IDT Energy Savings

Stay Cool!

IDT Energy wants you to save on your energy bills with some tips on what you can do right now to achieve this goal.

1.    Get a programmable thermostat which will automatically adjust to keep your house just the right temperature, either comfortably warm or cool.

2.    Not only does it save energy when you reduce the temperature on the thermostat of your hot water heater, it is safer, too. 120 degrees Fahrenheit should be hot enough for just about anyone, without that “scalding effect” you might experience at higher temperatures.

3.    It is more energy efficient to run your dishwasher or washing machine when fully loaded.  Go out and buy more clothes and then you won’t need to do a wash so often!

4.    Keep your electronic equipment hooked up using power strips. When not in use, turn off your equipment with the power strip. This saves your equipment from the constant and wasteful energy draw of “stand-by” mode.

5.    It is incorrect that turning your computer on and off is damaging. Save electricity by turning off your computer when not in use. If you leave your computer for differing amounts of time make sure to set the power save options.

Summer’s coming and IDT Energy wants you to think about saving on your electric bill. We all know that summers in New York can be challenging when it comes to staying cool, so here’s a simple summary of the basics of saving energy, and keeping cool, too.

It’s always important to keep in mind that there are two aspects to saving, efficiency and conservation:

Conservation refers to how you use energy; do you only use exactly how much you need, or do you leave lights on when you’re not in a room, or let the water run when it’s not in use. Recycling would also come under the category of conservation, because whenever you don’t need to use resources, for instance if you can use paper, glass or plastic over again, you have conserved the resources that would have been needed to produce new paper, glass or plastic.

The other half of the saving equation relies on energy efficiency. This often refers to how well a machine or appliance, such as an air conditioner or refrigerator, turns energy into the form that you need it, such as turning electricity to cold air. Efficiency can also be increased using insulation and other mechanical ways of focusing or directing the effect you want to the place that you want it. For instance, if you want to cool off your living room you can increase the efficiency of your air conditioner by closing curtains to keep out excess sunlight and heat, and closing doors to keep in the cold air. In this way your air conditioner does not need to work as hard to produce the same cooling effect.

IDT Energy wishes you a cool summer in hot New York!