Ok, we all know heat rises. But did you know that heating the lower levels of your home is more expensive than heating the upper levels because of this fact?
Or that taller ceilings have an impact on your heating bill? Or that smart thermostats can heat only the rooms you’re sitting in?
If you are a homeowner looking to save money on your energy bills, you have lots of questions. We hope the answers we’ve provided give you insight into some of the amazing energy-saving inventions for central heating systems.
These inventions will help you heat your home more effectively and save money and energy without sacrificing comfort.
Question: I work from home during the day. My children go to school, and my wife works at her company’s office, so I work alone. I generally use only the first floor of my three-story home. How do I keep my house comfortable without paying to heat areas I’m not using?
Answer: In larger homes, the key to effectively managing energy, maintaining comfort, avoiding waste and keeping costs down is zoning. And the key to zoning is programmable thermostats.
(If you’re not currently using a programmable thermostat, you should consider replacing your current thermostat with a programmable one.)
Zoning your central heating system allows you to heat the areas of your house you’re using, while moderating the areas you’re not. (Why pay to heat areas if you’re not using them?)
You can further customize central heating systems in a zoned environment by creating setback temperatures for uninhabited space throughout your home.
Question: What’s a setback temperature?
Answer: Setback temperatures are a minimum temperature you create in rooms you’re not occupying.
Setback temperatures keep central heating systems from allowing temperatures in uninhabited areas throughout the home to drop critically below a certain thermostatic setting.
They are usually several degrees below your comfort level, but not so low that you burn energy unnecessarily. So for a room with a normal temperature of 20c you may have a setback temperature of 15c.
In a zoned heating system, if uninhabited zones are allowed to get too cold, valuable energy can be lost bringing those zones back up to a comfortable temperature once you are ready to inhabit them. Setback temperatures let you avoid this energy draining mistake.
The next step to strategically heating your home is learning thermostats. Learning thermostats can be combined with programmable thermostats for even more energy saving climate control.
Question: What are learning thermostats?
Answer: Learning thermostats come to understand your movements and heat your home based on where you are. They allow temperatures to fall to setback values based on where you are not, similar to a zoned system; however, learning thermostats adjust almost instantaneously.
Again, this keeps temperatures from ever getting critically cool in the areas you’re not using, but doesn’t overheat uninhabited areas either. These thermostats essentially track your movements around your home, sensing where you are at a given time and adjusting the temperature to accommodate you. We know – pretty cool, right?
Tip: To save even more energy … Be sure you’ve installed a highly efficient aerated condensing boiler, because unless you’ve got a high efficiency boiler, your system isn’t really functioning as it should be.
Also, if you’re using radiated heat, be sure each radiator is fitted with thermostatic radiator valves, even though you may have a central thermostat. If you’ve got a large house, and some of your rooms are benefiting from solar gain, you don’t want those rooms to be heated at the same rate as the rooms not getting solar gain. See what we mean?
Be Patient
Employing all of these methods is a super-efficient way to keep your home comfortable … saving you the most money, and conserving the most energy.
However if you can’t employ them all at once, maybe begin by simply zoning your home and creating setback temperatures … learning thermostats can come later.
Remember, energy efficiency is about small changes that equal big savings over time, so don’t be discouraged if you can’t do it all. A little here and a little there and before you know it your bills will be coming down, and you’ll be as comfortable as ever!
Did you find this information helpful? Let us know!
