Keeping your home cool and comfortable while the whole world seems to turn hot outside can be quite a challenge. The easiest way it seems it to simply turn your air conditioner on and voila! you now have a cooler home.
However, air conditioners are identified to use up to 1/6th of electricity in the United States and, during hot summer days, actually consume 43% of the U.S. peak power load. Furthermore, it is a major contributor, along with heating systems, of up to 24% of the sulfur dioxide generated in the country which is a chief ingredient to produce acid rains.
Should we sacrifice our comfort then for the sake of eliminating cooling costs and saving the environment? Strictly speaking and ideally, Yes! However it doesn’t have to be the case because there are a number of ways to help cool your home that gives you a significant amount of energy savings with less impact on our environment.
A natural way of cooling the home has been used for centuries and although it may have been slightly forgotten, is now being revived and proves to still be very effective. It is simply known as “passive cooling”. There are a number of techniques that can be employed to do this but for this article let’s discuss the simplest and easiest one to perform, blocking the heat.
The most effective and cheapest ways to block heat from the outside to penetrate the interior of your home are shading and reflective barriers.
Shading
This is perhaps the simplest yet the most effective method to keep your home cool and ultimately reduce energy consumption. By employing shading techniques like the use of drapes and blinds or by landscaping the surrounding areas of your home, you can reduce up to 40% of your cooling costs.
Your windows are common gateways for sunlight to penetrate your home. Drapes and blinds made of light colored fabrics help reduce heat gain by reflecting much of the sun’s rays. You need to make it as tight as possible to your wall to make it more efficient.
On the other hand, landscaping your home by planting trees, vines and shrubs can help shade the exterior of your home. Trees that are properly placed can save between $100 and $250 in energy costs annually. It is ideal to have leafy trees planted in the south and west ends of your home where it shades you during summer but will allow radiant heat during winter. Vines and shrubs can be employed to protect the lower part of your home by shading the walls and also acts as a wind breaker during winter time.
Reflective Barriers
The color of your home’s exterior is an important factor that needs to be considered when employing passive cooling. I understand that you may be a fan of navy blue or deep purple and other dark colors and it may appear as aesthetically pleasing, but it is a known fact that 70% to 90% of the radiant energy or heat that strike’s the home’s surface coming from the sun is absorbed by dark-colored homes. An amount of this heat gets transferred into your home by a process known as conduction.
On the other hand, light-colored homes create a reflective surface that absorbs very minimal radiant heat and actually turns most of the heat away from the home. There are other radiant barriers than can be employed and installed in your home that can be a bit more complicated, but by just being mindful of your house’s color, you can already reduce a considerable amount of heat from penetrating your home’s interior.
These are just some of the techniques you can employ to block heat from penetrating your home to keep it cool. They are also considered the cheapest and simplest. There are other techniques that will require you to buy specialized materials but the return on investment is also considerable which makes it worth all the trouble.
It all boils down to making sure heat is not contained within your home which is the basis to help you lower your cooling costs.
