Saving electricity.

[JohnW2]

I boil my water with a stove kettle - gas is 1/4 of the price of electricity. Probably slightly less efficient, but not 75% less. And helps warm the room a little in winter.

Same here, but (I blame my other half ) I have what must be the most 'ridiculous' and energy-inefficient of cookers known to man, otherwise known as an Aga!

Kind Regards, John

 

[JohnW2]

Last April I started turning off everything not in use and noticed a drop in bills. Not sure how much.

Around April 2017 (when there had been a significant {by those days standards!} hike in electricity prices), I very critically reviewed, and changed, my usage of electricity and, as a result, reduced my bills by 60%-70% - and that reduced usage has persisted every since (although prices have obviously gone up).

Kind Regards, John

 

[oldbutnotdead]

Big savings to be had by replacing ancient fridges and freezers, the modern ones may be very flimsy but they consume a lot less current than older ones.
Obvs ditch any tungsten lighting (especially if you have a zillion downlights at between 20 and 50w a go)

 

[Mr Chibs]

I don't think it's that simple, just binning old electrical items... and replacing with new ones that are more efficient.
If my plasma TV is £70 more per year to run, fair enough, but I will have to find £700+ to buy the replacement to get better efficiency.

Lighting is a cheap fix, to go round your house and replace.

 

[JohnW2]

Big savings to be had by replacing ancient fridges and freezers, the modern ones may be very flimsy but they consume a lot less current than older ones.

Indeed, that was one of the most decisive changes I effected back in 2017. I had several ancient fridges and freezers which, when I measured, were using obscene amounts of electricity. It did not take all that long for the savings in running costs to repay the cost of replacing most of them (generally with 'the cheapest I could find'!).

Another (to me unexpected) issue was that of a good few UPSs dotted around the house. When the batteries are new, they are not too energy-hungry, but when the batteries start ageing, the UPS ends up charging them almost continuously - and that adds up significantly over a number of such devices.

Obvs ditch any tungsten lighting (especially if you have a zillion downlights at between 20 and 50w a go)

Sure, that too - but I would hope that most people are aware of that by now (and, to a large extent, are being 'forced' to move to LEDs). It wasn't only the running costs, either. In the days of incandescents, with my very large house, I found myself having to buy large batches of bulbs every month or three - but now I buy small batches of LEDs every year or 3!

Kind Regards, John

 

[JohnW2]

I don't think it's that simple, just binning old electrical items... and replacing with new ones that are more efficient. If my plasma TV is £70 more per year to run, fair enough, but I will have to find £700+ to buy the replacement to get better efficiency.

Probably true in that case but, as I've just written, the arithmetic is usually much more favourable in the case of ancient fridges/freezers (and obviously with incandescent lighting).

Kind Regards, John

 

[Harry Bloomfield]

Last April I started turning off everything not in use and noticed a drop in bills. Not sure how much.

The big overnight consumers are fridges and freezers, plus maybe any lights you leave on unnecessary over night.

 

[JohnW2]

The big overnight consumers are fridges and freezers, plus maybe any lights you leave on unnecessary over night.

Indeed. As I said, the most dramatic changes I achieved back in 2017 resulted from the replacement of a number of ancient fridges and freezers (most of which were approaching the ends of their lives, anyway), which had been consuming obscene amounts of electricity, 24/7

Kind Regards, John

 

[Jackrae]

Was in John Lewis's today casually looking at modern flat screen TV sets.
There were only 2 energy efficiency ratings quoted on all sets; F and G
(Their letters, not my swearing)

 

[ericmark]

I boil my water with a stove kettle - gas is 1/4 of the price of electricity. Probably slightly less efficient, but not 75% less. And helps warm the room a little in winter.

Last April I started turning off everything not in use and noticed a drop in bills. Not sure how much.

I watched my daughter boil the electric kettle, and pour the water into the pan, and asked her why, she said it was faster, and I replied I don't think so that ring is rated 5.5 kW and the kettle is 2.8 kW.

So she did the demo, filled kettle to mark, poured it into a pan, filled again to mark, turned of gas, and turned on the kettle, and there was a very marked difference in the time, lid was on the pan, but it took some thing like twice as long, so if twice and long to boil and twice as much power being used that is ¼ the efficiency of gas.

So there is not real gain using gas to boil the kettle, in fact if to factor in how much hotter it makes the kitchen, and the fact you need a cooker hood to remove combustion gases, then it is likely more expensive to use gas.

But maybe due to using a hob rather than kettle, so when I got home, did the same test, and the 3 kW induction hob boiler the water same time as the 2.8 kW kettle.

