Home Renovation

With home construction on the decline, it makes sense to renovate an existing home rather than start from scratch. Renovation saves on building materials and also preserves undeveloped natural land.
If you are a homeowner, invest in energy-efficient upgrades that reduce your home's heating and cooling loads by adding more insulation in the walls, roof, and floors; sealing up leaks or installing new windows; and upgrading old electrical appliances with energy-rated models.

Smaller Footprints

If you are building a new home, less square footage translates into materials and labour savings, not to mention cost savings based on heating and cooling a smaller space.

Net Zero

A concept that is making waves is to make your home net-zero, which means generating as much energy as it consumes, netting out at zero energy. Most net-zero homes achieve this by combining a variety of passive and active design strategies. Passive strategies include thoughtfully placed windows that utilize or prevent solar heat gains, plenty of natural ventilation, and well insulated walls. These are to be coupled with renewable energy system such as solar panels, geothermal wells, and even wind turbines.

Energy Monitoring Systems

You can monitor your energy usage more comprehensively and in real time with energy monitoring systems that tie into your home's circuit and allow you to examine the data from your laptop or smartphone. The more aware you are of your energy consumption, the more ways you can find to cut back.

LEDs

By now you've accepted that incandescent bulbs aren't very energy-efficient. Compact fluorescents (CFLs) have been touted as the best replacement. However, LEDs use even less energy than CFLs and have much longer lifespan. Although LEDs were previously dismissed for residential use because of their many drawbacks, they've come a long way in recent years with various designs, lower pricing, more output, and warmer light colours. Try to incorporate LEDs and watch your bills drop accordingly.