How can an air conditioner save electricity?

When the hot summers hit Australia, air conditioners become a matter of necessity rather than a matter of convenience. With great heat and strong air conditioners come the big electricity bills.

It is hard to avoid using air con altogether, but you can do your best to make it as efficient as possible. Here are some proven tips on how to make your air conditioner save electricity.

• Keep Your Air Con at 100% of Efficiency
• Use the Thermostat to Keep a Steady Temperature
• Turn Your Air Conditioner off at Night
• Have Your Rooms Completely Shut
• Opt for Smaller Units
• Reduce other Heat Sources
• Opt for Alternative Energy Sources

These tips all make sense, but the logic behind them is not always absolutely clear. Therefore, let’s explain each of them in more detail.

1. Keep Your Air Con at 100% Efficiency

When you purchase an air conditioner, it has a certain energy rating, and it also has a certain strength. Its label also says how much electricity it spends per hour. However, that is its normal spending rate. If it doesn’t work well, that spending rate will increase.

You need to make sure your air-con is as functional as possible. That requires two things from you:

• Proper air conditioner installation
• Regular maintenance

Regular maintenance for your air conditioner means that you should call an air conditioning expert to service it annually. Besides that, you need to replace your filters every month if you have pets and every three if you live alone. This doesn’t mean that those filters don’t need cleaning. Clean them at least once a week.

Proper air conditioner installation can only be performed by a licenced expert. This may sound like a pricey service, but it doesn’t have to be. Get quotes for aircon installation on Service Seeking and see how much you can expect to pay.

2. Use the Thermostat to Keep a Steady Temperature

What does the temperature have to do with anything, you may ask. Furthermore, how does a steady temperature help? Those are all valid questions, and here are the answers.

If you need to cool down your room to a low temperature, your air con will do, let’s say, three cycles of cooling before it reaches it. If you lower it even more, it will have to make more cycles. More cycles means more energy is used for all the fans, compressor, condenser and evaporator.

A steady temperature means that once reached, your air con can rest and stop using the energy. It is much easier to maintain it by regular, short cooling sessions. If you change the temperature up and down, it means the air con will start working every time.

3. Turn Your Air Conditioner off at Night

It is difficult to fall asleep when it’s too hot. However, if you live in a well-insulated home, there is no need to keep cooling it down when the temperature outside is pleasant and low.

Turn off your air-con during sleep and enjoy the warm summer nights by the open or even closed window. There are other ways to help you sleep through the summer night other than your AC.

4. Have Your Rooms Completely Shut

Your air conditioning works by extracting the heat from the room air. This means that as long as the new, warm air is leaking in – your air con will work at full capacity. That is why you need to make sure that no air is coming in.

For that to happen, you need to keep all the doors and windows shut, and you need to do your best to insulate them properly. Ceiling and floor insulation are also good, but if it is not possible, work with what you have and plan it for some time in the future. Insulation always pays off.

5. Opt for Smaller Units

When purchasing an air conditioner, central ducted air conditioning sounds like a great idea – and it is! You get to cool down your entire home at once, and the system is barely visible in your home. However, if you don’t use all your rooms throughout the day, there is no need for such a powerful system to be working for so many hours.

A good and high-quality split system will work perfectly for smaller areas in your home. You can use them to cool down only one room. It uses much less electricity than a system that needs to cool down an entire home.

6. Reduce Other Heat Sources

As we already said, your air conditioner extracts the heat from the air. If there are other devices nearby that emit the heat, your air con will work non-stop, trying to eliminate that heat from the air. Constant work means constant electricity spending.

Try to organise your home so that you don’t cook in the same room where your air conditioner is. Replace all your incandescent light bulbs with cool LED bulbs. Look around your home and turn off or get rid of all the other devices that emit heat.

7. Opt for Alternative Energy Sources

If you have already done everything in your power to make your air conditioner more energy efficient, you may want to reconsider other energy sources. If your home is eligible, try getting some of your electricity from solar panels.

For that to happen, you need a home that is exposed to the sun, and you need to have enough space for the solar panels. If you do, this can become a huge shave off your electricity bill as you will be producing your own power. For example, this is the thing that can take your AC bill off your list.

There are even some new devices that make sure your air conditioner works at its best capacity and that it turns off when it is not needed. There are different options, and some air cons have that system installed in them already. How do you know which is which? You ask an expert.

Ask Service Seeking air conditioning installers for their quotes and about the energy-saving expectations you have from your system. They will gladly answer, and then you can choose the right man for the job.