Buildings

High Utility Bills

Q: We recently moved into a new house, and the utility bills are much higher than we expected. The house we moved out of was 40 years old, hardly insulated, had leaky windows, and a very old heat pump. Our new house is just a little bigger, insulated to today's building code, has a high-efficiency heat pump and water heater, and much tighter, double-pane windows. I think the electric meter must be wrong, but the power company says it's accurate. What could cause my high bills?

A: While it's possible that your meter is faulty, this is very rare. In many years of investigating high bill complaints, I think I've run into malfunctioning meters only a handful of times. I think you probably need to look elsewhere.

Even though your house is new, and "passed code," that doesn't mean it's been built to be energy efficient. As one of my colleagues often says, "A house built to code is the worst house permitted under law." On top of that, just because certain things were done on your house doesn't mean that they were done right.

Insulation, for instance, is rarely installed properly nowadays. Ductwork is installed so that, on average, about one dollar out of every five spent on heating and air conditioning in new houses in the Carolinas is wasted. Those dollars simply disappear through leaks in the duct system-into the attic, crawl space or basement, or yard. Similarly, while new windows are, as a rule, much tighter than older ones, we see many houses with big air leaks in them that no one ever noticed.

So, rule number one: before you accuse the power company of having the morals of a running dog capitalist lackey pig, have the house checked out for air tightness with a device called a blower door, for duct tightness with a device called a Duct Blaster, and for insulation consistency visually and with an infra-red camera. And while you're at it, have the heat pump checked for proper charge and proper sizing. Most new units are over-sized and over-charged, both of which reduce efficiency.