If you want to conserve energy and lower your utility bill, first check out resources from PG&E if you’re a Californian in their service area like me.  Go to pge.com and select the menu “save energy & money.”  You will see something like this:

Yes, there is a lot of assistance!  It’s almost overwhelming.

You can start by understanding how you use energy in your home. You have to begin by knowing your energy usage beyond “wow, my bill is too high this month.” PG&E offers you tools that you can experiment with to bring down the cost on your electric bills.  These tools will help you control and budget your energy consumption and cost.

I will go over some of the tools offered by PG&E that I’ve tried:

• Energy Alerts – PG&E provides a couple of alerts that will help you stay in control and budget the cost of energy for your home. The first alert is involved with the Bill Forecast; this sends you a notification when you bill is likely to exceed a certain fixed amount specified by you. The second alert involves High Usage; this will notify you when you are likely to incur a surcharge against the units consumed by you every month, on an average.
• Automated Demand Response – PG&E offers rebates and credits for those who are willing to respond quickly when the demand for electricity is peaking. This is often referred to as “demand response.” Essentially, when everyone is using electricity at the same time, e.g. cranking up the air conditioner during a hot summer afternoon, PG&E will pay customers who use less electricity during those “peak demand” times. They pass on the savings onto you.
• Stream My Data – PG&E Stream My Data tool will help you save energy and your money because it provides electricity data on a real time basis by means of a device that monitors energy. It will be connected to your electric SmartMeter in your house or office. This meter helps you with the understanding of how and when you use electricity and the costs related with that usage. It will allow you to take proper action when you want to save on energy consumption and the resultant saving of money.
• Share My Data – This is a safe and a streamlined method to give domestic and commercial consumers authorized access to information from your PG&E account. This tool will package up your data through PG&E and inform all third parties when that data is ready before you send it out securely.

PG&E also offers cost-efficient ideas that can help you save on energy consumption throughout the year, which could really also reduce your gas and electric bill.  Here are some examples.

Tip 1: During winter, when you use your fireplace, you can turn down the heater. When you are not using the heater, you have the damper closed so that you block the cold air that can come in.

Tip 2: You can close the shades, curtains and blinds during the night and also during unoccupied periods during the day to block the warm air from going out.

Tip 3: You can caulk cracks and gaps around door and window frames that are drafty to prevent the cold air from entering. Caulk is not very expensive and can be bought at various hardware shops.

Tip 4: You can have a door sweep installed on that garage door so that the gaps are sealed between the threshold and the door bottom. This sweep will prevent cold air from entering and warm air from going out.

Tip 5: Insulate the spaces between your walls with foam. These gaps can be filled by means of spraying foam insulation into holes that can be drilled in your walls.

Tip 6: Cooling costs can be considerably reduced when you set your thermostat between 75F and 80F when you are at home, and set it to 85F when you go away for a few hours.

Tip 7: Get into the habit of turning off lights when they are notin use. You can try and rely on natural light, particularly during summer days.

Tip 8: During spring and autumn, you can have the windows opened and let the cool airflow in. This can be done in the earlier part of the day and evenings and cover the windows during noon time to block the hot rays of the sun.

Tip 9: Use ceiling fans to keep your home cool during the day.

Tip 10: Have your room air-conditioner placed in an area which is relatively cool and shaded and keep it away from items like lamps and television sets that produce heat.

By following these valuable tips provided by PG&E, you can reduce the cost of energy for your home or office while lessening the impact on your environment as reduced energy usage will result in less pollution.

Note: PG&E also helps by directly assisting the payment of bills, which is covered in another article about programs from PG&E to reduce utility bills.