Bringing down my gas and leccy bill challenge (start August 2008)

greenbee

No, sorry, instead of the candle ones.

There is another thread somewhere that has information on energy saving dimmable bulbs. I've got some philips ones (can't remember what they're called). They don't save as much as CFLs, but then again, they don't have mercury in them!

oldMcDonald

I'm with Eon and have just heard about the price increases from tomorrow:(

At least we have been looking hard at our usage and ways to bring it down this past week - looks like we are going to have to have a family chat tonight and make sure the kids understand why we have been doing it.

mrs-moneypenny

has anyone on here used or heard of an owl?
its a wireless device that tells you what you are using in cost and watts. there was an article about them in our local paper last night they cost £35. i wondered if anyone had found them useful or if they trained you to save enough to make them worthwhile

newlywed

mrs-moneypenny wrote: »

has anyone on here used or heard of an owl?
its a wireless device that tells you what you are using in cost and watts. there was an article about them in our local paper last night they cost £35. i wondered if anyone had found them useful or if they trained you to save enough to make them worthwhile

rayday2 on the dmp support thread has just got one. Maybe pm her to ask?


Given up trying to get energy saving bulbs for the front room after emailing a supplier who says you can't get dimmable ones for that

So concentrating on the other rooms instead - to replace the bulbs in just 4 rooms will cost us £160!!!! ouch

But these are some of the costs and W savings - any ideas on how much actual electricity money this will save over the year??

Room 1 - cost of bulbs £26 - 120W down to 21W - saving 99W
Room 2 - cost of bulbs £36 - 200W down to 44W - saving 156W
Room 3 - cost of bulbs £45 - 200W down to 35W - saving 165W
Room 4 - cost of bulbs £32 - 400W down to 250W - saving 160W

Am definitely going to rethink how often I put lights on, looking at that list of W per room All of it was pre-MSE :rolleyes:

Will be doing one room at a time I think due to the cost of all those bulbs

Have also just discovered our prepay elec is actually on economy 7 (OH always dealt with this and when I asked said he didn't know :rolleyes:) so will be moving any washing loads and dishwasher runs to after 10pm from now on - starting from last night when I found out

greenbee

Newlywed - I suggest that you just buy the energy saving bulbs as the old ones go, rather than doing it all in one go, and it will seem less expensive (besides, it would be wasteful to throw out bulbs that are already working ).

As my bulbs go, I move them round, so for example, if one on a dimmer goes, I replace e.g. the outside light (hardly used, but if I do use it it tends to get left on ) with an energy saving bulb and move the old one to a dimmer.

Where I have halogens in the kitchen, I don't replace them when they go if it doesn't make a difference. If you have lights with multiple bulbs, cutting down on the number is pretty effective (just leave the dead ones in).

Dimmable bulbs - try Philips EcoClassic (think I got it in homebase). It's only 30% more efficient, but its better than nothing.

greenbee

mrs-moneypenny wrote: »

has anyone on here used or heard of an owl?

Have a search, as they're discussed on loads of threads. Some people have found them useful, others reckon that if you do the right thing (switch stuff off when not in use :rolleyes: ), then you don't really need them. £35 is quite a lot of money - if you are going to get one, look for an offer. The cheapest place I found one was on the British Gas website, but I ended up borrowing a plug in meter from a colleague (its one of the ones that measures each appliance separately) so I now know which are the most efficient washes on my DW/WM, that I need to switch of the charger for my cordless phone etc...

Andy_Hamilton

£160? What bulbs do you really want?
Lidl are selling Philips 18W bulbs for under 80p each. flicker free instant start. The colour is not too bad.

I

newlywed

greenbee wrote: »

Newlywed - I suggest that you just buy the energy saving bulbs as the old ones go, rather than doing it all in one go, and it will seem less expensive (besides, it would be wasteful to throw out bulbs that are already working ).

As my bulbs go, I move them round, so for example, if one on a dimmer goes, I replace e.g. the outside light (hardly used, but if I do use it it tends to get left on ) with an energy saving bulb and move the old one to a dimmer.

Where I have halogens in the kitchen, I don't replace them when they go if it doesn't make a difference. If you have lights with multiple bulbs, cutting down on the number is pretty effective (just leave the dead ones in).

That's the thing - every room except the kitchen has a bulb or two gone :rolleyes: Its one of those things that really bugs me, can't help it

I think we're going to do the bathroom first as that has no natural light at all and will save 156w by doing those (and one has blown already). For the bedroom, the supplier has confirmed we can mix normal with energy saving in the same light fitting and there shouldn't be problem so might look to doing those one at a time - but the whispy topped candle bulbs replaced with fat energy saving candles will be seriously obvious :rolleyes:

newlywed

Andy_Hamilton wrote: »

£160? What bulbs do you really want?
Lidl are selling Philips 18W bulbs for under 80p each. flicker free instant start. The colour is not too bad.
I

Well it's like this:

8 MR16 spots (kitchen)
4 GU10 spots (bathroom)
5 dimmable candle bulbs - SES (bedroom)
3 R50 reflector bulbs (boys room).

Total including VAT from energybulbs is £163 :eek:

We only have one "normal size" bulb in the whole place - which is energy saving

Cranky

Great Thread all!!!!

I've found some great tips here which I will try and implement behind the families back (as they will just ignore me:( - bet if they paid if they would pay the bill they would change there minds)

My tips - if your using a pc instead of a laptop go into the control panel and use your power manegement functions set a time to turn off your monitor and a time for your pc to go to sleep, better still turn it off.

Here's some pics for the kids to remind them to turn things off http://files.webhost.ru/stuff/edf_ad.html