Small, medium, large ways to cut energy bills

Making a dent in your home-heating bill this winter could be as simple as turning down the thermostat and as cheap as a new $3 filter for your furnace.

"For the average consumer, if you pay a little attention — seal up leaks, be careful with how you're using heat — you could save 10 percent off heating costs," said Mary Smith of Puget Sound Energy.

But to get real savings, you'll have to do more. Get ready to roll up your sleeves and face the dirty work — or pay someone else to do it. "I'm sorry, but you have to go in your attic or your crawlspace ... because that's where the savings that are left are," said Chuck Murray, energy specialist with the Washington State University Extension Energy Program.

The prospect of higher heating bills is prompting some homeowners to look for new strategies to save money. Two popular approaches are doing home-energy audits and sealing heating ducts.

Home-energy audits

Monty Hoeft and his wife, Diane, bought a 1909 home in the University District last year that turned out to have a lot of charm, a lot of drafts and no insulation.

Last month, a home-energy auditor from Seattle City Light spent more than an hour looking over their house and showing them where they could tighten up the structure to stop air leaks and save money. That included sealing cracks around doorways, changing to more energy-efficient light bulbs and turning down the heat at night — "just the little things we could do," Hoeft said.

The couple has tackled a couple of bigger projects, hiring a contractor to add insulation to the roof, dormers and the master bedroom's walls and floor.

Seattle City Light targets one neighborhood each year — the University District this year — for free energy audits and other resource-efficiency programs.

Many utilities also offer free online audits. And some homeowners are hiring contractors to do professional home-energy audits. For $100 to $200, Atmosphere Indoor Environmental Management in Seattle offers a walk-through audit, checking insulation levels, heating equipment and doors and windows for air leaks.

For $250 to $500, the company will depressurize the house and test for air leaks. In both cases, the homeowner gets a prioritized to-do list of projects to help seal the house and more efficiently heat it.

Duct sealing

Another new area of interest is sealing heating ducts where the seams in the ductwork meet in crawl spaces and other unheated areas of the house. Most homes, including newer ones, have unsealed ducts.

"That's 15 to 20 percent of your heat lost before it even gets into your house — just to give you a nice, warm crawl space," said Kevin Watier, an energy consultant with Snohomish County Public Utility District.

Up to 40 percent of home-heating bills pays for leakage of hot air from ducts, said Dan Wildenhaus of Atmosphere. "Stopping air and duct leakage are two of the easiest and fastest ways to make a difference" in your bill, he said.

Insulating ducts alone doesn't stop leaks, Watier said. Instead, seal the seams first with mastic, a gooey substance that is painted on, then insulate. (Duct tape is great for just about anything except ducts.)

You can do it yourself for $50 in supplies or hire it out for $200 to $1,500, depending on the size and design of the house and the amount of accessible ductwork.

This is an "awful, dirty job," Murray said, but besides making a dramatic difference in your heating bill, it also can improve the air quality in your house.

Jolayne Houtz: 206-464-3122 or jhoutz@seattletimes.com

Information in this article, originally published November 27, 2005, was corrected November 29, 2005. An informational graphic about home-heating costs incorrectly said that seven utilities provide natural gas in Washington state. There are four natural-gas utilities and seven refineries in the state. Also, the graphic said that all crude oil coming from Alaska to Washington state is processed into heating oil here. It should have said that all of the fuel oil made from Alaska crude is processed here. Crude oil also is processed into other fuels, including gasoline.