If you are trying to save electricity, begin with measurement. That’s my first tip for how to save electricity. Once you know what you’re using for each light, appliance, or other home device, you will quickly find ways to lower your electricity use.
I should know. Our family foursome went from using a third as much as an average family of four in our province, down to one sixth as much. We started measuring our electricity use, and from there it wasn’t hard to find ways to cut waste. Most of our neighbors are amazed when we tell them how little electricity we use.
We had a solar engineer do a site assessment three years ago, when we were considering having a solar electric system installed. The engineer told us we should really cut our energy use in half first, because it is usually less expensive to reduce energy demand than to generate more of it from photovoltaic panels. But we only used 11 kilowatt hours (kwh) per day, I told him. Well, then, he said, you should cut it to 6 kwh.
This startled us – we already used far less electricity than our neighbors. Could we cut another 50%?
The engineer assured us we would figure it out, if we measured our electricity usage diligently. He sold us a Kill A Watt meter, which measures the power use of electrical appliances, such as watts used for a light, toaster, or fan, or kilowatt hours over time, for a chest freezer or washing machine.
We measured or guessed the energy use of every light, appliance, or other electrical device in our home. The furnace fan, the central air conditioning system, window fans, kitchen and bathroom fans. Computer and peripherals. Television, DVD and VCR. For lights, you can just check the light wattage printed on the bulb, and guess how many hours the light is left on each day. For electronics, fans and the like, measure the wattage with the Kill A Watt meter and do a similar calculation. For the fridge and freezer, we used the kilowatt hours measurement of the meter over a 72 hour period, then calculated kwh per day. For laundry appliances, we checked kwh per load, and estimated number of loads per year.
Once we had our numbers and could compute estimated electricity use per year, we went to our previous year’s bills. Surprisingly, our estimates were bang on.
Our next action was to deal with the major electricity users, and the many small devices that are continually running but provide little benefit.
The biggest energy users in terms of kwh per year were a wine cellar, chest freezer, fridge, and lighting, using a combined total of over 1,600 kwh/year. Energy users that provided little or no benefit were things such as computer peripherals (cable modem, router, a printer used twice a month or less); and a coffee maker, bread maker, and other devices with LED or LCD clocks, that stayed connected even when not in use. All told, these phantom loads used over 300 kwh/year.
Our first cut was the wine cellar. We decided it wasn’t ecologically justifiable to use the energy equivalent of 500 pounds of coal, to run a wine cellar, so we just kept the wines at the basement’s ambient temperature. The second thing I learned about saving electricity is how important it is to challenge yourself to redefine necessities as luxuries, and give them up. Other so-called necessities you might decide to treat as luxuries might be air conditioning, basement beer fridges, and any appliance our grandparents got by perfectly well without.
A simple temperature check of our ENERGY STAR refrigerator revealed that someone had accidentally turned the freezer thermostat down, so the compressor ran continuously and kept the freezer temperature way too low. We now check our refrigerator and freezer temperatures monthly, to avoid accidentally wasting electricity on our fridge and freezer.
Next we shut down the chest freezer, which we were no longer making much use of. It was only half full, and much of the food inside it had been frozen for a year or more. We used to preserve a lot of our own food, but had stopped a few years before, but we had somehow kept on using the freezer. By eating, throwing out, or moving food to the fridge freezer, we added 360 kwh per year to our electricity savings, which yields the third lesson I learned: Challenge your own ideas about what you consider necessary.
Lighting offers many opportunities to cut energy consumption. Here are two important tips on how to save electricity on lighting: use lights less (turn them off, use fewer lights in a fixture, use dimmer switches, use natural daylight), and switch to more energy efficient lights such as compact fluorescents and LED house lights. We probably cut 40 kwh/year off our lighting by taking such actions.
The devices that burned a few watts while doing no useful work were simple to fix. We put the computer and peripherals on a power supply bar, which was switched off when the computer wasn’t in use. Six watts may sound like trump change, but multiply that by a half dozen devices and by 24 by 365 hours, and it adds up to a bundle. We were wasting 180 kwh/year on computer peripherals, and got that down to 15 kwh/year. The VCR, DVD player, coffee maker, and other devices with electronic clocks were using another 125 kwh/year. So here’s the fourth thing I learned about saving electricity: unplug anything that isn’t working for you right now. Any device that requires an AC adapter, or that can be turned on by remote control, should be completely unplugged when you’re not using it. Any device with a digital clock must be drawing a trickle of electricity to keep the clock running. This may only be half a watt but typically it’s closer to the 1-3 watt range (9-27 kwh/year). That includes furnaces and AC systems when you’re not in the heating or cooling season – turn them off at the circuit breaker.
