Green initiatives for home improvements are great for the environment, but aren’t always financially feasible for many Americans. Thankfully, there are tons of inexpensive solutions to take the load off of your heating and air conditioning system, increase your home’s energy efficiency, and save yourself some money along the way.

• Start from the Outside In: Inspect your home for drafts or air leaks around windows and doors. While replacing or adding insulation is always a good idea, a more cost effective quick fix is to weather-strip or caulk around windows and doors. Weather-stripping costs around $10 for almost two dozen feet. Put draft guards around the bottom of doors to keep warm air in and cold air out.
  


• Dial Down, Dial Up: Turning down your thermostat just a few degrees in the winter not only uses less energy, but can also save 1-3% on your utility bill. If your home has air conditioning, the reverse is true for summer months. That’s a potential annual savings of nearly 10%!
  


• Snuggle Up: There are people who actually prefer to sleep in cold rooms, but for the rest of us it’s worth it to invest in some heavy blankets or a down comforter (you can find a decent queen size one for around $100) and lower the temperature in your home at night.
  


• Let the Sun Shine In: Give your furnace a rest. Open curtains on south-facing windows to create passive solar heat in winter and use natural light instead of lamps whenever possible.
  


• Let the Sun Shine Out: Close blinds and drapes in the summer to keep out the sun’s powerful rays and reduce the load on your home’s air conditioner.
  


• Be a Fan of Fans: Ceiling, box or desktop fans, used instead of central air or a room AC, can provide relief from the heat without breaking the bank. You can get a good fan for about $5 at most hardware or discount stores.
  


• Go Acoustic and Unplug: Few people realize that even when not turned on or in use, many devices continue to draw power as long as they’re connected to an electrical outlet. Unplug anything that’s not being used—toaster, coffee maker, cell phone chargers—and use power strips or a surge protector for things like computers and home theater equipment.
  


• Give Old Bulbs the Boot: Switching to energy efficient compact fluorescent light bulbs—you know, those weird looking spiral things—can help you save money and reduce energy consumption. The average CFL bulb lasts longer than a traditional incandescent bulb, doesn’t get as hot, and burns exactly the same as a standard bulb. A single CFL bulb can save about $35 over its lifetime; changing every bulb in your house could save you thousands. Plus, they just look a lot cooler!

Get More Energy Efficiency Tips from Horizon Services:

• Home Energy Myths Debunked!
• Seasonal Energy Saving Tips
• Cutting Edge Solutions for Energy Efficiency

Properly maintaining your home’s heating and cooling systems can improve energy efficiency, reduce your utility bills, and prevent the need for costly repairs. The best time to check your systems is in the spring and fall, before a heating and air conditioning contractors’ busy summer and winter seasons.

You can do many general maintenance checks yourself and then report potential problems to a trusted heating and air conditioning professional. It’s also a good idea to hire a professional to do a thorough inspection once or twice a year. A typical checklist should include:

• Reviewing your thermostat settings to make sure the temperature inside your home makes things comfortable when you’re there and saves energy when you’re not.


• Tightening electrical connections to make sure your appliances are running safely and to prolong the life of system components.


• Lubricating moving parts to reduce damaging friction and strain on your home’s electrical supply.


• Inspecting condensation drains if your home has central air, a furnace or a heat pump. Blocked drains can lead to water damage and mold infestation.


• Checking system controls to make sure everything is working properly. Be sure systems start, run and shut down as they should.


• Cleaning and changing air filters on your furnace, air conditioner and heat pump regularly. Dirty filters increase utility costs and can damage equipment. Most filter manufacturers have recommended replacement schedules clearly printed on product packaging.

If your home has central air conditioning or if you use portable window air conditioners, the following are some routine maintenance issues you should be aware of. (If you don’t feel comfortable doing this yourself, it’s best to consult a certified professional heating and air conditioning contractor such as Horizon Services):

• Clean the evaporator mechanism and condenser coils. Dirty coils will restrict the air conditioner’s effectiveness in cooling your home, making the system work overtime to compensate. This will cost you more on your utilities and can significantly shorten the life of your system.


• Check refrigerant levels and adjust fluids as necessary. The wrong amount of refrigerant chemicals circulating through a system can cause irreparable damage and will increase your energy usage.


• Have blower components cleaned and adjusted if needed. This ensures that the proper amount of air is flowing through the system at all times, which makes for more comfortable temperatures. Airflow restriction can decrease your energy efficiency by as much as 15 percent.

Heating systems require regular inspection and maintenance, too. No matter what kind of heat source you use, the following checklist can help your system work as effectively and efficiently as possible:

• Check all connections, especially if your heat is supplied by oil or natural gas. Loose or malfunctioning connections create a fire hazard and can lead to serious health risks like carbon monoxide poisoning.


• Make sure pilot burners and heat exchangers are functioning properly. Dirty, damaged or malfunctioning burners and exchangers can impede the operation of your system and may cause heating quipment to run less safely and less efficiently.
  

More Info About Heating and Air Conditioning Maintenance...

• Seasonal Energy Saving Tips
• A Precision Tune Up is Your Air Conditioner's Best Friend
• Horizon's Furnace Tune-Up

With so much media coverage of green initiatives these days, you may find yourself feeling guilty just flipping on a light switch in your home or turning on your heating or air conditioning system. For many people, "going green" is an overwhelming and intimidating prospect; but there is one simple thing we can all do to make a significant difference.

