Do Your Own Home Energy Audit

DYO® Basic Energy Audit Kit

What is an Energy Audit? An Energy Audit is a diagnostic examination of a structure to determine its efficiency in regard to energy consumption.

Why would you want to conduct an Energy Audit? Maybe your home, apartment or condo has high energy bills. Maybe a member of your family has a home that is too drafty or uncomfortable. Maybe you want to help a friend learn about the energy improvements that make the most sense or maybe you are interested in taking advantage of energy tax credits. Whatever the reason, this is a way to step back and take an in-depth look; not just at the structure, but at the every component that uses energy. An energy audit will help you examine every component of the building.

Every building requires energy to maintain comfort for the occupants sometime during the course of a year. The amount of energy it consumes is not based just on the efficiency of the furnace or other heating system, or the number of panes of glass in the windows, but on how these and other obvious (and not so obvious) items work together to make the structure more or less efficient.

The DYO® Basic Energy Audit Kit teaches you to perform your own basic energy audit on your residence. It provides the tools and takes you step-by-step through what is necessary to gain the information you need to make smart home improvement decisions.

Geared toward the home, condo, town home, or apartment dweller, you are guided through a detailed inspection of your structure and its potential energy problems. All the forms, instructional materials and tools you need are included (along with a carpenter’s apron to keep the tools handy) along with a clipboard to give you a writing surface as you complete the forms. Several presentations are available on the accompanying CD to increase your learning curve with sample images to help you determine your specific building’s construction and components.

As a bonus, DYO® Kits has included REScheck (the free software program provided by the US Department of Energy) and easy-to-follow instructions on how to determine if your structure is compliant with energy codes and how much better or worse it is than code.

Once you have completed your audit, your knowledge of where energy problems occur, not only in your home specifically, but in home’s generally as well. And you will be able to compare scenarios for cost-effective changes you can make to reduce your energy consumption.

The DYO® Basic Energy Audit Kit is worth more than its price tag because you save that amount many times over. By using it you:

learn to see your house from an energy raters point of view,
learn to proceed through an energy audit safely and efficiently,
learn how to find the common places where your energy dollars could be escaping,
learn to diagnose your energy use (or mis-use),
learn where your energy dollars are being least effective,
learn about overlooked energy problems,
learn to transfer your findings into scenarios for problem-solving,
learn to manipulate those scenarios to discover cost-effective solutions,
learn to make home improvement decisions based on costs-to-results ratio,
learn where best to spend your money to save your money.

Your kit contains everything you need to perform your own basic energy audit on a structure:

Companion pages - Paper-based consulting with expert information to assist with your audit and energy savings plan.
Forms – Used to collect information and create drawings.
CDROM – Contains digital versions of all the DYO® Basic Energy Audit Kit Forms and Companion Pages as well as educational and informational slideshows, links to web-sites with more information, and a copy of the REScheck™ software to help evaluate your structure’s energy efficiency against current energy codes.
Tape Measure – Measure your structure to obtain square footage, measure doors and windows, etc.
Screwdriver – Remove and reinstall switch plates (when checking wall insulation).
Thin Plastic Ruler – Draw your plan to scale; plus determine depth of insulation in walls and attic.
Pencil – Fill out forms and draw the floor plan.
Calculator – Perform calculations.
Audit Apron – Holds all energy audit items and keeps them handy while performing the energy audit.
Clipboard – Provides a writing surface and holds your DYO® Basic Energy Audit Kit paper forms.