Phone Chargers...

deanos

Cardew wrote:

This is a money saving website and the forum is entitled Green and Ethical money saving.

Exactly so you can be saving money and being ethical by turning things off that you dont use

Cardew

Fred_Bear wrote:

When I went on holiday this summer I read the meter and read it again when I returned. I was amazed to discover that I had used 5.5kWh per day! The biggest users were the fridge & freezer, but these accounted for just 2.5kWh. To find out where the other 3kWh electricity was going I bought a plug-in consumption meter (a Brennenstuhl PM230). This is useful but does not work correctly below 5W, and so is unable to measure the standby current of most appliances. Does anyone know the best way to measure small standby currents?
Fred

The Maplins power meter measures 1 watt. It also has a cumulative kWh/time display so you can leave, say, a standby device on for a week+ and measure tiny wattages. e.g. it will display 180 hours and 146 watts.

Finding 3kW per day should be possible even on a device that can only read 5 watts. That is a lot of unaccounted for power.

Cardew

deanos wrote:

Exactly so you can be saving money and being ethical by turning things off that you dont use

The things I don't want to use, I do switch off.

I suggest others do exactly the same.

What I won't do, is turn off the things others say I should.

If I want to switch the TV in my bedroom to standby by the remote control, rather than get out of bed to do so - and get out again in the morning to switch it back on, I will do exactly that.

Meanwhile you may continue to use your computer and the internet and post here without a word of criticism from myself;)

Quasar

I would never dream of keeping my phone charger plugged in. It goes into a drawer and out it comes and into the plug when my phone needs charging. It doesn't even get as far as being a question of energy saving to me, it's a question of not having stuff lying around when not in use.

Also I have to say that I've never liked appliances plugged in or on standby, simply because I'm afraid of potential fire hazards, however silly my fear might be.

My TV, DVD player, computer etc. are switched off at the mains when not in use. I just feel better this way, and if it saves money and helps the environment, that's all gravy...:)

deanos

Cardew wrote:

The things I don't want to use, I do switch off.

I suggest others do exactly the same.

What I won't do, is turn off the things others say I should.

If I want to switch the TV in my bedroom to standby by the remote control, rather than get out of bed to do so - and get out again in the morning to switch it back on, I will do exactly that.

Meanwhile you may continue to use your computer and the internet and post here without a word of criticism from myself;)

Yep thats about it

Fred_Bear_2

tr3mor wrote:

You could plug all the related items you usually leave on standby into an extension lead then into the meter. It might be able to pick it up better.

Thanks tr3mor for the idea. I have four cordless phones so plugging them all in at once and dividing the watts by four should give me the individual consumption accurately.

Fred_Bear_2

Cardew wrote:

The Maplins power meter measures 1 watt. It also has a cumulative kWh/time display so you can leave, say, a standby device on for a week+ and measure tiny wattages. e.g. it will display 180 hours and 146 watts.

Finding 3kW per day should be possible even on a device that can only read 5 watts. That is a lot of unaccounted for power.

Thanks for your reply Cardew. The Maplin meter sounds the same as the Brennenstuhl but it can also read down to 1 watt so I will buy one. When reading low currents the Brennenstuhl goes haywire. Eg. My cordless doorbell is rated at 3 watts but the meter reads 12 watts.

Yes 3kWh is a lot. A lot is used by equipment for my disabled mother eg. electric toilet, chair lift, bed lift and lifeline monitor which I left plugged in when I went on holiday. The rest are about 15 items (including 4 cordless phones) which are permanently on or were left on standby. Last year I used 6100kWh and this year I will have reduced it to about 4500kWh. Next year I hope to reduce it further but it gets increasingly difficult as the easiest savings have already been made.

When I get all the results from the Maplin meter I hope start a new thread to give my results and conclusions.

Altarf

deanos wrote:

But the point is if everyone did it the saving to the enviroment would be huge when all things that are left on standby are combined.

So it is worth the bother.

No because you have no chance of convincing anyone that it worth the hassle to save 66p. Even if you appeal to their green conscience the same amount of CO2 could be saved by driving 50 meters less per day, yes 50 whole meters. So I hope you always park on the bottom storey of a multi-storey car park, as only evil earth killing people park above the ground floor.

The only way that organisations such as the Energy Saving Trust get any publicity is by multiplying stupid numbers together and coming up with an even more stupid number.

ailuro2

Altarf wrote:

No because you have no chance of convincing anyone that it worth the hassle to save 66p. Even if you appeal to their green conscience the same amount of CO2 could be saved by driving 50 meters less per day, yes 50 whole meters. So I hope you always park on the bottom storey of a multi-storey car park, as only evil earth killing people park above the ground floor.

The only way that organisations such as the Energy Saving Trust get any publicity is by multiplying stupid numbers together and coming up with an even more stupid number.

ok, forget telling them about the "stupid" 66 pence they will save and save their life instead.
Some types of phone chargers do not switch off when not attached to a phone, causing an overheating risk, and become a fire hazard. This has been well documented,not all chargers,only specific types.

It will save a lot more than 66p if you save a house from going up in smoke.:D

Also EMF from a phone charger is pretty high, not something you want to leave on unneccesarily.

Altarf

ailuro2 wrote:

Some types of phone chargers do not switch off when not attached to a phone, causing an overheating risk, and become a fire hazard. This has been well documented,not all chargers,only specific types.

Silly argument, you would have to be a complete plank to plug in a dangerous phone charger that would burst into flames, whether you left it unattended or sat there watching it whilst it charged the phone.

As for the stupid numbers quoted by EST, they only manage to get the high figures by suggesting silly things. I mean, who is going to unplug their video recorder at the wall when they are not watching something. Setting limits for energy usage for appliances on standby is much more sensible.