burlingtony asked:
standard 8 ft ceiling) I would assume it’s about a 12% reduction in actual cubic footage and I was wondering if it would save you about that much in energy costs ?
Kelly
standard 8 ft ceiling) I would assume it’s about a 12% reduction in actual cubic footage and I was wondering if it would save you about that much in energy costs ?
Kelly
Tags: Cubic Footage, Energy Costs, Foot Ceiling
It might save more because heat rises. When I had baseboard electric heat, I thought I would save money by turning them off whenever I was gone. But I found without air circulating all the heat went to the ceiling at first and for a long time until it mixed.
So sitting in a chair I was cold but it was 100F degrees at the ceiling. I found it was cheaper in cold weather to turn it down, not off, so I wouldn’t turn it up higher because I felt cold.
And I bought fans to circulate, mix, the air. That helped.
Doing this would have some energy savings, as you are heating’cooling a smaller space. The size of your HVAC unit could be smaller, but again, not that big of a savings.
What can reduce your bills dramatically is proper insulation, stopping air leaks, turning your thermostat up a few degrees for cooling and down for heating, using overhead fans, etc.
What matters more than volume is surface area and how much heat loss/gain from that particular surface area. That reduces the percent gain from a shorter ceiling, unless you stuff that extra foot with insulation.
Since windows and doors would tend to be the least insulated, someone who knows heat loss calculations would have to figure out how much actual reduction there might be. So savings might not be as great as you think without other adjustments, especially if it is an existing home.
In a primary living space, you probably would not be able to lower your ceiling to 7′. Check with your local building inspector. There are minimum headroom requirements, and 7′ would not meet code. Interesting theory, though.
I would not lower the ceiling. The problem with both AC and heat is that air stratifies along temperature variations. Thus hot air goes up and cold air goes down. You would be getting better things for your money if you were to install ceiling fans in your rooms to keep the air moving and thus have uniform cool or heat depending upon the season.