Mars & Venus: Alternative Energy Saving Strategies of a Vermont Couple

By Nancy Baron*

My husband, Bob, and I got serious about saving energy a couple of years back when we moved from an old farmhouse to a newer house in Vermont. Those who know us would not be surprised that friction arose even over this common efficiency goal. In this case, it came down to approaches. Bob is into technology investments and I generally go for the low-cost/no-cost solutions.

A good example of this was the choice of energy projects we decided to tackle last spring. Bob had been researching the relevant payback of technologies, including pv's, geothermal and solar hot water. After analyzing the available products and our solar exposure, Bob selected a new solar hot water system for the house.

I would rather find places to cut before making a large capital investment. So, I had the plumber install a new water shutoff valve to the greenhouse, enabling us to turn off the heat completely without risking frozen pipes. As we aren’t growing food in the greenhouse over the winter months, there wasn’t a good reason to heat it.

Bob is Mars

Bob of course bought one of the first TED electricity monitors and hooked it up to his computer to analyze our electricity use. This has given us a much clearer picture of our electricity spikes and the appliances and activities that use the most energy. The TED monitor showed us that our oven needs a tremendous amount of power to preheat, more than ten times the amount of watts our induction cook top uses at a moderate setting.

Contrasting the energy used for a ten to fifteen minute preheat to running the induction for an hour and the burner still outperforms. For a long slow braise, the oven may pull ahead in energy savings, but I now use the cook top for most dishes that do not require a stay on the oven racks. I also hang our clothes outside on the line to dry during the short Vermont summers.

We really didn’t need a TED monitor to figure out what to do when it came to lighting. We had already made the investment in CFLs for most of the lights when we moved into our house. However, with a very open floor plan and an inefficient initial lighting plan, we could easily have bulbs burning in the double digits between the kitchen and great room – even at 12-15 watts per bulb, the kWh can really add up.

But Venus is Smarter

My low cost solution in the kitchen was simply to remove 25% of the overhead bulbs, still providing plenty of light. In the great room, my requested Christmas present this year was for Bob to update the light switches so that ½ the bulbs are on one switch and ½ are on the other. As we are generally either sitting on the couch in one half of the room, or eating in the other half, we rarely need all the bulbs on at one time. And, if we don't need broad light, the overheads go off and one or two table lamps can be used instead.

When we moved in, one thing that my husband and I could both agree on was the necessity to have a home energy audit. We were surprised to find an abundance of air leaks around our 12 year old home. The stone fireplace in the middle of the great room was also a source of major heat loss. Based on the audit, we insulated, sealed, and caulked, as well as installed a wood stove in the hearth.

Venus and Mars Together: Big Savings

The net effect of our technology investments and miserly ways has been a significant downward trend in our energy use. The previous owners of our house used more than twice as much oil to heat the house and water for only two people the year before we moved in. With our weatherization and fireplace projects in place, and a frugal hand on the thermostat, we saw our oil use go down by 60% that first year, comfortably meeting our family of five's needs. And, that's before the solar hot water project. Granted, we did burn 3 cords of wood to provide a major source of heat for our great room. Using the Smithers method of equating 150 gallons of oil per cord of wood, however, we still decreased our energy consumption by 35% and converted a significant portion of that fuel to renewable biomass.

Even with an unusually cloudy and rainy 2010 summer, we saw a 1/3 decrease in our oil use from the new solar hot water installation. Estimating a 10% increase in oil costs per year, we anticipate a 7-year payback on that project, and lots of satisfaction.

Our electricity use has also benefited from analysis, investment, and conservation. Checking on our bills for Novembers past, our kWh usage has decreased from 1050 kWh in 2007 to 652 in 2009, that's almost 38% over two years.

Mars and Venus Agree

Though my first instinct is to look to reduce consumption and Bob's is to leverage the latest technology, we both have the same goal in mind. Priorities aside, Bob and I have managed to both contribute to a more carbon-friendly and energy efficient lifestyle.

How do you approach reducing your impact?

*Nancy Baron is a social media, communications and marketing specialist with a passion for local food, climate action, and energy efficiency. She is currently a climate change Web 2.0 strategist with ICF International in the Clean Energy and Climate Engagement practice.