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There’s a lot you can do this summer to save energy.  The same insulation and weather-stripping that saved energy during the winter months will show you benefits during the summer as well. Even so, there are a few things you can still do during the hot weather that can help. Don’t Overwork Your ACYour air conditioner has enough work to do. If you’ve already chosen the most efficient air conditioner you could find and even made sure it’s the right size for your living space, there’s still more you can do to help improve its efficiency. •    During the daytime,...

Building a deck from scratch is one of the toughest DIY projects one can take on. Think about it..it’s just some wood and a bunch of screws right? Thinking to yourself, you firmly believe this is something you can confidently do yourself and I believe in you. We have all been on at least one and thought, ‘yea I can do this.’ Building any deck is a difficult project many people successfully complete. Follow this article for an overview of where to start when building a deck from scratch. Decks are like complex math problems as you’re sure to experience...

On a jobsite in Kingsville, Texas, in August 2013, a worker was mixing gypsum concrete in preparation for gypcrete installation on an apartment building. It’s not a particularly taxing job, but he was doing it in direct sunlight. “He wasn’t training or doing anything that involved a lot of lifting or climbing,” says Holly Webster, director of administration at Texas-based KWA Construction, which served as the general contractor on the job. (KWA would not release further information on either the worker or subcontractor.) The man, in his 20s, had just transferred from New Mexico, and he wasn’t used to the...

According to the US Energy Information Administration (EIA), residential lighting consumption for 2014 was about 150 billion KWh, or roughly 14% of total residential electricity consumption. That’s still kind of high when you think about it -- even with the advent of CFL bulbs and LED’s. Of course, results vary with lifestyles. If you’ve done all that you can to save on your electric bill; you’ve used CFL bulbs and/or LEDs and make every effort to keep the lights off when not in use— there’s still more that you can do. Consider allowing more natural light into your home. This...

When it comes to proper lighting, one of the most critical rooms in the home is the bathroom. It’s most often the first place people go to when they wake up in the morning, and it can set the mood for the day. The bathroom is where you wash and groom, and many people take their morning medications there—all strong cases for optimized lighting and daylighting. The other reason is that light, particularly daylight, is what sets our circadian rhythms, which play an important part in overall health.  Helping people see well is also critical for safety, since the bathroom...