Energy Saving Monitors/Sockets.

kaybal

Hi all,
Just before last Christmas I received one of those "Electricity Monitors & Energy
Saving Sockets" from British Gas. Now to be fair, these 2 items, though they had
the British Gas logo on them are not made by B/G. and a number of companies
give/sell the exact same kit with their own badge on it.
I've just this morning completed a 6 week test with them and though we must accept that variances in consumption will occur daily (we might watch more/less T.V. or we may use other appliances more one day then the next} my findings should be taken as a guide to possible savings only & all the readings were taken from the mains electricity meter NOT the electricity energy monitor supplied.(This was too erratic).

To start I have a 32" Acoustic Solutions LCD T.V & a Curtis Blu ray DVD player,
and these alone were the 2 items involved in the test.

Week#1. When not in use, both left in standby mode. Total household electricity consumption for the week = 71 units (71 kw).

Week#2. When not in use, both switched off at the mains 3 pin socket. Total household electricity consumption for the week = 56 units (56 kw). 20% less!

Week#3. Both items now going through the "Energy saving Socket". This unit supposedly kills the power to both units when "off" button on T.V. remote pressed.
Total household electricity consumption for the week = 63 units (63 kw).10% less!
but 10% more than switching off at socket!

Week#4. As week 1. Used 70 units (70 kw).
Week#5. As week 2. Used 57 units (57 kw).
Week#6. As week 3. Used 71 units (71 kw).

At fist 2 kw per day does seem excessive but it works out at approx 84 watts per hour total for the 2, which is still a lot.

Now as I stated variances WILL occur but our household is pretty stable in it's consumption of electricity.
RESULT:
YES the energy saving socket will save you about 10% consumption per year. That's just over £50.00 at today's prices.
By switching off at the mains you'll save about 20% consumption per year. That's just over £100.00 at today's prices.

CONCLUSION:
Get off your backsides and switch them off at the mains socket. You could do a lot with that £100.00 at Christmas.
Unit price = 14p x 14 units a week = £1.96 x 52 weeks = £101.92!!!!!!!!!

Who would have believed that just a T.V & Blu Ray player could account for 20% of annual household electricity consumption?

I hope my test has helped anyone wondering what would be the best practice to use when trying to reduce power consumption.

spiro

I have just checked the spec for my Samsung LED TV and it claims less than 0.1w in standby or 2.4w per day. Figures for the home cinema not listed.

Cardew

kaybal wrote: »

Hi all,
Just before last Christmas I received one of those "Electricity Monitors & Energy
Saving Sockets" from British Gas. Now to be fair, these 2 items, though they had
the British Gas logo on them are not made by B/G. and a number of companies
give/sell the exact same kit with their own badge on it.
I've just this morning completed a 6 week test with them and though we must accept that variances in consumption will occur daily (we might watch more/less T.V. or we may use other appliances more one day then the next} my findings should be taken as a guide to possible savings only & all the readings were taken from the mains electricity meter NOT the electricity energy monitor supplied.(This was too erratic).

To start I have a 32" Acoustic Solutions LCD T.V & a Curtis Blu ray DVD player,
and these alone were the 2 items involved in the test.

Week#1. When not in use, both left in standby mode. Total household electricity consumption for the week = 71 units (71 kw).

Week#2. When not in use, both switched off at the mains 3 pin socket. Total household electricity consumption for the week = 56 units (56 kw). 20% less!

Week#3. Both items now going through the "Energy saving Socket". This unit supposedly kills the power to both units when "off" button on T.V. remote pressed.
Total household electricity consumption for the week = 63 units (63 kw).10% less!
but 10% more than switching off at socket!

Week#4. As week 1. Used 70 units (70 kw).
Week#5. As week 2. Used 57 units (57 kw).
Week#6. As week 3. Used 71 units (71 kw).

At fist 2 kw per day does seem excessive but it works out at approx 84 watts per hour total for the 2, which is still a lot.

Now as I stated variances WILL occur but our household is pretty stable in it's consumption of electricity.
RESULT:
YES the energy saving socket will save you about 10% consumption per year. That's just over £50.00 at today's prices.
By switching off at the mains you'll save about 20% consumption per year. That's just over £100.00 at today's prices.

CONCLUSION:
Get off your backsides and switch them off at the mains socket. You could do a lot with that £100.00 at Christmas.
Unit price = 14p x 14 units a week = £1.96 x 52 weeks = £101.92!!!!!!!!!

Who would have believed that just a T.V & Blu Ray player could account for 20% of annual household electricity consumption?

I hope my test has helped anyone wondering what would be the best practice to use when trying to reduce power consumption.

Sorry but your results and conclusions are just not supportable in any way.

