8 Tips for a Greener Home via Smart Technology

A smarter home is quite often a greener home.Though it may take some investment, a smart home can pay for itself within a medium term period of time. By cutting energy costs you can offset the cost of these new technologies quite easily, while also helping to save the environment. Here are some of the best ways to achieve a greener home through smart tech. 

Installing a smart meter

One of the biggest consumers of energy in your home is heating. It is easy to leave the heating on for longer than needed, which is very common during the colder months of the year. This leads to a waste of both energy and money. The best way to avoid such a situation from happening is by having a smart thermostat installed. You can program the smart thermostat so that it can turn on at certain times of the day – you can program it to turn on when you are about to leave for home so it is fully heated when you reach home, and shut off an hour before leaving home. In fact, some even work with voice control like Alexa or Google Now - here is a list of the best smart thermostats that work with Alexa.

Smart meters will prove to be a great investment if you are looking to reduce your carbon footprint and lower your energy costs.

Installing solar panels

Solar panels are a must for anyone interested in having an eco-home. It provides you with clean electricity, and there are times when you produce more than needed and sell it to the grid. You should view solar as a long-term investment because you are not going to recoup your investment in a short time. Depending on where you live, you can expect it to take a decade or two before breaking even. When investing in solar, it is not just a monetary investment, but also a chance of taking care of the environment.

Taking to sustainability consultants

All homes are not the same, and there is a lot you can do to make your home eco-friendly. A good way of knowing what you can do is to speak to sustainability consultants. They are a great idea because they will do an analysis of your home and give you ideas on what you can do.

Embracing natural cleaning products

More people are avoiding harmful chemicals because they know they are not good for the environment. When you use them, you put them into the water supply. This means water will have to go through more purification before it can be used. You don’t have to use most of these harmful cleaning products. There are great alternatives like vinegar, bicarbonate of soda, and citric acid from citrus fruits which work great and are not harmful to the environment.

Insulation

One of the best ways of improving the eco-friendliness of your home is by minimizing the energy you use. One great way of doing this is by investing in insulation. When your home has good insulation, it holds in heat better, and this means you don’t need a lot of energy to heat your home. Some areas of your home that need to be properly insulated include the roof and the walls. If your windows are not double-glazed, consider doing it. If you have hardwood floors, cover the exposed floors using southwest area rugs. Getting area rugs will help because they are cost-effective and are going to insulate your home and prevents air from escaping through the cracks on the flooring.

Creating your own compost

Your kitchen scraps and leftovers should not be thrown away because you can use them to make compost. Most of the food you throw away can still be recycled and turned into compost. Buy a compost bin and put it in your garden so that you can fill it with scraps and leftover food. 

Buying recycled

Always choose recycled products when possible. This can range from kitchen roll to toilet tissue. When you are buying something and you see there is a recycled option available, choose the recycled one. Many products today have a recycled version, not just paper. Some of the recycled products include gaming consoles, mobiles, and recondition stairlifts. 

Cooking intelligently

Being smarter in the kitchen is not that hard. Once you manage to do this, your home becomes more eco-friendly. When cooking using an oven, you lose a lot of heat every time you open the oven door. Even if you have opened the door for a couple of seconds, it is going to require a lot of energy before the oven heats back to its original temperature. Coffee pods waste is another serious problem you need to look at. This is because they contribute to global environmental disaster, with plastic and aluminum capsules filling landfills in the country. The best option is to drink coffee from a conventional coffee maker.