Looking for ideas on keeping apartment cooler with electricity cost going up?

Question

i have added to 30" tower fans and black sheets as curtains on the 2 windows and covering the vertical blinds for the sliding glass door!!!! Not sure if it will help????

Also thermostat at the recommended 78 degrees for summer.

Answer 1

First thing: remove the dark sheets from the windows!!! How the room heats up during the day is by sunlight hitting objects beyond the glass and then the radiant heat being transmitted by those objects whe they absorb the light spectrum. The darker the objects that the light hits, the more heat you are creating!!!

The key is to reflect the light back out the windows as soon as possible so as to give it zero time to heat the interior air. What I use is rigid insulation with silver facing and cut it to fit in the windows with the silver side out and right against the glass. This will reflect most of the radiation outside again as well as the insulation acting as a thermal barrier for the miniscule heat gains you do get. If you cannot get to a hardware store, use tinfoil taped to the window but the insulation is good because you can take it out and replace it as you need light.

Setting the thermostat for 78F is good but I would suggest even bumping that to 80F (provided your AC unit is properly sized for the space it is serving). I would also place a fan directly in front of the AC unit to pump the air to the hotter parts of the apartment to make cooling more even and help you resist the urge to crank it up to cool the distant areas. Another thing to consider is what the outside of the building is made of because if it's brick then it will absorb heat all day and then radiate it into the house after the sun goes down. If you can somehow shade brick walls in direct sunlight throughout the day, this will significantly reduce heat gains as well. If you can get a tree planted through a civic program or maybe plant some wild vines to grow on the walls would be good but you could even hang strips of light fabric anchored to top and bottom or even paint the exterior a light colour. Anything that prevents sunlight from hitting anything connected to your apartment is a step upwards for your electricity bill.

Well, I'm all idea-ed out for now. Hope that helps. ;)

Answer 2

If your landlord will allow it, buy and install window tinting film like that which is used on cars on all South and West facing windows. It comes in sheets wide enough to use on regular house windows and also in nearly clear but will still block the UV rays that are heating up the house. The landlord may get a tax break and an energy credit from the local power company if he does it for everybody.
Keeping your curtains and blinds closed is also a good idea as the previous poster said, but it does make a difference which way you twist the blinds(unless you have vertical blinds). Heat rises and can get trapped between the window and the blinds. Set them so the slots overlap from the top and the heat rises withing the window gap, the other way allows the heat to escape from the top of the slot into the room.
If you're on the ground floor, ask the landscapers to plant bushes near your foundation to keep the sun from baking the siding, which will keep the inside wall a bit cooler by shading the outside wall. If you have a balcony that faces the sun, place potted plants between the sun and the sliding glass doors to "intercept" the suns rays. Also hang a bamboo shade on the outer edge of the balcony ceiling and keep it lowered to keep the sun from shining on the windows.

Answer 3

You and me both! I just got my bill for last month, the largest electric bill I've ever received. So I immediately went into research mode, found another provider and switched.

Use fans along with the a/c. You can actually bump the a/c up a couple of degrees if you create a breeze inside with fans. You get that wind chill effect and fans are cheap to run.

Answer 4

Running fans in rooms that you are not in is generally a waste of electricity. The big benefit of fans is the air flow on your body. (e.g. Wind Chill effect) Ceiling fans work great for this purpose. Have, over time, put them in almost every room of the house.

White curtains that are thick are more efficient at not absorbing heat than black.

Answer 5

the small units draw about 1350 watts. if it runs all the time then for 4 hours 5.4 kwh per day. Average cost of electricity is 10 cents...54 cents per day times 30 equals 16.20

Answer 6

keep all blinds and curtains closed during the day-keeps the sunlight out

Answer 7

dark shades cool at night open windows or us air then shut windows and blinds/curtains early morning it should help some.good luck!!!

Answer 8

they have this new fan, popular in Asia ...

essentially a regular fan with a compartment that you put ice cubes in .. supposedly works great for apartments.

Answer 9

Here's a thought, turn the A/C off.