Five Tips to Help Celebrate Energy Independence this July 4th
(PRWEB) July 01, 2015 -- Independence Day – our nation’s birthday – brings friends and family together for picnics, laughter and fireworks on the home front. Outdoor living spaces will be enjoyed to the fullest, but when it’s time to go inside, maintaining comfortable household temperatures can lead to high electric bills. According to the U.S. Energy Information Administration, the average residential electricity customer will not only spend more money cooling their homes in the summer months, they will spend 4.8 percent more in those months this year than last. CertainTeed, North America’s leading provider of building products, offers these five tips to help you save energy and money.
Time to tune-up – Caring for your heating, ventilating and air conditioning (HVAC) system is important to maintain optimal performance. Dirty filters can cause your system to overwork and can contribute to poor indoor air quality, so make sure to change HVAC filters every month. New filters are only a few dollars and will help your current system work more efficiently, longer.
Emit heat – Proper roof ventilation can help move hot, stagnant air out of your attic space, keeping your home cooler and increasing the service life of a roof system. CertainTeed® Intake Vent and Ridge Vent, for example, allows air to flow into and out of the attic, which helps prevent heat build-up in summer and ice dams during colder months. These ventilation products are part of CertainTeed’s Integrity Roof System™, which is also comprised of underlayments, shingles, and accessory products.
Padding the attic – If you’re having trouble maintaining desired temperatures in your home, insulation can help. To start, upgrade your attic by adding InsulSafe® SP Premium Blowing Wool. Designed for thermal comfort and sound absorption, this product can be installed in your attic in under a day – immediately improving comfort and saving energy.
Weeping willow – For hot summer days, relaxing on your porch can be a breeze. With CertainTeed’s EverNew® Kingston vinyl railing system, you can increase both the character and curb appeal of your home. Plus, it won’t rust or corrode and features a limited lifetime, transferable warranty – making it a smart choice for busy, no-maintenance lifestyles. For additional comfort outdoors, plant a shady a tree – and even when you’re inside, this canopy from the sun will continue to work. According to The U.S. Department of Energy, shade trees planted to the west and south side of a home can save up to 25 percent of the energy a typical household uses.
Be a star – Count all the appliances in your home. Some home appliances are incredibly inefficient, requiring more electricity and wasting several gallons of water on a daily basis. There are available products such as washers, dryers, showerheads and refrigerators that are ENERGY STAR®- rated, which will help with efficiency while improving the indoor comfort of your home. Installing some of these certified products might also qualify for tax credits, too – putting money back in your pocket.
For more information, visit http://www.certainteed.com.
Images, product samples and industry comments are available upon request. To speak to an expert, contact Vicky Gallagher of CertainTeed Corporation at Victoria.M.Gallagher(at)Saint-Gobain(dot)com or 610-341-7944.
About CertainTeed
Through the responsible development of innovative and sustainable building products, CertainTeed, headquartered in Valley Forge, Pa., has helped shape the building products industry for more than 110 years. Founded in 1904 as General Roofing Manufacturing Company, the firm's slogan "Quality Made Certain, Satisfaction Guaranteed," quickly inspired the name CertainTeed. Today, CertainTeed® is North America’s leading brand of exterior and interior building products, including roofing, siding, fence, decking, railing, trim, insulation, gypsum and ceilings.
A subsidiary of Saint-Gobain, one of the world’s largest and oldest building products companies, and celebrating its 350th anniversary, CertainTeed and its affiliates have more than 5,700 employees and more than 60 manufacturing facilities throughout the United States and Canada. For seven consecutive years, the company has received top honors from the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency for its contributions in protecting the environment and was most recently the recipient of the 2015 ENERGY STAR Sustained Excellence Award. The group had total sales of approximately $3.3 billion in 2014. http://www.certainteed.com
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Marissa Walters, Miller Brooks, +1 317.873.8100, [email protected]
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