Make Your House Energy Efficient

Step 2: Appliances and Electronics

Apart from using CFL's in your house; you can also take other steps towards energy efficiency. One of the easiest things you can do is fix leaky faucets. Though it may seem that this wouldn't make a big difference in your water use those little drops can add up.
Another thing you can do is try to cut down on your water use by filling your sink with hot water and cleaning your dishes by hand. Not only will this cut down on water use, but it will also lower your electric bill if you use a pump to get your water.
If you are not willing to clean your dishes by hand another thing that you can do is buy an Energy Star dish washer. These products use less electricity and water to clean dishes. Other Energy Star products include:

-TV's
-ovens
-water heaters
- driers and washing machines
-and just about anything electronic

Apart from using an Energy Star washing machine you can also use concentrated detergent, which contains less water, but still gets the job done. To dry your clothes you may also use an Energy Star drier or get a clothes line and hang your clothes out to dry on nice, sunny days.

Comments

[AuntJudy]

I live in Virginia where we have lots and lots of Homeowners Associations and they actually FORBID clothes lines - yes, you read that correctly - why, because it's not pretty and we certainly wouldn't want any one to see our undies, but you better recycle your newspaper or else ! makes sense right?

[nickmarrone]

Does washing your dishes by hand really save water? I've heard otherwise. You have to account for rinsing the dishes as well.

[paxdonnaverde]

The real issue here is the energy used to filter, neutralize, heat and pump the water that comes out of your faucet. Getting used water from your drain to city water facilities and back to your faucet uses 20% of the worlds energy.

We humans are terribly inefficient when it comes.

A dishwasher is a short distance closed-loop water filtering system. It can be efficient and simple because it is not required to filter out body waste, agricultural toxins, oils and the myriad of other things that enter a municipal water treatment plant.
A dishwasher uses a limited amount of water over and over again. Once it is heated it stays hot so it's not constantly drawing hot water from your heater that loses a lot of heat on its way to your sink.

[irish death1]

I guess i might all depend on what dishwasher you compare it to.