Saving Energy Staying Cool

It is the perfect time to discuss low-energy ways to cope with hot summer weather! In an earlier post, I mentioned that we have one window air conditioner, an attic fan, bedroom fans for the kids, lots of shade and a light-colored roof. Usually the air conditioner only goes on for a few hours in the late afternoon, if at all, but this week it has been running almost all afternoon and evening.

We got the attic fan our first year in the house, 1986, and it has been trouble-free ever since. It sits in a window in the attic, and we take it out in September and put it back in May or June. We keep the house closed up during the heat of the day, with curtains and shades drawn, and when it gets hotter inside than outside (usually in the evening) we open windows and doors and turn on the attic fan. We turn it off at bedtime. This works very well when the outside temperature goes below 70 degrees at night, but this week has been challenging.

It helps to wear less and drink cold drinks, especially just after coming inside or working hard enough to get hot. The kids like popsicles. I have read that some people say you get used to living without air conditioning, but others say you don't. I think it is somewhere in between: you never get completely comfortable in the heat, but you do adjust a bit. I always have trouble sleeping the first couple of hot nights, then I acclimate.

The same tricks that keep my house livable without air conditioning are useful to reduce energy usage for people who air condition.

Do not underestimate the cooling provided by mature trees. It is much better than the shade from an awning or roof. For one thing, the leaves take energy from the sun and turn it into sugar, whereas a roof or awning can get hot. Furthermore, even on a windless day the transpiration of the trees apparently sets up a very gentle circulation of air under the tree canopy. This is another good reason to plant trees. I've had visitors get out of their cars on my driveway and tell me that my yard feels ten degrees cooler than theirs.

One strategy is to try to keep the heat out of the house. In winter when we waste energy, we waste it once. In summer when we waste energy we waste it twice, because we also have to run the air conditioner longer to get rid of the extra heat. Did you know that compact fluorescent bulbs save on air conditioning? I hang my laundry outside to dry in the summer, which keeps heat from the dryer out of the house. I wash more laundry in cold water, and take cooler showers. In the summer I turn off the water in the shower while I shampoo. I've tried this in the winter and I get too cold, but in summer it feels just fine. And a drip-dry hairstyle saves on blow drying.

Some nights we have a cold dinner, such as green salad with chick peas or extra cheese for protein, or tuna salad. My mother used to cook dinner in an electric frying pan on the back porch, but I haven't tried that yet. I suppose we could even take the toaster out there. After heating up a large pot of water to cook corn, I pour it down the drain immediately, rather than letting it cool down while we eat, because it heats up the kitchen. I have worked my way down from two minutes to boil a cup of water for tea in the microwave to one minute forty seconds. My dishwasher has an energy-saver button, but it doesn't have a dial that shows what cycle it is in, making it hard to know when I can stop the cycle and open it without interrupting the rinse. It does have a digital readout of how many minutes are left in the cycle, and when I am around the kitchen I open it earlier each time. Eventually I will figure out exactly when is the earliest I can open it. Unfortunately I won't be able to set a timer to remind me, because the minutes on the dial don't correspond to real minutes. Who designs these things?

Here is my last-resort cooling trick, one that I hit upon when I lived in Philadelphia in the early eighties in an un-air conditioned brick row house: I stick my head under the faucet, then towel dry and go around with moist hair. It really cools me off.