Energy: How much can you lose?

RBC I Interested in reducing your energy waistline? How about lowering your home energy costs? Take the Northwest Colorado Energy Diet Challenge with homeowners across Moffat, Rio Blanco and Routt counties to see how much you can lose in home energy usage. The NW Colorado Energy Steering committee has developed an energy diet challenge checklist tool to motivate and equip homeowners in reducing energy usage thereby reducing home energy costs. This is the first of a series of six articles to encourage homeowners to act now when the weather is getting cooler.
Most homeowners believe their house provides adequate warmth. But are your family members wearing a coat indoors or complaining about drafts throughout your house? By conducting a careful study of your past three year’s energy costs (both fuel and electricity), you will be enlightened, if not shocked, at the increased energy costs in your bills. Looking at your household budget, how much do you spend on electricity and gas/propane/wood? We encourage you to go on the energy diet and spend less of your household budget on energy costs. We bet most households could use the savings on other needed amenities.
The Northwest Energy Diet Checklist is a tool to help us act on simple items we can do at home. Post the checklist on your refrigerator (the checklist has a magnet on the back for posting) and check off items you have completed from three levels of action items; nice and easy, intermediate and advanced. Our article series will delve into each of the three areas to give homeowners tips and tricks on how to make their homes more efficient and comfortable.
The checklists are available locally at the Bud Werner library, Hayden library, Craig library, city and town halls, Steamboat Springs, Craig and Meeker Chambers as well as at the courthouses. You can also download a PDF of the checklist at www.yampavlleydatapartners.com . The energy diet challenge is for the tri-county residents so the competition could be tough. Pick up your checklist and get started today.
In future articles, we will follow the outline of the challenge checklist to support and encourage those motivated to reduce energy in their homes. We will include real world examples to encourage and motivate homeowners in their efforts.
We challenge all readers with an assignment. Take time to pick up the challenge checklist, read it and use as a guide to save on your household energy budget. How much can you lose?
The Northwest Colorado Energy Diet Challenge Checklist can be found in your local library, city hall, courthouse or chamber or at YampaValleyDataPartners.com.