We still have a few more hard months to get through before the springtime warmth comes along!  It’s still that time of year when most of us watch our heating bills go up. It’s a simple scientific fact that heat moves towards cold. In winter months, it’s drawn to the cold glass of windows, looking for ways to escape, which is why properly insulating our homes is especially important during the winter months. In fact, according to the U.S. Department of Energy, the heat lost through windows can account for 10 to 25 percent of a home’s heating bill. Thankfully innovations from Hunter Douglas may provide you with savings. Here are some tips to help make your home more winter ready:

• Weatherize. Seal up holes, weather strip doors and insulate attic floors. When the fireplace is not in use, keep the damper tightly closed.
• Insulate. Don’t just insulate the attic. Look for window fashions specifically designed to reduce energy loss at the window. Duette® Architella® honeycomb shades, featuring a patented honeycomb-within-a-honeycomb design, provide a high level of energy efficiency. Certain Duette Architella honeycomb shades can actually reduce heat loss up to 50 percent at the window. And be sure to check out the newest Architella fabrics: Architella® Batiste Textured and the Batiste Bamboo. Who knew energy efficiency could be so gorgeous?!
• Improve and maintain your mechanical systems. Service and clean your gas or oil furnace at least once a year, and change or clean furnace filters once a month during the winter season. Invest in a programmable thermostat that lets you set temperatures for different times of the day. According to the U.S Department of Energy, turning the heat down from 72 to 65 degrees for at least eight hours a day can reduce heating bills by 10 percent. The popular notion that the higher you set your heater’s thermostat, the faster your home will warm up, is not true! In reality, it takes the same amount of time for the temperature to reach 70 degrees whether the thermostat is set at 70 or 90 degrees. Setting the thermostat all the way up will only increase your heating costs. Also, remove air conditioning units in the fall and winter because they invite drafts (or use an insulated jacket on the exterior).
• Watch your windows. In winter, on sunny days, open your window coverings to let in the solar heat. But be sure to close them at night. Hunter Douglas makes a solar energy sensor that can be mounted directly to the window pane to control motorized window fashions (available on our PowerGlide® 2.0 with Platinum Technology™ and PowerRise® 2.0 with Platinum Technology). Set to winter mode, the sensor raises shades at the appropriate instance to allow solar energy into the room for warmth. It also closes the shades automatically when the temperature drops outside, keeping the warm air inside.
• Keep the air circulating. During the winter, do not block floor registers, baseboards or radiators with rugs, furniture or other items. If you have ceiling fans with a reverse setting, turn them on low and reverse when using a lot of heat. Warm air rises and often gets trapped near the ceiling. The reverse air flow from the fan will help circulate the warm air around the entire room.
• Landscape. Think long-term: Stop chilling winter winds by planting evergreen trees and scrubs on the north and west sides of your home.
• Don’t have an open door policy. When using the door, make sure it’s completely closed. Latch windows closed also to prevent leakage.