The power bill lands. You open it, do a small double take, and promise yourself you’ll start switching things off. Two weeks later every light in the house is on again and the heater’s humming away in an empty room.
Vague promises don’t work because they go after the wrong things. Flicking off a lamp feels good. It barely moves the bill. What does? Mostly the stuff you don’t think about.
Start with heating and cooling
This is where the money goes. The Australian Government’s energy.gov.au says heating and cooling account for anywhere between 20% and 50% of the energy used in an Australian home, depending on where you live. A Canberra winter or a humid Brisbane summer will push you toward the top of that range.
If you only tackle one thing, tackle this.
Move the thermostat a couple of degrees
Probably the easiest win going. energy.gov.au’s quick wins guide suggests 18°C to 20°C for heating in winter and 25°C to 27°C for cooling in summer.
Why does that matter so much? Every extra degree adds somewhere between 5% and 10% to your energy use. So running the air con at 21°C on a January afternoon instead of 25°C adds up fast.
I know, 25°C sounds warm. Try it with a fan going for a week before you write it off. You might be surprised how quickly you stop noticing.
Hunt down the draughts
Gaps are sneaky. A bit of daylight under the front door, a rattly window, an old exhaust fan with no seal. Warm or cool air slips out, and your heater or air con just works harder to replace it.
energy.gov.au reckons sealing up gaps and draughts can cut your energy bill by as much as 25%. For what’s usually a cheap door seal and a tube of gap filler, that’s a great return.
Easy test. Wait for a windy day and run your hand around the door frames, window edges, skirting boards and exhaust fans. Feel a breeze? Found one. Adhesive weather strips around doors and windows are a Saturday-morning job, tops.
If you’re renting, you’ve still got options that won’t upset the landlord. Door snakes. Peel-off weather strips. Heavy curtains. All removable when you move out.
Curtains do more than you’d think
Insulation and decent curtains both make a big dent in how much heating and cooling a house needs, according to energy.gov.au. Curtains are the one you can fix this weekend. Heavy, close-fitting ones work best, ideally sitting close to the ceiling or under a pelmet, so warm air can’t sneak down behind them and escape through the glass.
Summer’s the reverse. Shut the blinds on the sunny side of the house in the morning, before it heats up, not at 3pm when the lounge room is already an oven. Much easier to keep heat out than to pump it back out again.
Fans. Seriously.
They’re so underrated. A fan costs about 2 cents an hour to run according to energy.gov.au, and the breeze can make a room feel 2 to 3 degrees cooler.
On a warm day that isn’t scorching, a ceiling fan might be all you need. When it really is stinking hot, running a fan with the air con means you can nudge the thermostat up a couple of degrees and still feel fine.
Hot water and washing
Heating water takes a surprising amount of energy, so it’s worth a look once you’ve sorted the heating and cooling.
First, the showerhead. energy.gov.au says switching to a 4-star rated one could save a family of four around $315 a year on water bills. Less hot water going down the drain means less energy spent heating it as well. They’re cheap and most people can swap one without calling a plumber.
Second, the washing machine. Most everyday loads come out fine in cold, and energy.gov.au says a cold wash over a warm one can save up to ten times the energy. Keep the warm cycle for the genuinely filthy stuff. Muddy footy gear, say.
Lights
Still got old halogen downlights or incandescent globes anywhere? Swap them. LEDs use about 80% less energy than older lighting, energy.gov.au says, and they last far longer, so fewer trips up the ladder.
Do the ones that are on the most first. Kitchen, living room, that outside light that stays on half the night.
If the heater or air con is about to die
Not a quick fix, but handy to know. energy.gov.au says reverse-cycle air conditioners run at 300% to 600% efficiency in normal conditions, because they move heat around rather than creating it. And split systems with inverter technology are roughly 30% more efficient to run than older fixed-speed models.
So when the old unit finally gives up, it’s worth thinking past the sticker price.
Where I’d actually start
Most people start with the small, satisfying stuff, like unplugging the toaster. I get it. But the real savings sit in a handful of places: the thermostat, the draughts, the hot water.
Pick two or three things from this list. Stick with them for one billing cycle and then compare. A lower number on an actual bill is way more motivating than any New Year’s resolution.
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