A cool landscape can lower your bills

Take a look outside your window.

The answer to saving money on home-cooling costs during the summer may lie with the plant life that surrounds your home.

A well-managed and -designed household landscape can not only add natural beauty to a home, but also keep the power and gas bills under control during the summer.

Here are a few basic suggestions for money-saving planting around the home:

• Plant trees or shrubs to shade air-conditioning units, but not block the airflow. A unit operating in the shade uses less electricity.

• An area richly populated with deciduous trees can also reduce the daytime air temperature by as much as six degrees, according to the Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory.

The U.S. Department of Energy estimates that just three trees, properly placed around a house, can save between $100 and $250 annually in cooling and heating costs.

• Consider growing vines, such as ivy or grapevines, on trellises.

These plants can shade windows or the whole side of a house, and stem heat exposure and buildup.

• Avoid using large amounts of unshaded rock, cement or asphalt on the south or west sides of a landscape because they increase the temperature around the house.

These surfaces also radiate heat toward the house after the sun has set.

Source: U.S. Department of Energy