16 Jul How Blinds Improve Energy Efficiency

How Blinds Improve Energy Efficiency

Windows account for nearly 50% of heat gain or loss in the home, so it is highly important to invest in high-quality, energy efficient window treatments. Whether wood, faux-wood, or vertical, blinds are a great method for making a home more energy efficient. Read on to learn about how blinds can make your home more energy efficient.

Highly reflective

When blinds are closed—light-colored blinds in particular—their highly reflective slats work to cast light away from the home, working effectively to reduce the amount of heat entering the home during the warm summer months. In fact, the U.S. Department of Energy estimates that “when completely closed and lowered on a sunny window, highly reflective blinds can reduce heat gain by around 45%,” which is significant when considering that windows account for nearly 50% of the heat gain or loss in a home depending on the season. When blinds work to reflect light back outdoors, it keeps the light from entering the home, striking objects inside the room, and turning into heat that in turn has to be counteracted with air conditioning.

Light control

Blinds, of course, can be opened to let natural sunlight stream into the home during the day. And while you do lose the benefits of high reflectivity when you do this, you do gain the advantage of having natural sunlight as your source of light instead of electric indoor lighting. Moreover, horizontal blinds can be uniquely positioned to block light and reflect it onto a light colored ceiling, which causes the light to be more softly diffused throughout the room, without much heat or glare.

Energy efficient design

Wood and faux-wood blinds are often manufactured in distinct vanes that allow them to more tightly close and block out sunlight. When blinds are closely more tightly, they create a better insulation barrier for keeping the heat from sunlight at bay.

Energy efficient materials

Wood and faux-wood blinds are made from materials that are famously poor conductors of heat: wood and vinyl. In addition, many vertical blinds are backed with vinyl in order to block out more heat and keep out even more light.

If you’re in the Salt Lake area and are looking to improve energy efficiency in your home with blinds, contact Wasatch Shutter Design at 801-839-5967 today for a free estimate for your windows. We are a company that truly strives to improve the standards of window treatments, and we continue to raise the bar in terms of quality and value of window treatments.