As we tackled items big and small, our energy use fell from 11 kwh/day to 8 kwh/day, a quarter of the typical usage for our area. And as we cut out big energy wasters, addressing smaller energy wasters suddenly made a bigger difference.
For instance, our stove only made up 5% of original energy use, but after our first round of cuts, it made up 7.5% of the new total. So we changed our cooking habits. We began to use our crock pot more, and did less roasting and baking. We became more diligent about measuring water before boiling it on the stove. No more opening the oven door every five minutes to check on cookies. And now it’s time for my fifth and final tip on saving electricity:
Keep raising the bar. You can always find more ways to cut.
Keep setting more ambitious goals. You’d be amazed at how little energy it takes to live a happy, fulfilling life. Do daily meter readings to confirm that your use is falling as expected, or holding steady, or beginning to climb.
Believe me, once you start measuring, and cutting, and seeing how low your electricity bills go, you’ll be hooked, just like I was. Who said saving electricity couldn’t be fun?
Robin Green owns Green-Energy-Efficient-Homes.com, a website that helps people find ways to use less energy at home. For more on saving electricity, see How to save electricity and Kill A Watt meter on Green Energy Efficient Homes.
Thank you for reading, British Gas Energy Smart
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A standard surge protector passes the electrical current along from the outlet to a number of electrical and electronic devices plugged into the power strip. If the voltage from the outlet surges or spikes — rises above the accepted level — the surge protector diverts the extra electricity into the outlet's grounding wire.
A power surge can damage electrical appliances. A power surge is an increase in voltage significantly above the designated level in a flow of electricity. In normal household and office wiring in the United States, the standard voltage is 120 volts. If the voltage rises above 120 volts, there is a problem, and a surge protector helps to prevent that problem from destroying your appliance.
A surge protector can be inadequate, depending on the strength of the surge. but different surge protectors merely offer a level of protection. there are various different types and price ranges that offer higher or lower levels of protection.
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That depends on the fan. There should be a label on the fan telling you the power consumption. Ok, rather the wattage, but that's easily converted.
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Wow, I wish I had a maid. Thanks Rhonda that was fun to watch.
Each week our friends at Inhabitat recap the week’s most interesting green developments and clean tech news for us — it’s the Week in Green. Solar power blazed a trail this week as we took a look at several hot new technologies, starting with SkyFuel’s SkyTrough, which is being billed as the world’s most efficient solar collector. We also saw solar energy take to the skies as designers unveiled plans for a fleet of high-flying solar robots, and we were surprised to learn that common household dyes could significantly increase the efficiency of photovoltaic panels by optimizing their color absorption spectrum. Speaking of dye, from the realm of wearable tech we also brought you a breakthrough new technique for dying fabric that saves water by utilizing fluid CO2. We also saw a prototype for a wired “safe cuddling” suit for kids that wards off improper touching by sounding an alarm, and if you’re a fan of high-tech footwear, check out these tricked-out kicks that do double duty as Wii…
cool
Check and see how much it is using. Unplug the freezer and go outside and check you meter and then check it plugged in. A little math and you should be able to get pretty close.
Soundtrack details?
far less energy than me? lol i doubt it. We made wind turbines and no longer use any city wide elect. And that fact that i’m a female has nothing to do with anything. Also, my age is irrelevant considedring i graduated high school in 2006 at the age of 15. For some solar energy isnt practical but neither is wind turbines. Based on energy need and reliance on wheather, anyone can make enough energy to run a mansion for less than $1,000, the problem lies in how much labor you’ll do.
Isn’t it wierd that Michael Jackson died at the same time this bill went to be voted on in Congress?
I think that might be the longest single sentence I've ever seen, and it was so hard to read and comprehend what's going on that I gave up halfway through. I can make no sense at all of the part I did read.
If yours are covered in glass, like mine, try those window washer thingies that they use in gas stations. I know you will have to climb up there to use them, but it makes it quite easy and quick to clean…
Power is off and don't want to open the fridge.. About to go find something to eat
How much do you think you spend on electricity?: I know reef tanks use a fair amount of electricity, and since I…
11:36 Sounds like a very sustainable economy to me! Mine more resources out of an already ravaged and depleted desert land! Yeah!
its still plugged in if u want it to stop running pull it out of the wall and unnplug it do whatever you want with the food inside but just dont throw it away thats wastefull
CRAMMED! Hey, take a look at this right now… central air conditioning system
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