• Learn More About Energy-Efficient Heating and Air Conditoning Systems from Horizon Services!
• Cutting Edge Solutions For Energy Efficiency
• Home Energy Myths Debunked!

Your main sewer line is the largest drain in your home. All other household drains lead into this line which runs underground from your house and connects to a city sewer line or a septic tank. Your home's sewer line might have been placed properly at the time your house was built, but over time, it can become subject to a wide variety of damage, including:

• Breaking, cracking, collapsing due to shifting soil or frozen ground.


• Clogs and blockages due to household waste, debris, grease and foreign objects.


• Corrosion and leaky joints and seals due to age


• Obstructions caused by tree root infiltration.

When your sewer line is blocked or damaged, not only are you at risk for messy flooding throughout your house, you are exposing yourself to leaking sewage...which can contain diseases and hazardous chemicals, as well as serve as a magnet for rats and insects. For the sake of your home and your health, damaged and obstructed sewer lines must be identified and repaired as quickly as possible.

Here are the major signs of a damaged or obstructed sewer line:

• Slow-running or backed-up drains (sinks, tubs, toilets)


• Frequent back-ups of basement drains or laundry tubs


• Gurgling drain noises


• Toilet bowl water levels rise and fall


• Sewage odor inside, outside and around your house


• Raw sewage on ground surface


• Rats or rat holes in your yard


• Sink holes or soggy wet areas on your property


• Water stains around the floor drain in the basement


• Cracking and structural damage along walls, floors and foundations

If you observe any of these indicators, call a sewer line company like Horizon Services as soon as possible. A sewer line technician inspect your sewer line by running a high-tech video camera through the line. It's kind of like a colonoscopy for your sewer line! This will enable him to determine if there is any damage of blockage and to pinpoint its location.

If the problem is just due to a simple blockage, your sewer line technician can cut through the clog with a rooter machine and clear the sewer line down to its inner walls.

If your sewer line technician identifies more serious damage to the main sewer line, it will need to be repaired or replaced. In the old days, that meant digging up your entire yard and destroying your landscape. Today, companies like Horizon Services employ a trenchless method of sewer line repair and replacement that is quick, inexpensive and requires no or little excavation. There are two major ways he can accomplish this.

• Pipe Bursting: With this method, your sewer line technician makes small access holes where the damaged pipe starts and ends. Using your damaged sewer line as a guideline, he uses a hydraulic machine to pulls a long-lasting replacement pipe through the old sewer line path, breaking up the old damaged pipe as it moves into place.


• Pipe Relining: Here your sewer line technican places a fiberglass liner into the damaged sewer pipe -- ie. a pipe within a pipe. This creates a durable, damage-resistant inner wall that restores all flow and function to the line.
  

More Info...

• Learn More About Sewer and Water Line Repair and Replacement from Horizon Services!

Nobody wants to be the one to have to unclog the toilet. Not only is a malfunctioning commode extremely inconvenient, but removing the problem can be really unsanitary. It is possible, though, to safely and cleanly deal with toilet clogs.

If you’ve flushed once without success, don’t try it again. This will only pump more water into the bowl from the toilet tank, raising the water level and causing a messy overflow. It may take a while, but the toilet will eventually drain on its own so avoid the urge to keep flushing until the clog moves.

This is definitely one of those jobs where you’ll want a pair of good quality rubber gloves. If you don’t have cleaning gloves, even a cheap pair of latex gloves will do in a pinch. It’s also a good idea to cover the bathroom floor if you can. Newspapers, old towels you don’t plan to use again, or rags are perfect because you can simply toss them in the trash later.

Hot water and liquid dish soap can help break up most clogs. Microwave or boil a few quarts of water; if you boil the water you’ll want to let it cool a bit before proceeding with this method, until it’s roughly the temperature of a cup of coffee. Add a squirt of dish soap to the toilet bowl and slowly pour in the hot water. If this doesn’t work the first time and the water in the bowl is not overflowing, try once more. If you live in an apartment, skip this method.

Enzymes are a good option as long as you have another toilet you can use while they do their work. These biological materials eat away at waste and are often used to maintain septic systems. You can find enzymes at most home improvement or hardware stores, but they’ll have to sit in the bowl at least overnight in order to dissolve a clog so you should only try this if you have another bathroom you can use in the meantime.

Plungers, while an old standby in many bathrooms, are not exactly the most sanitary method of clearing a clogged toilet, but if you’ve tried hot water and can’t wait for enzymes it may be a reasonable option. If you must use a plunger, invest in a large, good quality device. The bigger the plunger, the better it’ll work which means less splashing, less mess, and less time with your face down in the bowl.

If you’ve tried a plunger to no avail, a pipe snake or auger is the next logical step. Not quite as messy as a plunger, quicker than an enzyme treatment, and generally more effective than hot water and soap, a snake feeds a long tube down the toilet drain and into the pipes. The end of the tube pushes against the clog, clearing it from your pipes and letting the water flow freely again. You can buy a small pipe snake at most home improvement or hardware stores for less than $10. For larger jobs you can rent a bigger snake.

If these methods fail to clear your clogged toilet, STOP WHAT YOU'RE DOING; chances are your efforts will just compound the problem and lead to more expensive repair work. Stubborn toilet clogs require professional drain cleaning services like those offered by Horizon Services. Our plumbing and drain cleaning technicians have the tools and training to quickly and safely unclog any toilet.

• Learn More About Clog Removal and Drain Cleaning from Horizon Services!
• How to Properly Use a Plunger to Unclog a Toilet, Sink or Tub