A climate-friendly home begins with an energy assessment. This AP reporter got one

Hello and welcome to The Associated Press Climate Watch newsletter. I’m Caleigh Wells, an AP climate choices reporter. Today I’m going to talk about my surprising experience when I took the first step to making my home more energy efficient.   

If you’re looking to reduce your carbon footprint, home improvement usually falls into the Top 5 ways. For me, that belongs in the rewarding-yet-intimidating category because those changes can cost thousands of dollars, and there are SO many to choose from: heat pumps, solar panels, battery storage, air sealing, better windows…the list goes on.

Where do you start? Any expert will tell you it depends on the house.

Ugh. Not a satisfying answer, right?

This summer, I wanted a better answer than that. I moved into my first home in May. It’s 100 years old and is outside of Cleveland, which isn’t exactly known for being temperate. I wanted to make it less pollutive without having to freeze in the winter or bake in the summer.

As a climate reporter, I figured I had a pretty good guess where this was going:

1.   Toss the gas-powered furnace and buy a heat pump.

2.   Replace the original, single-pane windows.

3.   Get more efficient appliances (dishwasher, washing machine, etc).

To be sure, I started where all the experts recommended: with a home energy assessment.

The assessor, Tim Portman, assessed. For seven straight hours. And he found that my house is so, so inefficient. It failed just about every test. Portman called it a worst-case scenario. Bad news for my bank account. Great news for the story I wrote about it.

So, he gave me a list of recommendations based on my goals, prioritizing the ones that’ll make the biggest difference. First on the list? Not a heat pump or new windows like I thought.

He told me to call an electrician.

Because my house still has some knob and tube electrical wiring, which we stopped installing in the 1950s, partly because it doesn’t have a ground wire, and partly because it’s not designed for the higher electrical loads homes require today. Plus, there are rules about how to use modern insulation in an old house to reduce fire risk. The previous owners tackled that problem by...well, never insulating the walls. Which explains why I blast the air conditioning and still wake up sweating every night.

“You’re driving your car with the AC on and all the windows are rolled down,” Tim Portman of Portman Mechanical told me in his assessment.

And, here’s the other thing: I couldn’t buy a heat pump even if I wanted to because my electrical panel can’t handle that much electricity. So, once I figure out how to insulate my house, I must replace that, too.

So, in reality, my list is:

1.   Seal the many, many holes and gaps where air is leaking.

2.   Handle the knob-and-tube situation.

3.   Replace the electrical panel.

4.   Insulate the walls.

Portman estimated that I could cut my utility bills in half. Imagine that! My bills (and, relatedly, my carbon footprint) slashed, and I haven’t even replaced the furnace yet.

The electrician and insulation guy both come this week. I’m stoked.

Have you gotten, or considered getting, an energy assessment? Let us know in the comments or by email.

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✅Climate Solutions

Most of what goes into U.S. landfills is organic waste. It's a problem because in that environment, organic waste produces methane, a greenhouse gas many, many times more potent than carbon dioxide. Consumers can curb their environmental impact by composting their organic waste.

It's possible regardless of whether you have a giant yard or live in an apartment, and municipalities are increasingly making it easier to turn food scraps into nutrient-rich compost. Here is a guide that will help, no matter where you live.

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