How can I find out how much power appliances use?

lstar337

Detection of low powered devices must be very hit-and-miss since the Smappee only uses a clamp to read data from the meter. These devices are not usually very accurate.

Still, I wont condemn it straight off.

GreenBo

I've got one (Smappee that is). Installed in a minute and straight away helped me to start reducing my home's energy. So far I've got it down about 20% I reckon. This differs from other energy monitors I've had because it tells me when something comes on in the house, how much energy it's consuming and how much that is then costing me, over a day, month and year. Really easy to use and understand. Even the kids have been engaged by it, and that's no bad thing!! as they're the biggest culprits in wasting energy (at least in my house).

Let me know if there's any questions I can help you lot with as I'm assuming there's not many users of this product in the UK so far. I'm not very technical though...

lstar337

How does it get on with recognising devices that use very little energy?

Can it detect things such as individual energy saving light bulbs which may only be rated at say 7 or 8 Watts?

GreenBo

So far Smappee has detected 34 electrical devices in my house. Ranging from big loads like cookers and washing machines to appliances like kettles, microwaves, toasters right the way down to small loads like dining room lights, breakfast bar lights. I've been concentrating in order of annual cost so far so single energy saving bulbs are waayyyyy down there on the list of priorities for me at the moment.

I always used to think in terms of 'switch that light off you're wasting energy' but what this Smappee thing has opened my eyes to is that about 90% of the energy costs in my home are not as visual as lights, they're loads like fridges, hot water pumps, dishwashers.... which OK you know they're consuming electricity but to a numpty like me the first thing I think of when trying to reduce my homes energy budget is the things I see. I really like the way Smappee has made the invisible costs visible in an easy to understand way for someone like me.

I'm going to do a tot up on the weekend to try to calculate how much I think it's going to save me (typical 4 bed family house) based on what I've done so far. I'll let you all know.

lstar337

Sounds like a fun device. I would love it to play with, but it is never going to save me any money so I cannot justify the cost.

I know virtually every device in our house so it is never going to highlight anything I didn't already know about, and our import is only ~3.5kWh/day. Not much left to reduce!

Smappee would be a fun toy though!

zeupater

nancytrip wrote: »

Appliances that create or remove heat use the most electricity.

Hi

:think: ?? .... shouldn't that really read "Appliances that create or remove the most heat use the most electricity" .... ??

Could even still be a strong discussion point because an appliance which subjectively seems to create less heat because it runs cooler could objectively consume more energy because it runs longer ....

HTH
Z

rogerblack

Whole-house monitors can give a very misleading idea of your energy use, if used wrong.
It can be really hard to work out using them anything other than the instantaneous energy use.
Unless you sit there and stare at it, with a notepad, you can't easily find out how much energy a load that's intermittent is using.

GreenBo

rogerblack wrote: »

Whole-house monitors can give a very misleading idea of your energy use, if used wrong.
It can be really hard to work out using them anything other than the instantaneous energy use.
Unless you sit there and stare at it, with a notepad, you can't easily find out how much energy a load that's intermittent is using.

Completely agree Roger. That's why I had limited (no) success with things like the Owl energy monitor that simply displayed the whole house. It just didn't tell me what within the house was consuming what, like the Smappee does. I've got the Smappee to message me now when items come on - a little anal I know, but it's fun and interesting all the same. Found out my little lad is getting up at 6am and switching the X-Box on in the week, freaked him out when I asked him about it LOL.

I've calculated that so far the Smappee has helped me reduce about 20% off the house elec bill, and with the alarm/messages I've setup I hope to maintain it or even reduce it further.

zeupater

GreenBo wrote: »

Completely agree Roger. That's why I had limited (no) success with things like the Owl energy monitor that simply displayed the whole house. It just didn't tell me what within the house was consuming what, like the Smappee does. I've got the Smappee to message me now when items come on - a little anal I know, but it's fun and interesting all the same. Found out my little lad is getting up at 6am and switching the X-Box on in the week, freaked him out when I asked him about it LOL.

I've calculated that so far the Smappee has helped me reduce about 20% off the house elec bill, and with the alarm/messages I've setup I hope to maintain it or even reduce it further.

Hi

I've just been through the manuals and the forum for the product and it looks like a decent initial offering, but currently seems to have many of the same flaws as other systems with not too many advantages ... as such it looks to be something designed by a manufacturer without fully researching the customer requirements.

Flicking through the specs and manual, I can't readily see if/how/where the mains voltage is set. Combining this with the inability of the system to measure power factor (either whole house or by mains outlet) using it to measure/meter usage cannot be any more accurate than any other 'clamp based' monitor .... you see so many reports of clamp monitors being inaccurate at low loads, but what most making these reports fail to realise is that many low load appliances have extremely poor power factors, which lead to inaccurate readings.

However, I do like the ability to control appliances with the app, but this is where any future development needs to be as what's there is too basic - it's no use just having a schedule or socket remotes, it needs some logic gates sitting in the app to make the system useful .... If I was looking to spend £300+ on one of these and some socket switches I'd certainly want it to be a little more advanced in functionality ...

I'll stick to the OWL for the entire house and a plug-in unit to monitor individual appliances for the moment and wait for the 'right product' to suit pv automation needs to come along ....

HTH
Z

groovyf

Belkin will have the WeMo Inisght Switch out soon which has a built-in energy monitor (as well as its usual remote control), so you can see how much energy a device directly connected to the plug uses via a phone app: http://www.belkin.com/uk/p/P-F7C029/

I've got the WeMo Switch which is the earlier model and doesn't have the energy consumption info.