days seldom do. More than 74 and it just gets too hot here in my office where I spend much of my day.

[Matt]

If you have an electric water heater you can put a timer on it to come on a few hours before you need the hot water and go off after you have had time for shower and such. Most newer heaters will retain most of the heat through the day so you still have it when you get home.  On average it will cut between $35-$60 off of the bill. If you have a leaky hot water faucet or dont cut it off all the way then your heating elements are coming on every couple of hours drawing anywhere from 3500w up to 9000w. You would be amazed at how much money your electric water heater, dryer, stove and heaters really cost you each month.

Also with the new smart meters going in everywhere soon you will be billed based on time of usage not just the amount used so in many places do your laundry and bathing at night to save money.

Matt

[southernutah]

if you have sun light coming in any window you can place something of dark color to absorb the sunlight. I talked ot an old fellow that closed in his  patio in the winter with glass. He put a row of black plastic barrels in front of the windows that heated in the sunlight all day. He had curtins he closed at night to help keep out the cold. The barrel gave of heat all night. To brring heat into the house he open 2 windows putting a fan in one to circulate the air in to the house.

In sun facing windows one could mount black plactic on 2 dowels or fir strips ( top and bottom) that cover half the window. Attack to inside wall and leave a gap at the bottom to let air circulate. In summer just just remove and roll up plastic on stick and store.
Kind of tacky and some times hard to see thru one could add a sealed plastic sheat over the outside or inside of window frames adding a extra heat barrier