At Home with Lisa: Compare your bills

I have been trying to make my home more energy efficient for more than a year now. Let’s face it, when my house was built in 1910, no one would have had any idea how we use energy today: televisions, computers, electronics chargers, and heating costs. In fact, I suspect that my home had some sort of wood stove to heat the place when it was first built.

But now that I am thinking about energy efficiency, how can I tell if it is paying off? I found a great tool on Avista’s website: Compare Your Bills. I can see how much energy I use compared to last month or compared to this month last year.

September is an unusually light energy usage month in my house: we have turned off the air conditioners and have not turned on the heat just yet. I was curious if my energy use this month was any different than last year. One helpful feature of the compare-your-bills tool: it compares the average temperature of the weather, too, so I can see that last year, the temperature was similar to what it is this year. It also just tells me that I used less energy.

The page also gives me tips, such as the most recent day of energy usage this week was 85% less than the average of what I used last week, probably because the weather has changed.

Lisa, an Avista customer, bought her 1910 house because she loved the old-world character, some of which doesn’t make her house very energy efficient. Lisa is sharing her experience on taking some simple do-it-yourself improvements to inspire others to do the same. You’ll find her stories right here every Tuesday morning.