lower my energy costs

jayremoh

hi all

i have a 3 storey end terrace, built 2003.
2 adults, 2 young children (2 & 4)

im currently on eon save online 9

elec
21.536p upto 900 kwhs
10.969p normal
used 7000 kwhs last 12 months

gas
7.313p upto 2690kwhs
3.117p normal
used 27000 kwhs last 12 months

pay 160pm dd which just about covers the year. (£44 in debit currently)

contract expires on 1st sept.

ive compared on a couple of sites, putting in actual kwh and everywhere says moving would be more expensive.

so do i stick or twist?


OR/AND


how do i use less energy?

• kids share a bath every other night
• me and wife shower every other day (take turns)
• cook on gas hob and electric oven 5 out of 7 nights a week
• wife has washer and dryer on every day
• telly is on about 6 hours a day
• all lights are energy saving, turned on and off when entering/exiting a room
• hot water heated via boiler 2 hours at 5am and 2 hrs at 4pm
• heating off during summer months, on in autumn, winter, spring. set to 20c. on permanalty, day only. off at night (10pm-6am)

any ideas?

chris1973

I suspect that the Washer and Dryer, and more especially the Dryer is partly to blame, newer ones have been reduced in wattage slightly in order to obtain a better Energy rating, however because you only get out in usable heat what it takes in by way of Electricity, subsequently the time to dry clothes at the new lower wattages has also increased, negating any real saving even in modern dryers!.

Depending on how long its used for, the Dryer will eat around 2 to 4 units (KW/H) per drying cycle, which will be easily cost 20p to 40p per cycle in real terms, even at your lower electricity tariff and allowing for the dryers' thermostat. So multiply by 7 = £1.40 to £2.80 per 7 day week, assuming one drying cycle per day Mon - Sun just for the one appliance. If she does more than one load / cycle a day, then multiply these figures as applicable!.

If you have a garden, believe me, a washing line works out far cheaper, especially in the summer!. Does she really need to be washing and drying clothes EVERY day?, is she using the washer to its full capacity for each cycle.

The Electric Oven and Hob have very similar ratings as the dryer also, depending on thermostat settings and length of time running. If its running for half of the day for Sunday lunch then factor that into the equation also.

Unfortunately Electricity is one of the most expensive energies that there is (due to the fact we burn an additional fuel to produce it - eg Gas / oil / coal) using it to cook, heat or dry is likely to be more expensive than any equiv Gas appliances.

One TV or several?. Do the kids have one each or access to one?. These can consume 100 - 400 watts each depending on age, size and type (LCD, LED, CRT). Point of fact my fathers' older 42" plasma TV consumes nearly 420 watts, thats nearly half of a one bar Electric fire.

Xboxes, Playstations ?. Older models can consume nearly the same amount of energy as two or three old 100w lightbulbs!.

Source:- http://www.planetxbox360.com/article_1288/How_Much_Power_Does_Your_Xbox_360_Use

Also don't use Game consoles as DVD players, they consume around 9 times the amount of energy as a dedicated DVD player (120 watts vs 14 watts)

A shower will consume between 7 and 10 units per hour (based on a 7kw - 10kw shower rating) so 30 minutes of showers will cost roughly 70p to £1.00 in Electricity at your current lower tariff. Make them as quick as possible, my GF used to spend 10 - 15 minutes a time in there at a time, and it cost a bloody fortune, so don't linger!.

Monitor your Electricity use by reading the meter every 24 hours, and noting the readings. Do this over a week, and then divide by seven to get the average daily use. You might find it quite surprising.

Dave_save

Significant reductions in electricity use can be obtained by reviewing fridge and freezer use. If you have 2 or more, make do with one (A Rated).

jayremoh

thanks chris, very useful info there.

our wash an dryer are only a couple of years old, hotpoint. (not sure of exact models so would need to check the ratings), but i would i would hope they are energy efficient.

she does use the line, but prob not as much as she should. but when its sunny, the kids obviously want to play in the garden, so that can be difficult.

we have 3 tvs, 1 year old samsung lasma in lounge (3 hrs use a night), small 2 year old panasonic plasma in our bedroom, (30mins a night)
and a very old goodmans plasma is the kids playroom, which is used 2-3 hours a day. from what youve said this could be a problem and im looking at replacing it anyway. but couldnt justify spending 300-400 on a new telly that doesnt really get used all that much. but maybe now, it does make sense.

we also have 2 sky boxs, another satellite box and a home cinema pc, which are never turned off. they wont help i guess?

then a couple of iphones that are charged every night.

thats about it, outside the toaster and kettle.

is it worth getting one of them energy monitors and plugging all the appliances in to see what uses most? do they work? any recommendation on model?

cheers

jayremoh

Dave_save wrote: »

Significant reductions in electricity use can be obtained by reviewing fridge and freezer use. If you have 2 or more, make do with one (A Rated).

our fridge is fairly a new beko, and i only buy A rated kitchen appliances (unless theres a huge difference in cost)

like the plasma i mentioned though, the freezer is a old hand me down, i have no idea of the manufacturer, let alone the rating, so i'll need to test that.

cheers

Former_E.ON_Company_Representative:_Malc

jayremoh wrote: »

how do i use less energy?

