SAVE Money by programming your thermostat!
July 23, 2013
With the recent heat wave last week we have been receiving a lot of questions about programming or adjusting your thermostats to save energy and ultimately to save money. Here is an outline/guideline as to when and what temperature you should be setting your programmable thermostat. If you do not have a programmable thermostat you can still follow these guidelines, it just requires a little more due diligence on your part.
Please Note:
1. Use energy when it is the cheapest. By aggressively trying to move the temperature well before 7am, you achieve savings in excess of 25%
2. Make sure you ‘cut off’ well before change in rate. My experience in hydro billing is ‘whenever something can be interpreted against you, it will be…
3. Let Mother Nature help you. In the summer, open windows when it is cooler outside than in.
4. Only try to moderately adjust your temperature when you’re sleeping. Large swings are costly.
| Summer | |||||||||
| Time | Set (⁰F) | Set (⁰C) | Comments | ||||||
| Wake | 5:30 AM | 73 | 22.8 | enough time to cool entire house before you get up | |||||
| hydro is cheap, set up house to “cruise” into day | |||||||||
| Leave | 6:45 AM | 79 | 26.1 | house will be cool to start with, let it slowly warm up before you leave | |||||
| make sure system doesn’t work hard at beginning of higher use | |||||||||
| Return | 7:15 PM | 75 | 23.9 | wait until rates go down before aggressively cooling house | |||||
| try to wait as long as possible – not “cool” when you walk in the door | |||||||||
| Sleep | ??? | 78 | 25.6 | Hydro is cheap, but only go as low as you need to be comfortable |
Posted in: Cooling - Tagged with: air conditioner, Cambridge, cooling, cost, efficiency, efficient, Elmira, energy, Guelph, Hogg, Home, Hydro, Kitchener, saving, savings, Waterloo, Waterloo North Hydro