This was my handout for Earth Day handout. It is a useful checklist for families and businesses and can be downloaded. Also see www.EltonSherwin.com

1. Addicted to Energy: What Individuals and Businesses Can Do
What Are Your Home’s Top Energy Wasters?
Find and replace (or fix) your home’s “energy hogs.” Each home is
different, but here are America’s top 20 prime suspects:
1. Pool and spa pumps
2. Old refrigerators and freezers
3. Incandescent and halogen bulbs
4. Desktop and tower PCs left on
5. Mini‐refrigerators, wine refrigerators, and standalone ice makers
6. Drafty or uninsulated walls
7. Underinsulated ceilings and floors
8. HDTVs and cable/satellite set‐top boxes
9. South‐ and west‐facing sunny windows that are not spectrally selective in homes
using a lot of air conditioning
10. Old windows (below R‐8) in homes with high heating bills
11. Water heaters
12. Old or poorly programmed thermostats
13. Heating and air‐conditioning systems with only one thermostat per floor
14. Fixed‐speed furnaces and air conditioners
15. Surround sound and PC speaker systems
16. Game units left on
17. Whole house (attic) fans and gas fireplaces without twist timers
18. Fixed‐speed or two‐speed whole‐house (attic) fans
19. Recirculation pumps
20. Plug‐in rechargeable flashlights without LED bulbs
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Copyright © 2010 Elton B. Sherwin www.eltonsherwin.com

2. Addicted to Energy: What Individuals and Businesses Can Do
How Do I Find and Measure My Energy Hogs?
These simple products helped us reduce our home electric bill by over 40%. If your utility
company has installed a smart meter at your home, you should be able to view, track and
analyze your electricity consumption at an hourly level.
Kill A Watt EZ Electricity Usage Monitor, $35
This is an indispensable gadget that allows you to find and measure your
home’s energy hogs; it is the workhorse of energy detectives. The Kill A
Watt discovered that our $15 rechargeable flashlight, which had been
plugged in to the garage wall for 20 years, was using over $30 per year in
electricity. You can put it on anything with a plug (TV, refrigerator, PC, etc.)
and discover how much power it is using right now, or leave it on for a few
days and it will project your monthly and annual costs. Get the EZ model,
available at amazon.com.
Smart Strip, $30
This smart power strip eliminates standby power for
some devices. When used with a TV, this power strip
turns off DVD players, VCRs, game units and sound
systems when the TV is turned off. When used with
tower PCs, this smart power strip turns off printers,
scanners, monitors and speakers when the PC is turned off or in a low power mode. If you
manually turn your PC on and off, plug your monitor into a white socket, if your PC
automatically goes to sleep, then you may want to put the display in a red plug. Available
at amazon.com.
Home Depot
EcoSmart Soft White 60W Bulbs in Green Package, $1.50 per bulb
We tested eleven brands before choosing these bulbs.
Previously called n:vision, Home Depot recently upgraded
and rebranded as EcoSmart. We have installed more than 50
of these bulbs in our house. We primarily use the versions in
green packaging, which create light that is almost
indistinguishable from incandescent bulbs. These bulbs use
75% less electricity, so a 60‐watt bulb actually only uses
about 15 watts of power. Also available in 40, 75, 100, 120, and 150 watt equivalents; more
expensive for the higher wattages. Make sure the packaging says EcoSmart.
For more products and light bulbs tested in the Sherwin home, see www.eltonsherwin.com and go to “Products” page.
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Copyright © 2010 Elton B. Sherwin www.eltonsherwin.com

3. Addicted to Energy: What Individuals and Businesses Can Do
What Are Your Company’s Top Energy Wasters?
Each building is different, but here are the top 20 “energy wasters” in
American places of business:
1. Old, large‐diameter fluorescent tubes and their fixtures
2. Poorly calibrated HVAC equipment which needs recommissioning
3. Over‐sized, over‐aggressive air conditioners
4. Lighting control systems either not installed at all, or installed without occupancy
sensors, light‐level sensors, and automatic dimmers
5. PCs left on nights and weekends with power management systems disabled
6. Inefficient manufacturing and transportation of products you buy and sell
7. Sunny windows that are not spectrally selective
8. Incandescent and halogen light bulbs
9. Windows with R‐values below 8
10. Poorly maintained cooling towers
11. Water heated by burning natural gas or oil instead of using solar or waste heat
12. Underinsulated walls, ceilings, and floors
13. Rooms without thermostats; thermostats without occupancy sensors and
twist timers
14. HVAC systems with fixed‐speed fans
15. Fixed‐speed pumps, fans, and motors with no back‐pressure sensors
16. Office equipment not ENERGY STAR rated
17. Air compressors in factories, auto‐shops, and gas stations
18. Refrigeration equipment, refrigerated display cases and vending machines
19. Restaurant kitchen exhaust hoods and factory exhaust fans
20. Air conditioners with no thermal storage
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Copyright © 2010 Elton B. Sherwin www.eltonsherwin.com

4. Addicted to Energy: What Individuals and Businesses Can Do
Seven Steps to Reducing Your Carbon Footprint
Other than moving into a smaller home, here are seven practical areas
that yield the highest greenhouse gas reductions for most Americans:
1. Travel less by plane. Skip business meetings that are marginally
important, or send fewer people. Evaluate your business travel as if you
were paying for it yourself.
2. Drive less. One or two days a week, take public transport, bike, or work
from home. Alternatively, buy a hybrid vehicle and leave your SUV or
pick‐up truck in the garage.
3. Buy less stuff. Usually a function of the size of your home and your
income, your “stuff” includes the ongoing electricity or fuel needed to
run it, as well as the energy used to manufacture, transport and dispose
of it.
4. Burn fewer hydrocarbons to make hot water. This usually involves
installing a solar water heating system or taking much shorter showers.
5. Stop burning wood, paper, and leaves. Their soot is warming the
planet and melting the polar ice. In addition, long‐term exposure to
microscopic particles of smoke and soot in the air is linked to serious
health problems, especially in children, such as chronic respiratory
disease and asthma. A single wood‐burning fireplace emits more fine
particulates than thousands of cars.
6. Use less electricity. Find and replace the “energy hogs” in your home
with the most efficient ENERGY STAR rated models you can find. Turn
off your PCs at night. Replace incandescent and halogen bulbs with CFLs
and LEDs. Use smart power strips and motion detectors. Turn off the
lights when you leave the room; it really does make a difference.
7. Eat less beef, cheese, and cream. In some parts of the world a cup of
milk a day can save a child’s life. But most Americans consume too many
calories. Dairy products and beef have a disproportionally large carbon
footprint.
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Copyright © 2010 Elton B. Sherwin www.eltonsherwin.com