Hi jayremoh

Have a chat with our Energy Efficiency guys. Tell them about your property and appliances. They'll be happy to let you know about any ways you might be able to cut back.

Ask them for a copy of a booklet called '100 ways to save money by saving energy.' It's free and contains lots of useful ideas.

There are more useful tips on our website, too. Particularly, the Interactive House and Energy Menu.

Hope this is useful jayremoh. Let me know if you need any more info as will be happy to help.

Malc

macman

Insulation has not been mentioned. A 9 year old house should be pretty good, I assume you have cavity wall insulation, adequate loft insulation, double glazing?

jayremoh

macman wrote: »

Insulation has not been mentioned. A 9 year old house should be pretty good, I assume you have cavity wall insulation, adequate loft insulation, double glazing?

weve had a couple of door 2 door blokes round about the cavity insulation thing, but both have looked up mid conversation as said "oh its 3 storey, sorry to have wasted your time"

and ive heard mixed stories about the whole concept.

macman

Why can a 3 storey property not have CWI?
It should have been installed during the build anyway if built in 2003.

chris1973

our wash an dryer are only a couple of years old, hotpoint. (not sure of exact models so would need to check the ratings), but i would i would hope they are energy efficient.

The whole energy efficiency thing is a bit of a misnomer actually when you begin to dissect it, probably just a little novelty to kick start the appliance industry. I noticed that my new washer-dryer had a heating element rated at 1000watts for the tumble drying aspect, not surprisingly I found that it was taking a lot longer to dry the same amount of washing as my original older one, which was rated at 2200 watts. In other words, I have to run the 1000w version for about twice the length of time as I used to run the 2200 watt version, and the end result to me is about the same amount of energy used. Its just that because the actual appliance input loading has been reduced on paper, the manufacturers product gets a lower rating and often it means they can flog it at a higher price, but the cost in energy to you and me is roughly the same.

The same applies to new washing machines, which are 'cold fill' only, I often have a tankful of piping hot water for use on a daily basis, already heated and paid for. However despite having 120 litres of already heated available throughout the house, my new washing machine insists on filling with cold water from the mains, and then using its internal immersion heater to heat it from scratch. Completely wasteful in most household environments, and directly flies in the face of the whole energy saving clap-trap.

Like a lot of larger families, I suspect that a lot of your daily energy consumption is used by Entertainment appliances!. As I said before, even a modern large screen LCD TV can consume upto 200 watts, multiply this by 3 tv's and you have 600 watts of energy being used purely by TV sets and probably for longer periods of time especially during the weekends. Older models can consume even more energy, especially Plasma TVs, take a look at the back of your oldest and largest screen TV and read the rating in watts.

Add multiple sky boxes, home cinema PC and you could easily be approaching 1kw or 1 electricity unit per hour just in Entertainment, at least during any times when they are all used together.

Instead of just replacing the older TV's with like for like, can you not also downscale in size. For example a 20" LCD TV will use around half the Electricity compared to a 32" to 40" version, and do a 2 and 4 year old really need a Plasma TV?.

Any reason why the home cinema PC is running 24/7? this is extremely wasteful, as being PC based and probably having a heavy CPU and a high spec graphics processor it probably consumes at least 100 watts, which equals 1 unit every 10 hours, or over 2 units per day, and at just over 10p per unit, thats approaching 25p per 24 hour day, just consumed by the media pc, work out the cost of that out over a quarter!.

Iphone chargers etc, are probably not worth bothering about, they need to be charged and probably consuming less than 5 watts per phone.

Personally, i'd be looking at the appliances (needlessly) running 24/7, on the surface it may not seem to cost a lot, but add up their combined usage, and multiply it by week and then by quarter and you can see that they represent quite a high percentage of your bill.

Electricity is always going to increase in price (just look at the annual 20% here, 9% there price rises historically inflicted over the past 5 years) and the energy companies are always going to bleed us dry. The only way of reducing the cost is to cut back on your usage!.

I really wouldn't bother spending money on an energy saving monitor, when you already have an expensive, highly calibrated energy monitor in your house in the form of the Electricity Meter. A little common sense in respect of what appliances are left running when not required and going around switching them off before leaving the house, this not only reduces the cost of your utilities but also reduces the risk of fire.

jayremoh

no idea, but both have said it.

like you say the house should be new enough anway.