Rising electricity bills have forced people to resort to various techniques of energy conservation. A common cause of heat loss that often goes unnoticed in most houses is poor insulation. Simple improvements in insulation can have a major impact on your electricity bills without having to resort to expensive techniques. In fact, a properly insulated house can save you hundreds of dollars every year. According to estimates, more than three fourths of old houses are poorly insulated.

The most common insulators used in an average house include blankets, insulation panels and loose fill. However, these insulators not just lack in efficiency, they also harm the environment. An effective solution to this problem has been provided by cellulose based alternatives, which are renewable and environment friendly.

If you have a good idea of how insulation is installed, you can start off by sealing larger gaps in your house, including areas near the furnace, pipes, light fixtures, ducts, and chimneys. Then you can add insulation on the attic floor joist and hatch. Last but not the least, insulate the ceilings of the basement if it is not being heated, and if the basement is covered by the heating system, then seal leaks in the walls. You also need to take care of the unvented crawl spaces to trap as much heat as possible.

Remember that you should not try to change or repair the insulation on your own if you don’t know what you are doing, as it will not only be inconvenient, it would also lead to poor insulation. Always seek professional advice in that case.

Preventing Heat Loss through Furnaces

Natural gas furnaces are one of the most common means of heating homes. Ensuring proper functioning of a furnace or any other gas appliance is important for many reasons. You would not only want to cut down your electricity bills but also want to prevent any mishaps and fire hazards that can occur due to improper functioning of the furnace.

It is necessary to keep your furnace in a good condition and ensure that it is properly maintained by hiring services of licensed professional. However, there are a few things that you can do on your own to ensure longer life as well as higher efficiency of your heating system.

You should conduct basic checks of the furnace periodically to see if the filter needs to be changed or cleaned. Inspect the fan belt too to look for wear and tear. You can also shut off the pilot light of the furnace in warm weather to save energy. A gas contractor can help in relighting it when the need arises again.

While using a furnace, preventive measures are the best way to avoid mishaps and to save electricity. You should always keep the area near the furnace clear of other objects, especially inflammable ones. It is also advisable to adjust the thermostat according to your needs, either manually or by using automated thermostats that can adjust themselves according to your settings.

You also need to be careful when you are replacing your heating system. There are many factors like efficiency, filters, warrantees, fan options etc. that need to be taken into consideration while replacing an old furnace. It is always advisable to go for Energy Star qualified furnaces that are proven to be more efficient than other standard models. Products like the Bryant Evolution Series 90i Model Furnace have proved to be quite effective in reducing electricity bills.

If you notice any serious problem with the furnace, you should hire a professional to carry out detailed examination and maintenance. There are many companies that offer expert services for specific problems as well as overall servicing of the furnace.

Save Money by Minimizing Heat Loss through Doors and Windows

The desire to cut on electricity bills and to live in an eco friendly way has motivated many of us to take steps towards conserving energy. But there are a number of simple ways of energy conservation that people tend to overlook. One of the most common reasons for heat loss from homes is through doors and windows. Here are a few steps to ensure that this heat loss is minimized.

You should use weather-proof stripping for your doors. The space of even 1/8 inch between an average door and its threshold can cause significant loss of insulation, and closing these small spaces can help you save up to 15% of costs incurred in heating or cooling your house. Rubber is the most commonly used sealing material and rightly so. Foam and felt are cheaper alternatives but they have lesser life and effectiveness. Don’t forget to regularly replace the worn out stripping. And if you are thinking of replacing your doors, you should go for insulated doors that minimize heat loss.

A lot of heat loss from homes can be prevented by ensuring that the windows do not have cracks and ill-fitted frames or panes. This problem can be addressed by substituting the standard windows with high performance (double glazed or even triple glazed) windows. You can also go for windows covered with low emissive coatings. Low emissive glass costs slightly more than high performance windows but it can significantly cut your heating costs.

While planning any repairs or restructuring of your windows and doors, you should keep your finances in mind. If you don’t want to spend a lot in one go, then you should target the major problem areas first. Focus on north facing windows for reducing heat loss. And if you want to keep the house cool, then target south facing windows that trap additional heat in summers. You can also invest in shades and blinds that can perform both of these functions by improving the insulation of the windows. While you are at it, check out our Top 10 Water Heater Tips that can save you money.

What You Need to Know About Air Conditioning and Heat Pumps

Air conditioners and heat pumps keep your home cool in summers, but there are a lot o important facts about these appliances that most people are unaware of. Here is some information about these products that might influence your purchase decision.

