With stocks plummeting, home heating prices soaring and a recession in full swing, many people look toward winter with fear and trepidation. One of the best ways to alleviate this fear is to take a positive action like conducting a home energy audit.

Almost half of our energy use goes into heating and cooling our homes. We already pay an average of 20 percent more in home heating costs, so any way you can reduce your costs will pay for itself. A professional home-energy audit costs $100-$300, but if you take the auditor's recommendations, you will quickly make that money back.

Some states, like New York, will reimburse you for the cost of the audit, and make you eligible for a low-interest loan (2 percent) to pay for major renovations. If you take out the loan and make the improvements, the money you save on your electric bill could cover the loan payment, often with plenty left over. If you plan to go solar, or incorporate some form of renewable energy into your home, the same program will pay for half the installed cost.

Having a trained eye look at your home is invaluable. My auditor spotted right away that my furnace was operating at 80 percent efficiency in spite of just being serviced. He also found some leaky and un-insulated ductwork we had never noticed.

The blower door is a tool that auditors use to test your home's envelope. They install a powerful fan that fits exactly into an open outer door. The air is sucked out of your house causing negative air pressure. The auditor walks around with a hand held smoke machine and points out the major gaps and leaks, usually around doors and window frames. If added together, these gaps and leaks can equal a huge hole in your wall.

Here are a few ways my home energy audit helped me save money and reduce energy use:

Just by caulking all the gaps and leaks, we could save almost $1,000 off our annual heating and cooling bills. Even if we hired a contractor to do this and had to pay $4,500 for caulking, we would make that investment back in less than five years. You could not get a rate of return that good on the stock market right now.

One of the most obvious leaks in any home is an un-insulated attic and basement. We were losing much of our heat right though the roof of our house. An investment of about $1,500 added six more inches of insulation in our attic and made a considerable difference in how warm the house feels, and how much energy we use to heat it. We reinsulated many of our outside walls at the same time, and were able to cut our home heating costs dramatically last year.

If you have an un-insulated basement, insulating exposed crawlspace ceilings and walls could save you as much as $800 annually, depending on the size of your house. Again, if you paid someone to do it, you would make a return on your investment in less than five years.

Switching out your incandescent light bulbs for compact fluorescent or LED lights can save you 20 percent on your electric bill. The more bulbs you replace the greater your savings.

About 14 percent of our home energy use is spent on keeping water hot at all times. Buying an on demand water heater will save you the cost of that new water heater in about two to three years.

Appliances and cooking can account for 33 percent of home energy use. If you replace older appliances with Energy Star Rated appliances, you can save about $100 per year, per appliance on average. These savings help to offset the cost of the new appliance over the years.

Replacing windows can be expensive making the payback period much longer. In my case, we would save $30-$50 annually with a payback period of 10 years. We opted instead to invest in window inserts to use during the winter. An immediate action you can take is to cover every window with clear plastic window sheeting from your local hardware store. It curbs heat transfer, and will save energy.

To find a qualified energy auditor near you, go to www.energystar.gov and click the "partners" tab. You can look up a home energy rater by state.

If you can't find an auditor, do-it-yourself by gathering last year's utility bills and using the "Home Energy Yardstick" option on www.energystar.gov to get energy saving home improvement advice from Energy Star.

Shawn Dell Joyce is an award-winning sustainable artist and activist living in a green home in the Mid-Hudson region of New York. Contact her by e-mail Shawn@ShawnDellJoyce.com. To find out more about Shawn Dell Joyce and read features by other Creators Syndicate writers and cartoonists, visit the Creators Syndicate website at www.creators.com.

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