Making our home eco-responsible involves more than just maximizing our government rebates.  We are also making some upgrades that we won’t get any money back for.

Our natural gas company, Union Gas, had a display at one of our local malls recently where they demonstrated some tips for making your home more eco efficient. They gave out free “Energy Savings Kits” – which included a low-flow showerhead.

We decided to replace our old worn out and barely functioning shower head in our main floor bathroom. We had given up having showers upstairs, so hopefully the new shower head will make this bathroom more useable and save some water, too.

Step 1: Make sure the water is turned off and use the vice grips to unscrew the old shower head from the neck.

Step 1

Step 2

Step 3

Step 3: Now screw on the shower head over the pipe tape.  You can start this by hand until snug.

Step 4

Step 5: Turn on the water to make sure that you have a good seal.  If water comes out from around the screws, turn off the water and tighten it a little more using the kitchen towel to again so you don’t scratch the fixtures.  Once you have a good seal you are done.

Step 5

At our local mall recently, Sears had a special display focusing on eco renovations. They had representatives there from Union Gas handing out Free Energy Saving Kits, as well as independent energy consultant Gayle Lawlor (shown, right, holding a foam insulation on a pipe) demonstrating tips for making your home more eco-efficient.

For Sears’ part, they where promoting their furnaces (and their own home energy audit services). I talked to the Gary Long, a Sears Canada sales rep, and he had some interesting perspectives – but not what I expected.

His main focus was on selling furnaces.  He was quick to point out that with the Home Renovation Tax Credit and the ecoENERGY Retrofit grants that there is no better time to make this investment in your home.  The Sears top of the line furnace is 97% efficient and would normally cost about $3,500 installed.

With the various rebates available from the federal and provincial governments, this furnace could cost us only about $2,000 (even less if you are replacing an older furnace than ours).

Our old furnace and water heater

Our natural gas furnace is about 15 years old, we think, and we rent a water heater (the 50-gallon tank variety), see both right.

What surprised me were the upgrades that Gary did NOT recommend to me – even though it would have meant more sales for Sears!

Pros/Cons of the Heat Pump

For example, he did not recommend a heat pump to use heat from the air to heat our house during the fall and spring. His reasoning was that if you have already upgraded to a 97% efficient furnace that there is little if any savings with a heat pump.

In addition, since the heat pump uses more electricity than the furnace and electricity is more expensive than gas this mitigates some of the savings. For the few months of the year that we would actually be using the heat pump, we wouldn’t likely see any savings.

Tankless Water Heater: Worth the Extra Money?

Gary also did not recommend a tankless water heater.  I was shocked to find out that this type of water heater costs in the range of $2,000 to $3,500! That seems like a lot of money, to me, for what it does.  They even cost about $35 a month to rent – compared to about $18 a month for the old tank model we have now.

A tankless water heater heats your water as it comes into the house and only when you turn on the hot water. Because it is not constantly heating and re-heating water in your tank it is a more efficient system.

Gary of Sears’ point was that, even though it is more efficient, probably a tankless water heater is not going to save you the difference of $17 per month that it would cost.

This Sears salesman was very helpful, and I like that he was not just trying to make a sale but was recommending what he would do for his home. However, Gary was only interested in the economics of the issue and our home renovation is based on two goals 1) to save us money now and for the future and 2) to make our home as efficient as possible to minimize our impact on the environment. It’s this second issue that Gary wasn’t concerned with.

What is your heating system like right now? Have you considered a heat pump and/or a tankless water heater? Leave your comments here!

Eco renovation expert Gail Lawlor shows me how to caulk properly

Betcha read this post title and thought, why can’t I find something that fun to do on a sunny, unseasonably warm weekend?

Well, maybe you’re just not reading the flyers that come with your bills. I didn’t used to, but this month I actually ripped open a Union Gas bill and found a booklet announcing this demo event.

So yesterday Doug and I were off to an energy savings demo hosted by Union Gas and Sears in nearby Mapleview Mall.

The photo shows me getting a caulking lesson from independent consultant, Gail Lawlor, of Energy Matters, at the demo. She is contracted by Union Gas to instruct the  public on the fundamentals of home energy conservation.

Gail also trains contractors (for more than 20 years now) on green practices, including for RONA – with a current focus getting them to appreciate the largely untapped market around ecoENERGY retrofits, and of course, the Home Renovation Tax Credit (which most of them know about, she says.) Gail told me:

“In a room of 50 renovators, I ask ‘who knows about the ecoENERGY retrofit grants from the government, and about 3 people put their hands up. Then I ask, who is talking to their clients and prospects about these huge opportunities, and maybe 1 person puts their hand up!”

Free Stuff – Who Doesn’t Want That?

Union Gas was giving away FREE Energy Saving Kits ($35 in product) that contain the items shown below.

We haven’t unpacked our free kit yet – hey, it’s only been a day – but we’ll be using all these parts… or handing them off to contractors who comes tomorrow to give us a quote on some energy retrofits (including an insulator).

This Energy Savings Kit is free only to folks who are Union Gas customers.

If you’re a Union Gas customer, have you picked one up? Have you done anything with it yet?