Saving Energy

When I was going through our filing cabinet the other day, I came across a little brochure published by Washington Natural Gas in 1995 titled Saving By Degrees: No Cost and Low Cost Ways to Save Energy and Money. Even though it was relatively old, I read through it, and found a few tidbits that I thought to be worth sharing (my comments are in green). All of these came from the "no cost" section of the pamphlet:

• On the average, for each degree you consistently lower your thermostat, your energy consumption drops by 2 percent. If you set your daytime temperature at 65 degrees (not even I am that cheap--67 is about as low as I can stand it) instead of 70 degrees, and your nighttime temperature at 55 degrees instead of 60 degrees (ours is at 63 at night, which, again, is plenty cold for me), your annual heating bill will drop by about 10 percent.
• Water heaters typically consume the second highest amount of energy in the home, behind only the furnace. By setting the thermostat at 120 degrees, or low, you can save money and reduce the risk of scalding. Washington State law (as of 1995) requires that all new water heaters be preset at 120 degrees. For health considerations, do not set the thermostat temperature below 120 degrees F. We have drawn a line with Sharpie on our water heater temperature dial so that we know exactly where to set it, in case it gets bumped (which it does surprisingly often).
• Drain five to 10 gallons of water from the bottom of the water heater at least once a year to flush out sediments and keep your water heater operating efficiently. Connect a hose to the drain valve and let the water flow until it turns clear. Be sure to shut the drain valve completely. This is something we've never done before, but it makes sense.

For what it's worth...