R22 Freon Phaseout from Air Conditioners

When buying a new air conditioner, you can now only go for those which use Puron as a refrigerant instead of R22 Freon, which was commonly used before 2010. R22 Freon is harmful to the ozone layer and it has been banned from use in new air conditioners from 2010.

If you already own an air conditioner that uses R22 Freon then you will still be able to get the refrigerant from the market for service or repair purposes. But you should know that as more and more companies will shut down production of R22 Freon, its prices could shoot up. So if your air conditioning system is old and in need of repair then it might be a good idea to replace it with a Puron based system, instead of prolonging your use of R22 Freon.

Heat Pumps – Go for a Hybrid Product

Heat pumps are special appliances that have the dual benefit of providing heat in winters and cooling in summers. The system is able to do it through reversal of flow of refrigerants. In heating mode, the heat pump transfers heat from outside air to inside air and in cooling mode it takes heat from inside to outside.

The problem is that electricity based heat pumps work only till temperatures of -5°C. If the temperature goes further down, then you need to switch to a furnace. With Hybrid Heat systems, this problem is solved by automatically switching to the furnace mode when temperature falls below -5°C.

Such a hybrid heating system is not dependant on one type of fuel – either electricity or gas. They ensure that you can deal with a sudden increase in price of one type of fuel. There are many highly efficient and affordable Hybrid Heat products in the market that you can choose from. One of the best options that you have is the Bryant 18 SEER Evolution Heat Pump.

Another advantage with using Hybrid Heat systems is that some utility companies provide financial incentives for using them. You can avail loans and rebates on purchase of high efficiency heat pumps.

Once you have purchased the house ensuring that all air conditioning, HVAC, electrical and plumbing systems are in order, it’s time to start getting the broken things fixed or enhancing the existing systems to suit your preferences and needs.

From the time you step into your new house, you should plan to undertake periodical examination of all your house systems rather than waiting for the problem to take a monstrous form. This can be easily done by getting professional help from licensed contractors to conduct a periodical check of all your house systems. Also, make sure to choose reliable contractors with whom you can develop a long term association. Periodic inspections will not only help you find out problems in your home early on, but will also enable the contractors to get to know your systems well.

You should ensure that the people you hire for the installation as well as the maintenance of your systems are well qualified and experienced. Modern heating and cooling equipments are a lot more complex than they used to be and since they are quite expensive, you would not want them to be handled by unqualified people. A good way to ensure this is to go for NATE certified heating and cooling professionals who have sufficient experience in such systems. Though it might cost you a little on the higher side, you can be sure of safety of your system and your house.

At the time of buying, you should check that the basements are designed in a way to leave adequate space around the heating and cooling systems including the water heater systems to ensure accessibility for maintenance. There are some standard norms prescribed for the creation of such access. For example, there should be at least 30 inches of space in front of any furnace. Besides, you may want to check if there is more space available in the basement for later additions like high efficiency air cleaners, heat recovery ventilators, humidifiers and other big home equipments.

These are some important measures, which will help you avoid bigger problems in your house later on.

Buying a new house does not always result in the buyer being happy about the purchase, as there are a number of aspects that people tend to overlook when evaluating a house. Quite often, such factors come back to haunt the house owners in the form of unnecessary repair hassle and substantial expenses. It is better to carefully assess a few things about the house you are going to buy to avoid regretting your purchase later. Here are a few tips.

You should get the HVAC, air conditioning, plumbing and electrical systems of the house you are intending to buy, fully checked and evaluated. It is advisable to hire the services of licensed contractors for this job. You should preferably engage NATE certified contractors and plumbers to inspect the house’s systems. Don’t forget to verify the credentials of the inspectors before hiring them for the job.

People often leave this important task to a general purpose home inspector who might be unqualified for the inspection of these systems. Most of the times these inspectors are not paid well enough to consider putting in extra effort to check the cooling and heating systems of the house they are inspecting. It is best to engage the services of an independent inspector for detailed examination of the house’s cooling and heating systems.

Even though heating and cooling systems are one of the essential components of any house, the sellers often leave the buyers in dark about the problems in their house, which can create big troubles later. In order to avoid such situations, buyers should include a disclosure requirement in clauses of the purchase agreement that mandates disclosure of all problems with the heating, cooling, electrical and plumbing systems. In addition, you should also insist on getting the contacts of contractors who have worked on the systems in the past. The papers with the agreement should also include building permits and receipts for replacement of these systems, if any.

Only after you have got all the systems examined thoroughly and the important disclosures are agreed upon by the sellers, that you should go ahead with the purchase of the house.

When it comes to your plumbing you have to realize that everything you put down your sink can affect plumbing components further on down the line. For example, even small amounts of oil, grease, and food might quickly zip down your kitchen sink as you are rinsing out a pan with steaming how water.

