My Solar Review – BlogWe Review The Top 5 DIY Green Energy Websites

Here is the latest video showing why Green Power Easy is the Number ONE Solar and Wind Guide on the market today. As you will see they have taken the BEST of the rest and rolled everything into one great package. They offer many extras and bonuses that the others don’t. Their videos are extremely clear and straight forward as are their instructions.

The past few years have found all of us looking at rising energy costs which seem to have been multiplied by the slow economy. Whether you are thinking about ways to “go green” or you simply want to lower your monthly out of pocket energy costs, we’ve compiled some tips to help you out. This is the third in a series of articles on lowering your monthly energy costs.

In our first two articles we discussed several tips to reduce your energy costs specifically during either the winter or summer months. In this article we will discuss tips you can use year round to help lower your energy costs and save on your monthly bills.

First let’s recap some of the tips we suggested using in winter:
- Lower your thermostat. Stay warmer by wearing more clothes, using space heaters, using electric blankets at night, etc.
- Check for drafts entering the home through doors or windows and seal them off.
- Reduce your outdoor pool’s running time to a minimum

Next let’s look at some of the tips we suggested for summer:
- Raise your thermostat. Stay cool by using fans, drinking plenty of water, wearing fewer clothes, etc.
- Pull shades to block out the sun’s heat.
- Insure your A/C unit is running optimally

Using our summer and winter tips will help you save on energy costs year round. Many items work to help cool and heat your home both, helping your unit work less, and use less energy.
-Changing the A/C filter regularly helps your unit run at its optimum level in both heat and cool modes.
-Space heaters and fans help create air flow within your home which in turn helps your unit not work as hard to circulate the air.
-Pulling the shades on windows can help both in winter and summer. In summer the shades block out the sun’s direct heat. In the winter shades help to block out drafts and block the cold temperatures on the window surfaces from entering the room.
-Increasing your attic insulation helps year round as well by retaining both the heat and cool into your home instead of letting it escape thru the ceiling.
- Decreasing the amount of time that your outdoor pool’s filter system runs during the day will dramatically help to reduce your energy consumption. Work with your pool professional to find the optimal amount of time that the system should run each day to keep the pool clean while at the same time using as little energy as possible. You may want to consider building your own solar panel or wind turbine to power your pool pump. There are several websites that can teach you how to do this. See the links at the bottom of this article.
- Replacing your old windows with energy efficient models can easily pay for itself in a very short period of time. Today’s windows with Low E film are many times over more efficient than older models. The best advantage is that they work in both summer and winter. In summer energy efficient windows block out the sun’s direct heat as well as the ambient heat outside, all while directing the A/C unit’s cool air back into the room. In the winter they work the same by deflecting the heat in the room back into the room and by blocking out the cold air and wind. If you haven’t looked into replacing your windows and your home is more than 30 years old, you should really do so. The amount you could save could be huge. Not to mention that fact that your home will feel much better as well.
-Replacing your old, worn out central system will save you money year round as well. Depending on how old your unit is, how large your home is and how well it’s insulated, the savings you could see from replacing the unit could easily pay for the new unit in just a couple of years time.
-Caulking cracks around your home’s exterior will help to increase the home’s insulation factor which will obviously help year round by blocking out the cold and hot wind.
-Unplugging your unused electrical items will save energy year round.
- Don’t leave rechargeable items plugged in all the time. Once the unit is charged, unplug it completely from the wall.
- Don’t leave your toaster plugged in. It only takes a second to plug it in when you are ready to use it.
- Why leave your computer running all day while you are at work? Not only turn it off, but if you have it on a surge protector, which you should, turn the switch off so that all your computer items are off including your printer, copier, modem, monitor, etc.
- Unplug your jam box. It probably has a few lights and maybe a read out screen that stay lit even when the unit switch is off.
- Battery chargers. Once your drill or screwdriver battery is charged in the garage, unplug it.

So, as you can see over this series of articles we have listed numerous tips that can help you save on your energy costs not just in the summer or winter, but year round as well. Most of the items we have discussed are items that you could do yourself without having to pay anyone else and in many cases without having to spend any money at all. If you are the do-it-yourself (DIY) type you will find most of these tips very easy to follow and implement. If not, you can still accomplish them with just a little research. There are plenty of websites on the net you can use for resources.

