Reducing your KWH (Electricity Use)

[Porcelain Interior]

I just wanted to report that I reduced my KWH by 136 ($12) this past month by not using a hairdryer. FWIW it broke and I just returned it, it was brand new and I was miffed and decided to go without.

136 KWH's is nothing to sneeze at. With hairdryer my KWH averaged 684, without hairdryer it's 548.

I've just in the past week implemented power strips for all stations that have phantom loads and switching them completely off during non use and at night.

This includes:

TV/DVD/ in living room, TV/DVD in the bedroom, and TV/DVD/Wii upstairs, also computer/printer/modem/peripherals in the office.

I'm excited to see what happens with the bill.

Thanks for entertaining this boring report on my KWH.

[slsurface]

Phantom load can be quite a problem. We use power strips too and it really does make a difference. I've never checked the numbers, but I know it saves me $$.

[Liquesce]

I'd love to find a way to reduce my electric bill even just a couple of dollars, but, well, frankly we don't use that much ... short of stapling a note to my forehead to remind me about the occasional light switch I forget to flip (or, uh, wasting less time on MDC), I'm pretty much stuck at the level I'm at.

[AuntNi]

That is awesome - great work!

I personally don't think I could go without a hair dryer. But I have been trying to reduce phantom loads, too. I am totally addicted to my electric toothbrush, but I only let it charge a few hours per day. I also have been turning off the computers when I'm not using them. And the biggie that I resisted for a long time was increasing the temp on my A/C. I thought I would not be able to survive it I put it up to 78 in the summer, but with my ceiling fan in my office, it was bearable. And it decreased my KWH by over 500 the first month! :

I also got a lot of tips from this guy's website: http://michaelbluejay.com/electricity/

[mnnice]

Wow I knew hair dryers were energy hogs, but that's a ton. No one in our household use a hair dryer (I should because I go to work with wet hair like a middle school kid).

We quit using the electric dryer (except for about two loads per month because our clothesline doesn't accomodate king sized sheets) and its save about 150 kw per month too.

Eventually we'd like to be off grid (where exactly we don't know) and we know that the less we use the easier it will be to accomplish.

[southhavenjen]

Wow, how long did it take you to blow dry your hair each day?!! That's 4.5KW per day that you are saving.

[Porcelain Interior]

Originally Posted by southhavenjen

Wow, how long did it take you to blow dry your hair each day?!! That's 4.5KW per day that you are saving.

10 minutes max, I don't have very thick hair.

[Tradd]

I've got short hair and it takes me less than five minutes to blow dry my hair. And I don't do it everyday. Aside from Sat & Sun when I'm going places, I probably only dry my hair another 1-2 days a week. I go to work most of the time with wet hair (it dries quickly), but it looks MUCH better if I dry it, so I save that for days when I have to look better, lol! I also use a very small hair dryer.

[filiadeluna]

Until recently, I've been pretty happy with our electric bill. It averaged between $45-$60 a month in our apartment. Since we bought a house, it ran around $60-$65 each month until the last couple of bills. My last two bills were $115, which is INSANE to me. : I know part of it is because of the TVA hike due to the sludge spill. Another part of it is just having the heat on more with colder temperatures.

I am very ANAL about turning off the lights and everything else when not in use. We only have 1-2 lights on at night when we are awake. One is a small lamp with a compact fluorescent bulb, and the other is our stove light in case we need something out of the kitchen. I let my hair air dry year-round, and that takes hours since I've got hip-length hair. It's better for my hair anyway.

I have been desperately trying to get DH to finish putting the blinds back up (they were taken down for painting when we bought the house), b/c I know that will help with keeping the house warm. He just hasn't done it yet, and I don't much feel like doing it myself at 38 weeks pregnant.

[Belleweather]

Thanks for all the hints -- our electric bill is creeping up in the new house, and finding a way to cram it back down is high on my list of spring projects!

[llamalluv]

Originally Posted by Porcelain Interior

I just wanted to report that I reduced my KWH by 136 ($12) this past month by not using a hairdryer. FWIW it broke and I just returned it, it was brand new and I was miffed and decided to go without.

