Power Lines

As summer approaches, it’s time to think about ways to make your home more comfortable when the sun beats down. Some of the solutions are low-cost, while others require a bigger investment, but in the end, you can be more comfortable and have lower energy bills.

The first step is to reduce your home’s solar gains — the heat energy it collects from the sun. Since most solar gains originate through your home’s windows, awnings are an effective solution. They can reduce solar heat gain by as much as 65 percent on south-facing windows and 77 percent on west-facing windows.

Last month, I offered tips on how to hire a good contractor, but it’s smart to realize that contractors need to be managed after the hiring is complete.

First, clear communication is critical, because a renovation that includes energy efficiency improvements comes with extra challenges. Identifying a single point of contact will help avoid confusion, conflicts, and cost overruns.

Being a lineman is more than a profession; it’s a description of self, according to these men who have more than just their jobs in common — they share a wealth of stories, a knack for troubleshooting, and an often unspoken but consistently unshakeable dedication.

Electric cooperatives work hard to ensure their members have access to the cleanest, safest, most affordable and reliable power possible. They keep up with both technology and trends to maintain that balance through sunny, hot summers; gray, bone-chilling winters; and everything in between.

Renovations can be the perfect time to improve your home’s energy efficiency. To make sure you get those energy savings, it’s important to do some planning right from the beginning.

The first step is to educate yourself so you can be in control of your project. Helpful, easy-to-understand energy-efficiency information is available for virtually any area of your home and any renovation project.

If you still have an old dial thermostat controlling the temperature in your home, you might take note of new technology available that lets thermostats do things they never could before. That said, it’s worth asking if these new thermostats can save enough money to justify the extra cost.

There are three main types of thermostats: manual, programmable, or smart.

Homeowners are constantly looking for ways to help keep heat in a home during the winter and to keep heat out in the summer. One of the best ways to do that is to use a radiant barrier.

For most Ohioans, the first sign that something unusual was happening on that night 40 years ago was the shriek of a fierce, unrelenting wind.

In the late evening of Jan. 25, 1978, a low-pressure system from Canada met another low-pressure system from Texas. Such storms approach from opposite directions several times each winter, according to the National Weather Service. Usually they miss each other. This time they collided, causing what has come to be widely known as “the storm of the century.”

Snow and ice storms can lead to downed power lines and outages. Remember the following tips to stay safe and warm should you find yourself in the dark after severe winter weather:

When a water heater reaches a certain age, it can be easy to assume it’s living on borrowed time. It’s hard to say how long your water heater will last. Certified home inspectors estimate the life span to be about 10 years. Some manufacturers suggest 12 to 13 years, but it’s not unheard of for a water tank to last more than 40 years before the heating element finally gives out. That said, it’s wise to replace a water heater before it fails, because that failure can cause a lot of damage.