Another great way of reducing your energy costs is by producing your own energy through the use of either a solar panel or wind turbine. You DIY enabled homeowners will find that building a solar panel or wind turbine is actually must easier than it may sound at first. Several websites offer guides to building your own and take you through the steps one by one.

The key to successfully lowering your energy cost year round is to implement as many of our tips as possible. While implementing one or two of them will help, you will most definitely get the biggest bang for your buck by implementing as many of them as you can simultaneously. Then, building your own solar or wind energy producing system will take you to the next level. In many cases people who build their own energy generators completely take themselves off the grid and never have to pay for electricity from the providers again.

By Kathlene Easter
Green energy sources are being discovered by the Tree Hugger crowd and many of them are looking toward building it into energy efficient and environmentally safe homes.

What is all this “green” stuff? The reason for the green name is this type of energy contributes nothing or very little toward global warming, if such a thing even exists, and none toward polluting the environment.
Green energy sources are found in the sun and wind. This energy is converted into usable electrical power through the use of solar panels and windmills and passive heating for space or water heating.

The sun is by far the most popular source of energy. The energy captured from the sun has many options.

•It can be used for converting the sun’s energy into electrical energy. Harnessing the suns energy using solar panels containing photovoltaic cells converts sun energy into electrical power for use in the green home.

•Passive energy can be used to heat water for domestic hot water use in the kitchen, bathroom and the laundry.

Utilizing passive energy or converted solar energy can greatly reduce the homeowners electrical bill or even eliminate it.

Wind has been used for centuries to perform various mechanical tasks like running windmills to pump water. Windmills can be used to supplement solar panels in the alternative power configuration. As with the sun, there are no pollutants. However, it is good idea to live in a windy location to take full advantage of using the wind as an alternative power source.

Water can also be used as an alternative power source. However, it is a good idea to live close to a source of running water. It also non polluting as are the wind and solar energy sources.

Green energy sources are not dependent upon fossil fuels and are pollution free, but they can greatly reduce or eliminate the homeowners electric bill.

Download this guide to discover how to build your very own Green Energy System Get even more tips on Green Energy Sources here. Go do it now.

The past few years have found all of us looking at rising energy costs which seem to have been multiplied by the slow economy. Whether you are thinking about ways to “go green” or you simply want to lower your monthly out of pocket energy costs, we’ve compiled some tips to help you out. This is the second in a series of articles on lowering your monthly energy costs.

Obviously the largest energy cost we have in the winter time is heating our home. Here are a few tips to lower those heating costs.

Tip 1: Lower your thermostat setting. This is the single best thing you can do to lower the cost of heating your home. Dropping the temperature just a few degrees can easily cut your heater’s operating time dramatically. You’re thinking right now, “but I don’t like to feel cold”. So here are several tips to make you feel warmer even though the house temperature is lower.

- Wear more clothing. When you are at home wear sweats or sweaters. You could even consider wearing long johns under your clothing, even in doors. It makes a huge difference in how warm the home feels to you.

- Use space heaters in the rooms where you are the most. Let the heaters warm the rooms where you are at and let the rest of the house cool down with the thermostat. If you never go into your bedroom during the hours of 8am till 5pm then why does it need to stay warm? Only warm the room you are in.

- Wear socks and slippers. It’s very true that if your feet are cold the rest of you will feel cold.

- Use an electric blanket at night. If you are asleep from 11pm till 6am, why does the kitchen need to be warm? Turn the thermostat down so the rest of the house is cooler, saving energy, and use the blanket to keep you toasty warm as you sleep. An electric blanket uses much less energy than your home heating unit.

- Place area rugs in the rooms that have hard surface floors. This not only helps to retain heat but it also helps to feel warmer as you walk so that you once again have the feeling of being warmer.

Tip 2: Check for window and door leaks and install new weather stripping where needed. Some say to hold a lit match in front of a window or door to see if drafts come in and blow the flame. We suggest using a lightweight feather instead. A very small lightweight feather will move in a slight draft just as well as a lit match, and it’s much safer. Not to mention you’ll save the cost of burning through a book of matches.

Tip 3: If you are in an older home you may want to consider replacing your windows with new energy efficient ones. We’ll discuss this more in a later article, but energy efficient windows will make a huge difference in your heating costs. Double pane windows with Low E coating help to retain the heat that is in the room at the same time that they block out the cold on the outside. If you place a thermometer on the inside of a standard window it will read somewhere between the inside and outside temperatures. But if you place a thermometer on the inside of an energy efficient window it will read the same as the inside of the house, or at least within 1 or 2 degrees. The most efficient windows built today have the ability to insulate your home just as much as your walls do.

