Outdoor Home Cooling Tips

Outdoor Home Cooling Tips:

The way we landscape or decorate the exterior of our home can decrease our indoor cooling energy consumption and save us money. Looking to nature for ideas will take you far in your home cooling efforts.

• Plant wisely.
  Planting crawling vines along the south and west sides of your home or on trellises in front of windows can help insulate the house as well. You can do this with edible vines such as grapevines, for added utility.

• Plant native, deciduous trees.
  They will also help shade your home from the hot summer sun. And when they drop their leaves in the winter, they will assist in passive solar heating.
• Consider awnings.
  Used on the south or west facing windows, they will block the angle of the sun coming through the window during he summer while allowing the lower angled winter sun to come in and warm the home.
• Invest in solar screens
  Solar screens on the outside of windows make a huge difference and are worth the investment. They can be removed during the winter.
• Need to paint?
  If your house is in need of a paint job, consider lighter colors which deflect rather than absorb the light.
• Redoing the roof?
  Light-colored roof shingles also help decrease any heat absorption by deflecting sunlight.
• Paint your roof!
  You don't need to redo your roof to benefit from lighter colors. Collecting used paint from around town or cast-off paint from a local hardware store in light shades will give you the same effect for much less.

For more information on this topic, visit the source of the article at http://www.sustainablebabysteps.com/home-cooling.html