I have several TVs and none of them have a standby consumption as high as 1 watt and a couple are 8 years or so old CRTs.

All manufacturers signed up many years ago to reduce standby consumption to less than 1 watt and may have exceeded that. Even at 1 watt left on standby 24/7 it is less than 9kWh a year.

To conclude that your TV and Blueray player on standby can account for 15kWh a week is just absurd. -

To further conclude that your standby saver extention is itself using 7.5kWh a week is equally a nonsense.

You need to buy a plug in power measuring meter that measures cumulative power consumed if your experiments are to have any value.

I have a couple of these BG standby savers and the power they consume is negligble.

kaybal

Hi there Cardew,
I've already have one of these plug in power measuring devices which I tried prior to using the British Gas energy saving socket and had virtually identical results. This was the very reason I applied for the B/G kit to check the consumption as I myself thought that 2kw per day was excessive. 2000 watts!!!!
The plug in device is made by Paget Services of Woodrow London. Model number 9149
Version 07/2008.
Both the B/G & Paget units showed the same results but, ever the pessimist I read the mains electricity meter @ 9am every Sunday over a 6 week period and logged the readings; the results were as per my original posting.
I fully agree that this seems absurd/ridiculous so:
Could you suggest another way possibly of getting a more accurate result?

LeeSouthEast

Sending the TV and players back as faulty sounds like a good start

Cardew

kaybal wrote: »

Hi there Cardew,
I've already have one of these plug in power measuring devices which I tried prior to using the British Gas energy saving socket and had virtually identical results. This was the very reason I applied for the B/G kit to check the consumption as I myself thought that 2kw per day was excessive. 2000 watts!!!!
The plug in device is made by Paget Services of Woodrow London. Model number 9149
Version 07/2008.
Both the B/G & Paget units showed the same results but, ever the pessimist I read the mains electricity meter @ 9am every Sunday over a 6 week period and logged the readings; the results were as per my original posting.
I fully agree that this seems absurd/ridiculous so:
Could you suggest another way possibly of getting a more accurate result?

You can't read your electricity meter every week and deduce anything about something with so small a consumption as stand by.

As I said on the other post:

You need to buy a plug in power measuring meter that measures cumulative power consumed if your experiments are to have any value.

You can get these from Maplins for about £10. Essentially you plug in any 13 amp appliance into this meter and it gives you a reading of power being consumed and cumulative power over a period of time - e.g leave your TV/DVD plugged in overnight on standby and in the morrning it will read the time(e.g. 13 hours) and power consumed in that time e.g. 0.02kWh.

kaybal

You need to buy a plug in power measuring meter that measures cumulative power consumed if your experiments are to have any value".

I can only repeat myself: This is EXACTLY what the Paget unit does. It plugs into the 3 pin socket then the device(s) you wish to check plug into the front of this.
It displays: Tariff Setting. (set by user) Current reading. Max power consumption.Cost of energy consumption. Time setting. Voltage reading. Power consumption. Units used.Kwatt Hour display & Max load setting.Time unit has been running.

Cardew

Sorry I misread your second post.

Something doesn't add up here.

You are getting readings that would indicate that(allowing for your TV to be on 4 hours a day) your TV and DVD are using 100 Watts on standby.

What is more unbelievable is that when you switch the power off to the TV/DVD with the standby saver, the consumption drops to 50 Watts. This must mean that the standby saver itself is using 50 Watts, which is ridiculous.

If the standby saver was using 50 Watts it would melt!!!

Have you something else connected into the standby saver? Don't forget that the end 2 sockets(with the green switches) are not switched off with the green switch set to 'mains'.

Measure your consumption of the standby saver in another socket - it should be negligble.

You can always check by switching off everything in the house(including fridges/freezers and check your electricity meter over a period of a couple of hours while you are out - you can measure a consumption of 100 watts easily.

kaybal

Hi Cardew,
I really appreciate your help with this dilemma.
If someone had told me that a T.V & Blu ray player could take this much electric I wouldn't have have believed it myself either & essentially I still don't. 2kw between them per day is still frightening though I was/am going on the readings of the 2 devices employed for measuring consumption.
I was mind of the 2 end sockets "mains" & "standby" and in fact left these to empty of plugs during the tests as I have nothing that needs to be permanently on.
In an effort to determine the accuracy of the Paget & B/G devices I am going to connect them to a standard lamp with a 20 watt energy saving bulb both individually and together to see if the readings agree. I'm going to do this as near as I can to 100 hours spread over several days or more to see if the reading comes out at 2 kw consumed + -.
I'll also try switching everything off except the T.V. & Blu ray as you suggested & see then the results.
It is baffling but you can see how easy it would be to accept the findings from devices sold and bought in good faith as being unquestionable.
I'll post my findings as soon as I have them.
Thanks again.