When we talk about reducing energy use around the house, it’s frequently in the context of saving money on monthly utility bills. It makes sense — money plays a role in so many decisions that we make, from where we work to what kind of car we drive to where we go shopping. But it turns out that people are actually more motived to save energy because it’s better for the environment and their health than because of money, according to a recent study by the University of California Los Angeles. The result is contrary to the expectations of even the test participants themselves.

Money vs. Pollution, Health

The study broke up households into two categories — one of which received weekly reminders about how much money they could be saving by cutting back on their energy usage, while the other was told about all the air pollution they were creating, and how it could play a role in children contracting asthma and cancer. The researchers gave both groups analytical tools to track how and when they used the most electricity, as well as comparisons to their neighbors to give them benchmarks to shoot for.

In the end, the group that was nagged about money failed to change their habits to include any efficiency measures. The health and environment group, on the other hand, slashed their energy usage by an average of 8 percent — and families with children cut back by 19 percent.

Won’t Somebody Think of the Children?

Before the study, participants were asked what message they thought would be effective in persuading them to cut back on their electricity usage, and most of them said that money would be the prime motivating factor. The results proved otherwise.

“We’re finding that you have to bundle the public good with the private good,” said Magali Delmas, the study’s principal investigator and an environmental economist at the UCLA Anderson School of Management, said in a press release. “Our message about health and the environment reminds people that environmentalism is also about them and their kids.”

Researchers speculated that the amount of money at stake simply wasn’t high enough to prompt people to act, but when homeowners were motived by a combination of benefiting their own families and being good citizens, they did take action.

“The message reminds you that you’re hurting people and the planet,” one of the study participants reported afterward. “It made me more conscious of the energy I was using.”

Go Beyond the Pocketbook

The study can be a lesson for officials and utility companies who seek to encourage people to cut down on their energy consumption. While everybody likes saving money, sometimes you need to appeal to more than just their pocketbooks to get people to act.

Why not take advantage of all three benefits? By taking simple steps to lower your energy usage, you can cut back on your bills, help the environment and protect public health all at once. If you aren’t sure how to get started, call an expert to give your home an energy audit and put you on the path to a cleaner, healthier and more frugal lifestyle.

If you’ve been contemplating upgrading your home electrical system with your very own solar panel installation, there is no better time than summer. Here are a few reasons to make those dreams a reality.

The first is that you’ll get the best performance out of your system when the sun is shining the most. Of course, your solar array is going to give you energy savings all year long, especially in sunny southern California but in the summer, you’ll see impressive results right away that will really show you the potential of home solar power.

Without the threat of inclement weather preparing your home and installing your new system is much faster, translating to a more painless process for you. It also means that we have more jobs in the summer, so you might need a little advance scheduling. But all that is beside the biggest reason that you should pursue a solar panel installation:

The sooner you get solar at your home, the sooner you can start saving.

As you know, power prices increase all the time, with an average increase of around five percent a year. While municipal power increases, solar power provides a point of stability for your energy bill. Your solar power will always cost the same amount, so every time municipal power increases, your savings do too.

And with generous tax rebates and solar leasing agreements, you can establish an impressively low cost investment on your solar panel installation. You might even qualify for no down payment. You pay the cost of installation and parts over the life of your solar panel, even as you see instant deductions in your power bill.

As you can see, taking action now translates to intense savings for years to come. Don’t wait another minute. Let us help you take charge of you energy and financial future this summer.