And these items might even make it far down your homes internal plumbing systems. However, as the water cools or the items are met by narrowing plumbing pipes filled with some other debris they too might get caught up in the plumbing lines of your home causing a CLOG; a clog in your kitchen sink’s drain or a clog in your bathroom sink’s drain or a clog in your shower/tub’s drain.

Wherever a clog forms it is never a fun sight to see your drain getting plugged up and having water pool where it should be going away. It is an unnecessary frustration and annoyance. However, if you are not maintaining your sinks and drains well then guess what…eventually that system is going to “get sick” and break down; whether it is by forming a “clog” here or there or perhaps an even bigger problem.

So in much of the same way that we think about our own health we can work to fight sickness (aka plumbing problems in this case) by taking preventative measures. What is that old saying in sports…“a strong offense is sometimes the best defense”…meaning that if you stand up and are assertive/proactive about something you often can avoid trouble. You make the first move and keep the pressure on and the likelihood is that you will be the victor as your opponent will be backs on their heels. Well the same can be said when it comes to clog prevention.

If you simply sit back and play defense waiting for something to go wrong with your sinks and drainage systems in regards to a clog…well odds are that over time you eventually will run into a clog. However, if you are in more of an offensive mindset you will realize that you can take some easy preventative measures that will allow you to avoid any clog problems by simply being proactive and putting some of the pressure on the plumbing system itself and keeping it on its toes. Rather than just being relaxed and waiting for a plumbing problem to form you are trying to prevent one from forming.

Now you might be saying, “Ok well that is fine and dandy to say… but what sorts of measures can I take to prevent a clog so that I don’t have to have a sink repair”?

Well that is a great question and here are some answers for you in regards to ways to prevent clogs from happening to you:

Preventing drain build up…

• 1. FLUSH YOUR PIPES.
  • a. When you have extra boiling water from the kettle take it and pour it down the sink with some baking soda. The baking soda is slightly abrasive and will help to rub build up off the plumbing line walls and the boiling water will help to wash/move things along the plumbing lines that might normally want to stick to the side. The baking soda will also naturally fumigate odour. If you don’t have baking soda use sea salt.
  • b. Do not pour the boiling water into a porcelain sink in the winter time however as these extreme temperature differences can cause cracks.
  • c. Flush your drains in this fashion every month or two.
• 2. No FOOD or GREASE
  • a. Grease is the number one clogging element, along with hair. Avoid putting any grease or food scraps into your sink’s drain.
  • b. Grease can easily stick to plumbing walls and when it cools it works like plague on ones arteries causing a narrowing of piping walls and can also trap other items/debris developing difficult clogs.
  • c. By keeping your food garbage aside for composting or your food garbage (green) bin (as the case in a lot of Canadian cities now) you can avoid the chance of food getting caught in your drain.
  • d. Also simply pour grease into old coffee cups or metal tins for storage under the sink. When you throw this away in the garbage it actually helps to keep animals away from your garbage.
• 3. BEWARE of your HAIR
  • a. Hair, along with grease, is the top two causes of clogged drains. If you know you have a tendency to lose a number of hairs in the shower well than be proactive and either pick up your hairs after you shower OR you can even make a homemade hair trap by using duct tape and a plastic bag with some small holes to allow water to flow through and then taping this over your shower drain.
• 4. CHEMICAL CLEAN UP for a LAST RESORT
  • a. If you are getting ready to be preventative but have an annoying clog it is ok to use chemical plumbing products as a last resort for a one time flush to get your pipes as close to original working order before taking on the methods mentioned above. But this should not be used as your go to method.
  • b. But remember these products are specific to certain types of clogs as they “eat away” at whatever is plugging your drain…such as hair…so make sure you get the right product for whatever you believe is causing your flow problems.

HomeStars Awards ClearView With Best of Calgary Contractor Award

Thanks to our loyal customers, we were rated the top plumber in Calgary on HomeStars.

HomeStars is new to Calgary, having just launched in 2009. This online community of homeowners and home improvement companies offers reviews of contractors in various categories. Using these reviews, customers can find reputable contractors and tradespeople. You can visit the site and see the reviews at Homestars.

In 2009, ClearView had the most reviews for the city of Calgary, with 20. We also received a stellar customer rating of 9.8 out of 10.

On behalf of everyone here at ClearView, I would like to thank the satisfied customers who took the time to write a review about our service. We can’t thank you enough for your kind words and recommendations.

We have always prided ourselves on our responsiveness to customer needs and concerns. We are happy to be part of the HomeStars community and we look forward to connecting with our customers there.