The utilities in my city are owned by the local government. I guess it is a pretty large substitute stream for them, if my electric bill is any indication. I try to conserve both water & electricity, however even when I am really careful my city bills can be so discouraging. I have always known that the largest portion of the electric usage in a house is the Heating, Ventilation, & A/C system. Anything that makes your gas furnace or a/c job harder is costing you money. Because of that, I called in the specialist to do an energy audit of my house. I don’t own the house, I rent, although I was hoping there would be some simple things I could do to save on heating & cooling and other things that could decrease my energy footprint. It turns out there were a few things after all. First, there are small cracks between the bottom of the doors & the floor. Those allow the undefined & heating to escape, which means my central heating & cooling plan has to job longer & harder. The guy recommended I purchase inexpensive draft dodgers to locale there. Second, the temperature control/energy auditor showed myself and others that the caulking around my windows was looking pretty pathetic. To help my a/c out even more, I should re-caulk the windows. He looked at my air filter, & much to my delight, he was thrilled that it wasn’t dirty. I do change the a/c air filters properly! Go me! He did also say that the central heating & cooling component I have does not have a high SEER rating, however there is nothing I can do about that.