July Energy Usage

I am still seeing incredible benefits to the insulation and air sealing that I did in March through May of this year.

Remember, though, that I had 3 other people here last July with 3 TVs and the computers and routers were not completely switched off.

I don't think I set the temperature lower last year because my sister and her husband got cold in the house and my brother lived in the basement where it is 10 degrees cooler. This summer has been substantially hotter than last summer. The chart  below shows some July temperature averages from the past 15 years. The lowest temperature for July 2015 was 67 degrees, the highest 98. The lowest MAXIMUM temperature was 82 while there was a day last July where the high was only 69. This year's average high temperature was 91.9 and the mean temperature was 82. Last year's mean was 77.9. It has been much hotter this year which makes the drop in energy use even more impressive.

I will continue to monitor the energy use. My brother moved into his new home in September 2014 and my sister and her husband moved away in October so I should have better comparisons for one person living in the home after that time.

Also, remember that I insulated only to about a level of R-20 just over 1/2 of the current code requirements of R-38. When the weather cools off, I will be up in the attic again making some structural changes and increasing the insulation to around R-50.