Fall & Winter

Don’t be fooled by South Carolina’s mild win­ters. You still use your heat­ing sys­tem about five months of the year. A few ener­gy-con­serv­ing mea­sures can make a real dif­fer­ence:

  • Caulk­ing and/or weath­er-strip­ping around all your doors, win­dows, exhaust vents, and oth­er open­ings that allow cold air to leak into your house can save a lot in ener­gy costs. And don’t wor­ry about seal­ing your home up too tight­ly; for as many leaks as you can find, there will always be a few that you can’t find or fix.
  • Check your exte­ri­or doors. If you can see light or can feel air com­ing in around them, you prob­a­bly need to replace the thresh­olds and/or door sweeps.
  • Seal around plumb­ing entrances under sinks and van­i­ties and around bath­tubs and show­ers.
  • Place foam gas­kets under the elec­tri­cal out­let cov­ers to cut down on air infil­tra­tion. You will be sur­prised at the amount of out­side air that gets in, even through the inside walls of your home.
  • Check for prop­er insu­la­tion in the attic and floors and good seals around doors, win­dows, and duct­work.
  • Check and clean or replace cli­mate-con­trol sys­tem fil­ters.
  • Choose the low­est com­fort­able win­ter ther­mo­stat set­ting. For each degree you low­er the ther­mo­stat, you can reduce the cost of heat­ing your home by as much as 3 per­cent.
Electric heat pump is pictured

Electric Heat Pump

With South Carolina’s mild, sea­son­al cli­mate, heat­ing and cool­ing with an elec­tric heat pump makes good sense. It pro­vides supe­ri­or com­fort and low­er oper­at­ing costs; plus it’s safe, clean, and reli­able — the most effi­cient kind of heat­ing and cool­ing unit on the mar­ket today.

The elec­tric heat pump’s oper­a­tion and effi­cien­cy come from a prin­ci­ple known as heat trans­fer. Rather than cre­at­ing heat, the elec­tric heat pump uses exist­ing heat and sim­ply moves it to the desired loca­tion. The result is a con­stant, com­fort­able flow of air into the home.

The beau­ty of an elec­tric heat pump is that in the sum­mer, the process can be reversed by the touch of a switch on the home’s indoor ther­mo­stat, pro­vid­ing year-round com­fort and pos­si­ble sav­ings.

FAQ

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Energy Use FAQ

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Do you have a service that would allow someone to come to a member’s home and give a review of the home and offer advice on how to make the home more efficient and show them how to reduce their bill?

Yes. York Elec­tric offers a free in-home ener­gy audit. All you have to do is call our mem­ber ser­vices depart­ment at 803–684‑4248 and tell them you are inter­est­ing in sched­ul­ing one.
Cat­e­go­ry: Ener­gy Use FAQ
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What is the best temperature for heating and cooling?

The ide­al set­ting is 78 degrees for cool­ing and 65 degrees for heat­ing.

Cat­e­go­ry: Ener­gy Use FAQ
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Someone said outdoor floodlights were making my bill run higher? Is this possible?

Yes, it can. You can save by using your cur­rent spot­lights less, con­vert­ing your cur­rent spot­lights to 23 watt com­pact flu­o­res­cent spots, and by installing motion sen­sors so the lights only work when motion is detect­ed.

Cat­e­go­ry: Ener­gy Use FAQ
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Is electricity still a good value?

The val­ue of elec­tric­i­ty remains very high. The nation­al cost of elec­tric­i­ty today, when adjust­ed for infla­tion, is less than what it was in 1980. Very few com­modi­ties have remained such a good val­ue. Com­pared to oth­er con­sumer prod­ucts and ser­vices, elec­tric­i­ty is a bar­gain.

Cat­e­go­ry: Ener­gy Use FAQ
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What can I do about the amount of my bill?

Con­serv­ing ener­gy is always a good idea. York Elec­tric has a free 101 low-cost/no-cost home ener­gy sav­ings mea­sures brochure. Vis­it one of our offices to pick up a copy or view and/or down­load here. Also, vis­it TogetherWeSave.com and take the home tour to learn what actions you can take to save on your ener­gy bill.

Cat­e­go­ry: Ener­gy Use FAQ

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