Tip 4: Go around the exterior of your home and fill in cracks with caulk. Anywhere that two different surfaces meet such as bricks to wood, need to be sealed up. If cold wind is allowed to enter these cracks it dramatically reduces the efficiency of the insulation inside your walls.

Tip 5: Decrease the time that your pool filter system runs throughout the day. In most cases you are not using your pool during the winter, so why does it need to run all day? You will notice that your pool maintenance person is putting very few chemicals in the pool during the winter. This is because the micro-organisms don’t grow as well in cold water as they do in warm water. Therefore your pool will stay cleaner looking in the winter anyway. So only let the filter system run a few hours per day; just enough to turn the water over a few times and keep it fresh.

Tip 6: Insure that your attic has adequate insulation. This is one of the easiest and least expensive ways to increase the overall insulation factor of your home. Have a professional come out to measure and evaluate the insulation and give you pricing on increasing it if needed.

Tip 7: Use door sweeps at the bottom of exterior doors. Place your hand on the floor next to the bottom of all exterior doors, or use that feather we talked about before, and determine if there is a cold draft entering under the door. If so, install a door sweep to block that cold air from entering your home. There are many types and models of door sweeps on the market; many of which are very inexpensive and can be found at any local hardware store.

We cannot go without saying in any article about saving energy that the best way to save energy is to create your own. It’s actually easier than it may seem. You can find many websites on the net that offer guides to building your own solar panels and wind turbines which you can use to power your home. Many people are completely powering their own homes and even selling electricity back to the power companies. This is probably one of the best ways to “go green” and save money around your home. Please visit this link to view all of our articles in this series of saving energy.

The past few years have found all of us looking at rising energy costs which seem to have been multiplied by the slow economy. Whether you are thinking about ways to “go green” or you simply want to lower your monthly out of pocket energy costs, we’ve compiled some tips to help you out. This is the first in a series of articles on lowering your monthly energy costs.

The largest energy cost most of us face in the summer months is cooling our homes with air conditioning. There are several things you can do to lower your A/C costs.

Tip 1: Make sure you change your filters regularly. Most filter manufacturers suggest changing them every 3 months whether they are dirty or not. The filters break down over time and after 3 months don’t stop as many particles as when new. Clean filters allow air to flow more freely through the unit which in turn helps the unit not work as hard to move the air throughout the house.

Tip 2: Next, consider lowering your thermostat setting a couple of degrees, especially on those very warm days. Most A/C units are only designed to keep the inside air at 20 degrees less than the outside air. This means that if it is 100 degrees outside your unit will be working way too hard if you have your thermostat set at 75. Try turning the thermostat up to 78 or even 80 if you are still comfortable. On a 100 degree day the difference in having your thermostat at 80 vs. 75 could cut the unit’s running time almost in half.

Tip 3: Also, make sure you use fans around your home. 80 degree air which is being circulated around the room actually feels much cooler than 80 degree air which is stagnant. Fans also help your unit to work less by circulating the air more efficiently between the air duct registers and returns.

Tip 4: Drink as much water as possible during the summer as well. Not only is drinking more water good for your health it also helps you to feel cooler. The more water you drink the more hydrated your skin will be. Hydrated, moisture rich skin feels cooler when air flows across it than does dry skin. So, drink up for your health, your comfort level and your lower energy costs.

Tip 5: Pull the shades. We aren’t suggesting that you live in a cave, however caves are very cool, just cut down on the amount of direct sunlight that enters your home. If you don’t like this option because you like to have as much light coming in your house as possible, you can always consider upgrading to new energy efficient windows. Energy Star rated windows with Low E film on them block out the majority of the sun’s direct heat but still allow all the light in. We’ll discuss energy efficient windows more in a later article; please look for it soon.

Tip 6: If you live in an older home and are still using the original A/C unit it may be time to consider upgrading. Units which are manufactured today are many times more efficient than the ones built 20-30 years ago. Yes it is a large upfront cost to replace an A/C unit, but if you choose the right one the savings can easily pay for the upfront costs in a relatively short period of time. You should at least invite a few A/C contractors to come out and give you information and bids for replacing your unit. Most of them will come out for free and should be able to tell you how long it would take to pay for your upfront costs with the savings you’ll see based on the specifics of your home. And, of course we suggest doing all the other tips we’ve given to help reduce your costs as well. Using several money saving tips at the same time will help you recoup your costs even sooner.

