I often find myself juggling multiple responsibilities, constantly on the go, and never fully done with my to-do list. I don’t know if it ‘s all adults, all millennials, or just me. With so much on our plates, though, it can be easy to overlook the impact our daily habits have on the environment. Energy conservation is a crucial aspect of sustainability that we can all contribute to, even with our busy lifestyles.
Engage “dad-mode.”
By making small changes to our daily routines, we can reduce our energy consumption and, our overall carbon footprint. For example, turning off lights and electronics when not in use, using energy-efficient light bulbs, and adjusting the thermostat a few degrees can all make a significant difference. These actions can benefit the environment and save us money on our energy bills. So, let’s figure out practical ways we can incorporate sustainable habits into our daily routines without sacrificing anything in our busy lifestyles.
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Table of Contents
Understanding Energy Conservation
If you’re anything like me, you’re always on the go and may not have the brain energy (or time) to think about our energy consumption. But it is really important to understand our energy consumption, and its impact on the environment that would lead to us wanting to conserve our energy usage.
Definition and Importance
Energy conservation is the practice of reducing our energy consumption; there are many ways this can be done: using renewable energy like solar or wind, switching to more energy efficient practices, or just knowing the energy use of our life to know where we can make changes. And honestly, cutting down our energy usage, saves us money as electricity and fuel prices soar all across the country.
Fossil Fuels and Energy Usage:
Fossil fuels, such as coal, oil, and natural gas are finite resources formed over millions of years from the remains of ancient plants and animals. These fossil fuels are the primary source of energy for electricity generation, transportation, and industrial processes worldwide. But the extraction, processing, and burning of these fossil fuels release large amounts of greenhouse gases, primarily carbon dioxide (CO2), contributing significantly to global warming and climate change.
Burning fossil fuels is also a major contributor to air pollution (think industrialized areas, or heavily populated cities) that can lead to health issues such as respiratory problems, allergies, and exacerbating environmental degradation.
Greenhouse Gases and Climate Change:
I feel like we all have heard about greenhouse gases, but just a quick blurb so that my brain can follow this post logically. Greenhouse gases, according to the United States Environmental Protection Agency (EPC), act like an insulating blanket that traps heat in the Earth’s atmosphere. This insulating blanket acts like the plastic insulation on a greenhouse: letting all the sunshine and heat into the greenhouse and keeping all the heat inside for the plants to enjoy.
Except, we’re the plants, living in the Earth-sized greenhouse.
Our human activities, particularly the burning of fossil fuels for electricity and transportation, have increased the greenhouse gas concentrations in our Earth’s atmosphere to unprecedented levels, enhancing the greenhouse effect and causing global temperatures to rise.
I’m a four-seasons girl, it’s why I LOVE living in Pennsylvania…but recently we’ve been getting less and less winter, having temperatures in the 60s and 70s (Fahrenheit) in January and February when we’re supposed to be in deep freeze. This rise in temperatures across the globe has a ripple effect causing significant climate changes, including more frequent and severe weather events, melting glaciers and polar ice caps, rising sea levels, and disruptions to ecosystems and biodiversity.
Barriers to Energy Conservation
Despite the global benefits of energy conservation, there are still barriers that prevent us from adopting energy-saving practices. Some of these barriers include lack of awareness or knowledge, believing our individual actions don’t matter, and a lot of the “best energy conservation” routes are super-fucking expensive (and they’ve turned into a cash-grab for a lot of companies–but that’s too much to dive into here).
We can also feel overwhelmed by the amount of information available (both true and untrue) or unsure about where to start.
To overcome these barriers, we start small, by making one change at a time in our daily routines. For example, we can turn off lights and electronics when not in use. Or use energy-efficient appliances (or upgrade to them as we need new ones). Or even adjust our thermostat to save energy. By making these changes, we can reduce our energy consumption, and our individual greenhouse gas emissions.
Practical Ways to Save Energy
There are simple steps we can take to reduce our energy consumption without sacrificing anything in our daily lives. Here are some practical energy-saving tips that we can implement at home, work, while commuting, or even out shopping.
Use of Energy At Home and Work
- Unplug appliances when not in use: Many appliances, such as chargers, TVs, and computers, can consume energy even when turned off. Unplugging them when not in use can save this phantom energy and reduce our electricity bills. I haven’t personally found phantom energy being consumed in anything in our house, except for our furnace and our mini-split heat pump.
- Use energy-efficient light bulbs: LED light bulbs use SO. MUCH. LESS energy and last longer than traditional incandescent bulbs. We’re talking magnitudes of savings (changing out 1 lightbulb in our basement remodel to 5 LEDs is going to save us something close to $60/year USD). Replacing all light bulbs in our homes and workplaces with energy-efficient ones is an easy way to significantly reduce our energy consumption.
