Now that it's been a few months since I got the "green" bug, I thought I'd give you an update on what's happened with our electric bill since we replaced our incandescent lights with compact fluorescent lights and started using radiant panel heaters instead of our heat pump to heat our upstairs.

Not to put too fine a point on it, we've saved almost $300 on our electric bills just in the last three months!

Now, your first question might be, "Well, okay, you can say that, but how do you really know? And how can I check my own progress?"

It's easy! What I did was compare the bills for the months since we started our energy conservation - and money-saving! - efforts with the bills for last year. I looked at the number of kilowatt hours (kWh) used for February, March, and April this year, and found the difference for the same months last year. Here's what I came up with:

• February: 287 kWh less than 2006
• March: 739 kWh less than 2006
• April: 713 kWh less than 2006

Now, when looking at those figures, there are a couple things you need to know. First, in February our heat pump ran for around 100 hours when we were away and I had the thermostats set a bit too low, so we didn't save nearly as much. Second, the average temperature (which is reported on our utility bills) for both February and March this year were five degrees colder than last year, but we still saved a ton of electricity!

Figuring out the money part might vary a bit, depending on how you're being billed. For example, if you just pay a flat rate for all your electricity (as we will be next month once we get switched over to 100% wind power), you just multiply the cost per kilowatt hour times the number of kilowatt hours saved. For example, if your flat-rate electricity cost is $0.10/kWh and you used 500 kWh less, that would be a savings of $0.10 x 500 = $50.

If you have "time of use" metering, things are a little more complex. This metering usually divides the day up into peak, intermediate, and off-peak periods. The cost of electricity is highest for peak, goes down some for intermediate periods, and is cheapest during off-peak times (which are usually nighttime hours and weekends).

For us, our current prices per kilowatt hour are $0.11891 for peak, $0.10134 for intermediate, and $0.09093 for off-peak periods. The utility will then average the cost for the usage you make for each period to determine your "cost to compare" (this should appear somewhere on your bill), which for us is $0.1056 per kilowatt hour. This price is what you'd use to compare your current utility with alternatives when you shop for electricity.

So, let's do the math for February, March, and April of this year:

• February: $0.1056/kWh x 287 kWh = $30.31
• March: $0.1056/kWh x 739 kWh = $78.04
• April: $0.1056/kWh x 713 kWh = $75.29

Total saved: $183.64!

Now, that's the savings off of our current billing method. But I'm also going to kick up a little dirt about our utility company, Baltimore Gas & Electric (BGE) that might be worth keeping in mind. Without going into all the gory details, the actual average price for our electricity is now $0.15749 per kilowatt hour (not $0.1056). The reason we're being billed for less is that there's a state-mandated deferment of a huge cost increase that went into effect last year with BGE. But not only are BGE customers going to have to pay the balance of their bill that's deferred (it'll be tagged onto future bills), they'll have to pay interest on it, too!

The reason I bring this up isn't just to take a shot at BGE: it's also to impress upon you how important a little bit of research can be into where your money's going. Check out all those charges on your utility bill - do you have a clue what they are? Are you paying more than you have to for electricity and/or gas? Are there green energy options available? Don't be a sheep - you can shop around for your electricity and gas!

So, let's take another look at those savings with the real numbers:

• February: $0.15749/kWh x 287 kWh = $45.20
• March: $0.15749/kWh x 739 kWh = $116.39
• April: $0.15749/kWh x 713 kWh = $112.29

The total? A whopping $273.88 that we've saved in just three months! For anybody who's counting, that just paid for all of the compact fluorescent light bulbs and two of the five radiant panel heaters that we bought. And if I hadn't screwed up in February and let the darn heat pump run, we probably would've saved another $60 or so.

So, what's the bottom line here? That energy conservation lightens the load on your wallet or purse!

On top of that, we saved 1,739 kilowatt hours of electricity - that's more than a full month's worth of our previous average usage (1,476 kWh per month)! And that's that much less power that some nasty coal or nuclear power plant had to generate, reducing the amount of greenhouse gases, mercury, and nuclear waste going into our kids' environment. Maybe not by much, but every bit helps.

And if I did it, you can, too - you don't have to live in a cave to be "green"!

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