This month's challenge comes from Mrs. Green. A whole month!
This month make note of the electricity (Kilowatts) used in your home (find this number on your electric bill, by reading the meter, by using a home electricity monitor, etc.). Then, spend one month reducing that number by 10%. In December we'll come back and report on our success including the actions we've taken to reduce our usage.
For this month's challenge, my goal is to track the amount of electricity and gas that we use each week. I start each Monday by taking a reading from both meters and continue taking readings each Monday after that. I am using a spreadsheet to track the day, time, readings, and any notes. I will analyze the results and see what type of progress we are making each week. My challenge is to reduce the usage by 10% each week (the Change the World Wednesday Challenge is to track for November and reduce in December).
A few items that will affect the usage:
The following items are opportunities for reduce electricity use:
In the next few weeks, I will post my table of readings to share my improvements!
>> Will you join me in this challenge?
For this month's challenge, my goal is to track the amount of electricity and gas that we use each week. I start each Monday by taking a reading from both meters and continue taking readings each Monday after that. I am using a spreadsheet to track the day, time, readings, and any notes. I will analyze the results and see what type of progress we are making each week. My challenge is to reduce the usage by 10% each week (the Change the World Wednesday Challenge is to track for November and reduce in December).A few items that will affect the usage:
- I work from home sometimes
- We travel on the weekends to visit family
- We will be traveling out of town for Thanksgiving and Christmas
The following items are opportunities for reduce electricity use:
- Leaving lights on when no one is in the room
- Leaving the TV on when not in use
- Length of showers
- Leaving small appliances and electronics plugged in when not in use
- Lower the thermostat by 1 degree (we already have it fairly low, 67 during day, 64 at night)
In the next few weeks, I will post my table of readings to share my improvements!
>> Will you join me in this challenge?
7 comments:
great blog!
follow each other? i'll wait your answer on my blog! :)
xx
www.feedyourfashionmind.com
I like your challenge! I'm in too!
Following you from the Weekend Gathering Hop! Cute blog! I hope you will stop by Swanky Baby too!
Swanky Baby
http://swankybaby.net
What fun ... I can't wait to see how it turns out for you. When we first became "green", we went around the house looking for opportunities to reduce our energy use. We did all the things you've suggested along with twisting off some of the light bulbs in our bathroom and using CFLs, turning off the water heater except for 1 hour a day, planning laundry day so that we dried successive loads of laundry without letting the dryer cool down, and using table-top appliances to do our cooking. Our electric bill dropped by half that first month. Now we've streamlined our use so ... reducing by another 10% is, indeed, a challenge for us ... but I'm searching for ways. :-)
Swanky Baby's Mom - welcome to our challenge! I think this is also a great activity to get kids involved to identify ways to reduce energy consumption!
Small Footprints - we've been pretty good over the past year and have noticed a reduction, but we still have some opportunities. I will have to research about turning off the water heater except for 1 hour a day. I've never thought of that!
can't wait to see how you get on! Tomorrow I will be posting up a 'normal' weeks usage and from then on I'll be trying to reduce mine. This is something I could do SO much better on, so I'm looking forward to the challenge :)
warm wishes
Rae aka Mrs Green @littlegreenblog
Rae - I'm glad to be doing the challenge with you! It's actually been hard not trying to reduce my electricity usage. I want to get a good baseline reading this week and then kick off improvements next week.
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