136 KWH's is nothing to sneeze at. With hairdryer my KWH averaged 684, without hairdryer it's 548.

I've just in the past week implemented power strips for all stations that have phantom loads and switching them completely off during non use and at night.

This includes:

TV/DVD/ in living room, TV/DVD in the bedroom, and TV/DVD/Wii upstairs, also computer/printer/modem/peripherals in the office.

I'm excited to see what happens with the bill.

Thanks for entertaining this boring report on my KWH.

I doubt it was ALL from the hair dryer.

http://www.motherearthnews.com/Energ...icity-Use.aspx

So, I’ve left the Kill a Watt plugged into my computer for 10 days now, and the meter shows that during that time the computer has used 13.5 kilowatt-hours of electricity.

Have I used that much electricity over the last 10 days while drying my hair? Not even close. 1.5 kilowatt-hours is a better guess, because I've probably spent a total of an hour* drying my hair over the last 10 days.
So, yes, I’m using far more electricity with my computer than with my hair dryer.

I really want one of those Kill-a-Watts, or possibly one of the $100 versions that you hook directly to your meter to track ALL of your household usage.

[Porcelain Interior]

Originally Posted by llamalluv

I doubt it was ALL from the hair dryer.

http://www.motherearthnews.com/Energ...icity-Use.aspx



I really want one of those Kill-a-Watts, or possibly one of the $100 versions that you hook directly to your meter to track ALL of your household usage.

Oh me too, I do realize it was rather large after breaking it down, but that is the only thing I've eliminated entirely in the last month, so I don't know what to attribute the rest to. We don't use electric heat, and our hot water heat is gas. I may have hung a couple more loads of laundry than usual, but I'm pretty consistent with hanging my laundry and Jan was a tough month and I was lazier and used the dryer more than in Dec, so it is quite a mystery. Whatever it is (maybe more vigilance about lights?) I'll take it.

[sunnysandiegan]

This is a very timely thread. Thanks!!!!! DH is at a conference for the week and I need to figure out how to reconfigure various power strip situations in our house in order to flip the switch whenever they are not in use.

Thanks to AuntNi, I read the site she linked above and researched a few monitoring devices and called KitchenAid to find out our refrigerator's usage (largest user of electric energy in our home, from what I can tell after reading all of the above). It is 616 kWh per year, so 51.33333 kWh per month (on average, of course). I am guessing our dishwasher is the next highest user of electric energy, so a call to Sears is in order.

I looked up our energy bill online and for the month of January 2009, we used 378 kWh. If the fridge is the highest single user and it is only using 52 kWh, where on earth are we using the other 326 kWh???

Meanwhile, our utility company has some cool tools online. One such tool is I can choose certain criteria about our household (type of home, year built, square footage, number of people, etc) and it will compare our usage to other households like ours. Well, I am not surprised to find we use less electricity and gas than comparable households most of the last 12 months. The interesting finding, however, is during the few months when we used more therms (gas - Jan, Feb, & Nov 08) our usage was enough higher to put us into a new pricing tier and cause our average COST for the year to be higher than comparable households even though our average CONSUMPTION was still lower than comparable households. Therefore, it would behoove us financially to work more diligently during those key months to lower our gas consumption below whatever the "magic" therm level is to avoid going into the higher priced tier. This particular feature only goes back 12 months, but I can see our bill for 24 months and I can see that we went over that "magic" therm level (29-30 therms per month) during our four "winter" months each year EXCEPT this December. We hardly have winters here, so it seems that simply having the heat turn on AT ALL pushes us over that edge into the next tier. Hmmm... How do other people avoid it? From the data I saw, it looks like their therm usage is more consistent all year (in the mid-20s) whereas ours drops down into the teens 6 months out of the year and low 20's for two months, then low 30s for the remaining four months. Does this mean they are using the level billing plan??? The bill amounts on this screen are not EQUAL for each month. However, they are more similar than ours are. Our bills for the last 12 months range from $55 to $102. Comparable households had bills ranging from $68 to $92. Hmmm... something to ponder...