Lower Your Air Conditioning Bill And Save The Planet
by John Laumer, Philadelphia 
on 08. 8.06
As our intro graphic, courstesy of the Florida Solar Energy Center , shows, opportunities for improvement in your air conditioning bill lie not only with expensive HVAC equipment upgrades, but in reducing your 'cooling load'. Although the site lists 16 ways to reduce the cooling load, thereby reducing your personal climate footprint, we’d like to focus on just one of them: solar screening. See the example below the fold.
SunBlox Corporation offers a solar screen that, as advertised: ‘Diverts up to 90% Of 230 BTU’s per square foot of the sun's energy as it approaches a home's windows & doors.’ Reportedly, use of solar screens results in an energy cost savings of up to 30% in the Central Florida market (depends on proportion of a home's envelope covered with sun-facing glass). The Orlando-based SunBlox, Inc. website mentions a payback period on savings approaching 6 years, and includes a photo gallery of product installs. We’ve clipped few shots for you. Solar screen installs, depending on brand/type, are priced in the $2 - $6/square foot installed.
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