- Adjust thermostat settings: Setting the thermostat at moderate temperatures can help us maintain a balance between comfort and energy conservation. Lowering the thermostat by just a few degrees in winter and raising it in summer can make a big difference in how hard our heating and cooling appliances have to work, and therefore the energy they consume.
- Maximize natural light: Opening curtains and blinds during the day to let sunlight in can reduce our dependence on artificial lighting. This can also help heat up a room during the winter, and then shutting the curtains/blinds during the night can help retain some of that sunlight. This saves energy AND improves our mood and productivity.
Energy Efficient Transportation Choices
- Choose hybrid or electric vehicles: Hybrid and electric vehicles are more energy-efficient than traditional gas-powered cars. If we’re in the market for a new car, choosing a hybrid or electric vehicle can significantly reduce our carbon footprint and save us money on fuel.
- Carpool or use public transportation: Sharing a ride with coworkers or taking public transportation can reduce our carbon emissions and save us money on gas and parking fees.
- Walk or bike for short distances: Walking or biking for short distances saves energy but also promotes a healthy lifestyle.
Shopping and Consumption Habits
- Buy energy-efficient appliances: When you need anew appliance or you find yourself shopping for appliances, look for the Energy Star label. Energy Star-certified appliances use less energy. And sometimes, your electric company will give you a rebate for switching to an energy star certified appliance.
- Reduce, reuse, and recycle: Reducing our consumption of the overall items we bring into our homes, reusing or repurposing items, and recycling waste can significantly reduce our carbon footprint.
- Choose sustainably sourced products: Choosing products that are sustainably sourced and produced can reduce our impact on the environment and promote a more energy-efficient economy. We dive more into that in our sustainable shopping series.
Technological Aids for Energy Efficiency
The cool thing is that there are many technological advances available that can help us conserve energy and reduce our carbon footprint.
Smart Home Technologies
Smart home technologies are devices that can be controlled remotely using a smartphone or other internet-connected device. These devices can help us conserve energy by allowing us to control our home’s heating, cooling, lighting, and other systems from anywhere. Some examples of smart home technologies include:
- Smart thermostats: These devices can learn our preferences and automatically adjust the temperature to save energy when we are away from home.
- Smart lighting: These devices can be controlled remotely and can be set to turn off automatically when we leave a room.
- Smart power strips: These devices can turn off power to devices that are not in use, reducing standby power consumption.
Apps and Online Tools
There are many apps and online tools available that can help us conserve energy and reduce our carbon footprint. Some examples include:
- Energy tracking apps: These apps can help us monitor our energy consumption and identify areas where we can reduce our usage. We LOVE our Emporia Energy system for this; we installed it ourselves prior to getting our solar installed so we could see our biggest energy draws in the house.
- Renewable energy apps: These apps can help us find renewable energy sources in our area, such as solar power or wind turbines.
- Carbon footprint calculators: These tools can help us estimate our carbon footprint and identify ways to reduce it. Some companies, like Wren, will help you offset your footprint as well.
Using Renewable Energy
Renewable energy is crucial in today’s world to reduce our dependence on fossil fuels and lower our impact on the environment. By utilizing these renewable sources of energy, such as solar or wind, we can generate clean energy without depleting natural resources. One of the main benefits of using renewable energy is the energy savings that can be achieved.
Using renewable energy in conjunction with our energy efficiency and conservation practices, we can drastically reduce our reliance on fossil fuels, further reduce the amount of energy we consume, and lower our energy costs.
For example, by using a solar water heater, we can harness the thermal energy from the sun to heat water instead of using electricity.
Energy management plays a key role in utilizing renewable energy effectively. By conducting an energy audit, we can identify areas where we can improve energy efficiency and reduce energy waste. The Department of Energy and the Energy Information Administration provide valuable energy information and resources to help individuals and businesses optimize their energy use.
If getting solar, or wind energy is not available for you as a consumer, consider going with an electric company that only provides clean or renewable energy choices. In Pennsylvania, we have the option to choose our electric generation company and the one we’ve chosen supplies 100% renewable energy through solar and wind farms. In addition, we’ve used Arcadia for several years now (in conjunction with our electricity generator + provider), and basically the company purchases renewable energy for our house and this means that our electricity usage can be attributable to renewable energy sources.
Decrease Demand for Energy
By implementing energy efficiency and conservation practices or using clean and renewable energy sources (or both) can decrease our individual energy consumption, and the overall demand for energy from fossil fuels. The law of conservation of energy states that energy cannot be created or destroyed, so it is important to reduce energy where possible. For example, turning off lights when not in use or setting the thermostat lower can save a lot of energy over time. Using clean energy sources such as solar energy can also help decrease the demand for traditional forms of energy like thermal energy used in water heaters or air conditioners.
Thinking about our energy use may seem daunting, or even overwhelming at first, but there are small, simple steps we can take everyday to make a difference.