We cannot go without saying in any article about saving energy that the best way to save energy is to create your own. It’s actually easier than it may seem. You can find many websites on the net that offer guides to building your own solar panels and wind turbines which you can use to power your home. Many people are completely powering their own homes and even selling electricity back to the power companies. This is probably one of the best ways to “go green” and save money around your home.

If you’ve been searching for the best way to go green for a while, I’m sure you’re thinking it should at least be easier than you have currently found’. Maybe you’ve set going green as a New Year’s resolution or maybe you just want to save money on your electric bills. Whether or not you believe in global warming at this point is irrelevant. It does not matter how you came to your decision to look into alternative energy sources. What’s important is that you’ve made the decision and are acting on it.

The undeniably true and historic fact is that the human race needs to diversify it’s reliance on the energy sources we choose. This fact-started centuries ago, probably even before humans began consuming whale blubber for their energy needs almost exclusively. Whales were hunted to near extinction. In some circles, it is debatable as to whether the extinction of whales would have changed the world for the worse. What is not debatable is the impact of humans changing their energy source choices, such as when we began to conserve whale blubber with the invention of the Argand oil lamp. The Argand lamp used far less oil than it’s contemporaries in the late 1700’s. Then we humans replaced that energy source with kerosene some 70 years later and the whale population began to grow again.

We are at that turning point again with our energy source choices. We are experiencing such phenomena as rolling blackouts. Rolling blackouts are when the power that supplies our towns and cities is cutoff in sections at a time for several hours at a time. This can be very dangerous for health, traffic, safety, hospitals, nursing homes and even people in their own homes. Sometimes this is due to the power company choosing to do this so the entire power grid doesn’t go down. Other times the grid has failed because we are simply using more than the manmade power grid can produce and store. These rolling blackouts will continue without some intervention. If we were all to intervene and produce even a small amount of energy from alternative energy sources for ourselves, we would drastically reduce the burden on the power grid. This would be in turn drastically reducing mankind’s need to use fossil fuels as our almost exclusive energy source.

If you’re thinking it truly should not be this hard. You are not alone. Many people are thinking about doing something to help the environment. Many more people are actually taking charge and acting on those thoughts. The environmental movement has really taken off into a cottage industry of do-it-yourself (DIY) alternate energy building project web sites and forums. The internet is saturated with these web sites all promising the same thing; buy their product and you’ll save energy. Today it’s not like the late 1700’s when all you had to do was save for 10 months, then upgrade to a new oil lamp that would let you spend less money on oil because you used less with the new lamp. In today’s high tech internet market place it is maddening the amount of information that you get when you do a simple Google web search for “solar panels” alone. You then have to decide how to categorize all the data and only then can you begin to cipher through it. You can’t really afford to purchase every e-book or e-set of plans, build every solar panel and then test them all to see which one is the best for you. It shouldn’t be that hard to try to do your part to help make better choices for the earth, your family and most importantly the world you will leave behind for your grandchildren’s children.

Thankfully, you are not alone. We here at MySolarReview thought the exact same thing. We’ve actually done the unthinkable by putting the research down on paper and shared it with the world. We have done the research, built the products, tested them and given you all the results and their recommendations.

DIY Green Energy Guides – Choosing the Right Solar Panel or Wind Turbine website

“Going Green” is on just about everyone’s mind now days. Many of us have jumped on board and are doing everything we can to help the revolution. Many have started the boarding process and are doing a little at a time and others are just starting out. No matter which step you are at, the key to success is doing your research. As most of us have heard before “knowledge is power.” And in the case of “going green” we are literally talking about power, or at least the amount of it we use and where we get it from.

The internet is absolutely bombarded with companies and advertisements concerning the green revolution. Many of these companies are very legitimate and are truly taking steps to help mother earth, while others are simply trying to capitalize on the movement. You can literally find hundreds or thousands of “green” products out there for sale, everything from rain collection barrels to solar lighting for your walkway. In this article we are going to discuss do-it-yourself solar panels and wind turbines. Due to a few advances in the industry over the past few years it has become very inexpensive to actually build your own systems and literally power your complete home from these systems, in effect never having to pay the power companies again. Because of these advances and the ability to build inexpensive systems there has been a boom of internet websites promoting the practice.

