met council’s helpful tips
How to winterize your home Whether you live in an apartment or a house, New York winters are cold. It’s important to winterize our homes both for safety reasons and to keep heating bills from getting out of hand. Search for heat Leaks Drafts can waste 5% to 30% of your energy use, they can also give your thermostat a false reading, which can cause your furnace to work overtime. Start off by finding out where the leaks are - on a breezy day, walk around inside holding a lit incense stick to the most common drafty areas: recessed lighting, window and door frames, electrical outlets. The smoke from the incense will waver if there is a draft. It’s easy to stop drafts- just place a rolled bath towel under a drafty door, or make a draft snake out of scraps of fabric, and fill with sand or kitty litter for heft. Caulk and tacky rope caulk can fill other drafty spots around windows and outlets. Face your windows If you have them, put up storm windows, which provide an extra layer of protection and warmth for the home. Storm windows are especially helpful if you have old, single-pane glass windows. If you don’t have storm windows, pick up a window insulator kit from your local hardware store. The kit includes plastic sheets that affix temporarily to a window’s interior with double-stick tape. It’s an inexpensive and effective way of keeping out the cold.
outdoors If you have trees growing on your property, trim any dead branches that could break under weight of ice and snow and injure a person or your property. If there is a city tree in front of your building that you think needs trimming don’t try to do it yourself; call 311 and the NYC Parks Department will send a crew to trim any dead branches.
Attics and gutters Add extra insulation to the attic, it will prevent warm air from creeping up to your roof and causing ice dams. Clean out the gutters and use a hose to spray water down the downspouts to clear away debris. Consider installing leaf guards on the gutters or extensions on the downspouts to direct water away from the home.
winter home safety As the cold weather settles in, you may burn candles, use space heaters or wood burning stoves. While these devices may help heat your home they also pose certain safety risks if not monitored correctly. As part of your home winterization, check the batteries of your smoke detectors and install a carbon monoxide detector near your furnace and/or water heater. Also, make sure you know where your fire extinguisher is.
AC and Garden Hoses To avoid hoses freezing and cracking, drain garden hoses and air conditioner pipes. If your AC has a water shutoff valve, shut it off. Turn off exterior water spigots. www.MetCouncil.org