Sustainable PF has been playing around with our air conditioning units to figure out the best temperature for us and the animals throughout the day. As you all know these units are generally not cheap to run so to ensure we are not cooling rooms (and paying for cooling rooms) in the space we don’t need to use. For those unused spaces we close the doors instead of cooling rooms.
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I haven’t shut off any of my vents, but this might be a good idea for my bedroom during the day. No one’s in there except at night!
Actually LH, don’t close that vent!
When you have central air (we do not) the unit that is meant to cool your home is meant to cover a specific square footage home. If you close off vents the machinery is working harder than it needs to but can’t give the output it is expecting. A furnace repair guy (whose best interests, technically, would be MORE future visits – not less) told me this. Closing up the vents means the machine isn’t working as it should and could break down more quickly.
You’re better off reducing the AC when you’re not needing it or not at home. Then turning it back on when you need it.
Great tip! I never realized how big our home was until we started getting the bill to cool and heat this house. I love the home, but hat the size right now, so this is a great idea.
I didn’t think about it in the summer months, but we do something similar in the winter. While the boys are at school, the wife and I don’t heat the house (above like 65 degrees), then we stay in the same room and bring in a space heater to keep the environment warm. We both work from home, so we don’t have to move around a lot as long as we have our computers.
Thanks for the tip!
We have another tip Freddie – Heat the Space you are In. Right on! Good way to save heat during the day. TBH, during the winter, Mrs. SPF and I keep the whole house @ 68 even when we’re home and moving about. We are VERY well insulated, as per our retrofit.
If you use fans, turning them off when you leave a room helps save money too. Fans don’t actually bring down the temp in a room they just make us feel cooler by moving the air around us. -Sydney :)
We leave some of the ceiling fans on during the day for the benefit of the pets (1 Newf who really heats up and 3 cats). We’d prefer they enjoy the air circulation over keeping the plug-in-the-wall units on all day.
Oh yes, with pets it’s important to help keep them cool. That’s so awesome you have a Newf! They are SO cute, and I’m a big cat person too. I grew up with cats and they always loved to sleep in the bathroom sinks and the bathtub during hot days to stay cool. :)