The idea of just putting enough water in the kettle does not really work, some one will some time forget and boil it dry, however the one cup kettle does work, both same make, one on left fixed size, so need cups to match, one on right you can set cup size, and stop it mid flow, so one on right seems better, but although same wattage, the one on left always faster, the cup size is a bleed back into main reservoir, so always boils a large cup of water, even if only set to deliver small cup.

However main advantage is nothing to do with how much is costs, it is the speed, in the adverts on TV there is enough time to go to loo and make two cups of coffee before the program restarts. Big cup for me, small cup for wife.

We have a kettle which boils all the water in it, but only used when brewing beer.

If I want to save energy I could drink cold water, I still have hard wired phones, but we are moving to fibre, and that means phone will not work without router being powered. And when I have made those two cups of coffee last thing at night, easier to say hey google turn on landing lights, than to put the coffee down and switch them on with an old style switch.

And when I know there is a good program on TV, easier to get it to record rather than planning life around the TV.

I am sure I could live in a house the size of a caravan, with like a caravan a 16 amp electrical supply to work all, but the question is do I want to live in a house the size of a caravan, or do I enjoy living in a large three story house, and I do, so am willing the pay the extra to live in a house rather than a bed sit.

I did at one point start measuring how much stuff used, or I can monitor what I use with each plug in appliance, but soon lost interest, I will use it to see when battery charger has finished, or if beer brewing OK, but why bother? With a few exceptions like seeing if freezer is working OK, knowing what it used does not help, we buy a washing machine which weighs the cloths, and auto adjusts the cycle time, and water used, so it never uses the same amount of power even with same program, so what is the point in measuring?

As to dish washer, time is between 58 minutes and around 3 hours, it seems likely using 58 minutes uses less power, but not if the dishes are not clean and it needs doing twice. And yes it says for what each program is for, how many people sort out the dishes into hard and easy to clean? We don't, they all go in together.

To conclude, there is no point buying labour saving devices, then using labour to decide when to use them. You don't buy a dog and bark yourself. I am sure I could get a oil heater and just heat one room in the winter, one of these placed in the fire place would heat the room I am sure, but unless I do some thing silly like have a heat pump fitted, I should never need to do that, back in the late 50's early 60's these were common, I hope we have moved on since then?

 

[Harry Bloomfield]

Was in John Lewis's today casually looking at modern flat screen TV sets.
There were only 2 energy efficiency ratings quoted on all sets; F and G
(Their letters, not my swearing)

Maybe because they changed the energy rating system for TV's - the best you can buy at the moment is probably an E rating, which would previously have been an A+ rating.

 

[ericmark]

The big overnight consumers are fridges and freezers, plus maybe any lights you leave on unnecessary over night.

So you think we should switch them off at night?

As I said, the most dramatic changes I achieved back in 2017 resulted from the replacement of a number of ancient fridges and freezers (most of which were approaching the ends of their lives, anyway)

I did the same, however for a frost free freezer with a indicator to tell you during a power failure what was the max temperature reached is around the £750 upwards mark, if it lasts 10 years, then you have to consider swapping needs to save £75 per year to change it before it fails, typical power usage is around £250 per year, so in the main not worth renewing until it fails.

OK if it fails you also loose food, so not that simple, but that's like buying an electric car to save fuel, and spending £10,000 extra for the car, with around 10 - 15 years left to be driving, which is 4 times what I will pay for fuel, and that is before one considered the damage it is doing to the third world where workers are exploited to get the lithium for the batteries.

 

[Mr Chibs]

It's a funny thing with the energy usage on washing machines, (don't know about dishwashers) in the manual for my washer the least energy used is the longest programme... a 4 hour wash! It's also the least water used for the selected temperature.

 

[ericmark]

Was in John Lewis's today casually looking at modern flat screen TV sets.
There were only 2 energy efficiency ratings quoted on all sets; F and G
(Their letters, not my swearing)

Does that include the power used to run the LNB? I looked at power used for Sky box, only a few watts, but to be able to monitor program changes, it needs to receive the satellite signal, which means LNB is powered up, which takes more power than the sky box.

And so few channels on freeview from Moel-y-sant, no way am I using that.

 

[JohnW2]

I did the same, however for a frost free freezer with a indicator to tell you during a power failure what was the max temperature reached is around the £750 upwards mark ...

I've never paid anything remotely like that much for any refrigeration appliance. I have my own power-failure and over-temp alarms, which cost almost nothing in components, and took only a small amount of time to construct.

, if it lasts 10 years, then you have to consider swapping needs to save £75 per year to change it before it fails, typical power usage is around £250 per year, so in the main not worth renewing until it fails.

You seem to be overlooking the fact that, as I said, the fridges and freezers I replaced were all probably close to the end of their lives already, so your arithmetic was not appropriate to my situation.

typical power usage is around £250 per year,

What does that refer to? You're surely not suggesting that it costs that much to run a modern fridge/freezer, are you?

Kind Regards, John