Cutting the heating bill
Where the heat actually goes, in the order worth spending on.
Heat leaves a house through gaps first and through surfaces second. That order matters, because it is the reverse of the order most people spend in — new windows are the famous answer and are usually not the first one.
Air sealing is unglamorous and is where the money is. A house loses a great deal through the small gaps around pipes, wiring and the attic hatch, and sealing them costs a fraction of anything else on this list.
After that, insulation, and then the system itself. A heating system running well in a leaky house is still heating the outside — which is why the order here runs from the envelope inwards rather than starting with the furnace.
What it breaks down into
In roughly the order worth doing them. Each one goes straight to a post with the job already described — change anything you like before it goes up.
- air sealing and weatherizationThe cheapest thing on this list and usually the biggest difference.
- attic and wall insulationHeat rises; the attic is where most of it leaves.
- duct sealingLeaky ducts heat the crawl space instead of the rooms you are in.
- furnace and heating repairA system serviced before winter fails less often in the middle of it.
- window repairRepair before replacement — a sash that seals properly does most of the work.
- thermostat installationNot heating an empty house is the one saving that needs no building work.
The other guides, if this was not the one.