Cut Your Energy Bill This Winter with 35 Pro Tips

1. Use your microwave

For starters, use your microwave oven more in order to reheat food instead of your regular oven. That regular oven consumes more energy because it has to heat itself up before it can heat anything else up. In many cases, you can use the microwave to cook your food, too. “Using a microwave can use as much as 80% less energy when reheating than a standard oven,” according to the U.S. Department of Energy.

Microwaves also often let foods retain more of their nutrients. If you boil your broccoli, for example, many nutrients get dumped down the drain when you discard the boiling water. If you buy and use a fancier combination microwave/convection oven, you can save even more, as the convection feature circulates the air, heating things faster. Convection ovens use about 20% less energy than conventional ones, on average.