These “Green Energy” websites are capitalizing on the green diy movement by offering books or guides that teach individuals how to build these power systems themselves. Most advertise that you can build your own solar panel or wind turbine for under $200. If you perform a Google search for “diy solar panels” or even just “solar panels” alone, you will find hundreds of sites offering these guides. So many in fact that it becomes overwhelming to weed through them. We are about to give you some pointers as to how to choose the right ones.

We literally scanned and read through dozens of these green energy websites. What we found was that most of them are offering the same information just packaged in different brightly colored packages. All of the websites sell what is known as an eBook. This is an electronic book that you download from their website, usually in .pdf format. There are a few things you should look at when evaluating which of these sites to trust and possibly purchase your guide from.

- First and probably most important is to look at their Money Back offer. Do they offer a truly risk-free guarantee? Make sure you read the fine print to ensure there isn’t a catch.

- Second, do you get other items as well as your diy guide? Most offer tax savings info, parts guides and other bonus information.

- Next, do you get to download the information directly after you make your purchase, or do you have to wait for someone to respond to you?

- Try out their customer service. Send them an email to ask a question and see how long it takes to get a reply.

- Does the site look like a copy of all the other sites you’ve seen, or does it look original?

- Do their videos appear professionally made, clear and can you hear the audio well?

These are just a few of the items you can use to verify the validity of the sites you are looking at. One review site that exist out there is MySolarReview.com which has taken most of the guess work out of the equation for you by providing reviews of 5 of the top DIY Green Energy sites.

Simply make sure you do a little research before you decide which DIY site to purchase your guide from. Make sure the one you choose will provide you with as much info as possible for your money. There are several review sites out there to help with your decision. No matter which review site you look at most of them will list Green Power Easy and Earth 4 Energy as their top picks.

If you have been searching the net for information about solar panels or wind turbines you have undoubtedly seen dozens of Green Energy Review websites. The Green Energy niche market is at the peak of its existence right now. With the “Green” movement in full force there are dozens of websites selling ebooks that teach you how to build your own solar panel and/or wind turbine. These ebooks are directed at the Do-It-Yourself homeowner who wants to start producing their own electricity in order to cut their energy costs.

In this article we are going to discuss a website which has gone to extended lengths to review five of the top DIY Green Energy websites and the guides they are offering for sale. This site is known as MySolarReview.com. The site has been produced by a family in Texas who decided a little while back that they wanted to build one of these solar panel systems for themselves. When researching the market they found so many sites to look at that it was very confusing as to which might be the one to choose. After performing all of their research they decided to create their website to help others through the decision process.

In the reviews on their website, they have rated each of the top five sites on the following traits.

• Green Power – Obviously the main goal from any power generation project is to generate power. They tested how much power each solar panel and windmill could actually generate.

• Ease of Building – With a package that teaches how to convert a home, the material should be clearly laid out, and the components should be simple to build.

• Instructional Value – From the above criteria they gave higher ratings to those learning packages that taught how to go green with ease. The best packages had everything clearly explained, drawn blueprints, and then further explained with how-to videos.

• Cost Involved – The main reason people choose to convert their home themselves is to save money. They gave much higher ratings to the packages that teach how to find parts for less.

• Availability of Parts – Some of the learning packages tested recommended parts that weren’t available. They gave higher marks to those that used parts that were available to anyone (such as at your local hardware store)

• Time Involved – How long did it take to build each component. They found this had a lot to do with how well the material was explained, but some of the plans just weren’t simple enough.

• Overall Rating – From the above factors they gave each package an overall rating.

The five sites reviewed, in order of their rankings, are Green Power Easy, Earth 4 Energy, Home Made Energy, Energy 4 Green and Power 4 Home. The consensus of all the reviews is that each guide is capable of providing you with the information needed to build a solar panel or wind turbine, but only the first two do it in convincing style. The highest ranked site, Green Power Easy, is one of the newest sites on the web. Their developers have taken the time to roll all the good aspects of the other products into one. They are offering several items in their package that the other sites don’t offer yet including Green Power Easy TV, a video series that takes you through the process step by step.

In short, if you are interested in converting your home over to renewable energy, MySolarReview.com is the place to start. At the bare minimum they will give you the information you need to do your own research and decide which Green Energy Guide is best for you.