How much elecricty do house alarms use?

[Deleted User]

Roughly speaking (as I know this will depend on the kind of alarm) - does anyone know how much energy house alarms use (daily, weekly, etc) on average? Bearing in mind that you can't switch them off, and they occasionally go off (which, presumably, uses more electricity), wondering if anyone has any idea?

I've contacted the supplier but they don't seem to have a clue (comforting ... )

firefox1956

£3 a year ???

thescouselander

A house alarm can't use more than a few watts. I doubt you'd be using more than a couple of quid at most.

Undervalued

Fairly minimal but I would't like to say whether it is £5 or £15 per year. Depend a bit on the system but I'd be pretty confident it is not £50!

Alarm systems are capable of operating on their rechargeable batteries for at least 12 hours if the power fails so basically the mains draw is mainly to keep the batteries charged.

If you really want to know, turn everything else off (maybe not that easy) then see how much the electricity meter advances overnight (8 hours). Multiply by 3 to get the usage per day then by 365 for the year.

Owain_Moneysaver

1 watt power consumption will cost about £1 a year if on 24/7/365.

Menvier TS900 and according to

http://www.tycoemea.com/english/pdf/datash...er/datashts.pdf

which may or may not be right, here are the consumption figures

Current consumption
Panel 110 mA (normal) 190 mA (alarm)
LCD keypad 40 mA (normal) 50 mA (alarm)
On normal (standby), it all adds up to 150mA (110+40), which at 240V is 36Watts.
But when alarmed it adds up to 240mA (190+50), which at 240V is 58Watts.

If it's armed for 16hrs a day (ie put on at night as well as when go to work), that's an average of 50Watts

Security installer forum

so about £50 a year? or £1 a week.

charybdis26

This site http: //nicola.qeng-ho.org/elec-usage/help.php (remove the space after http: to make link active)

quotes power consumptions ranging from 20 to 150 kWh/year for burglar alarms.

At 12p per kWh this gives a cost pf between £2.40 and £18/year.


This Australian Government report from 2005 on burglar alarms (remove spaces from link below)

http /www .energyrating.gov.au/sites/new.energyrating/files/documents/sb200415-burglaralarms2_0.pdf

reported an estimated average 5.9 watts standby poweer equivalent to 52 kWh /year with proposals to reduce standby power to 1 watt in future.

So even at 5.9 watts standby power, the running cost is approximately £6 a year.

Carrot007

Corona wrote: »

I've contacted the supplier but they don't seem to have a clue (comforting ... )

It's hardly the suppliers remit to know the draw of any random item is it?

They are in the supply business, you are the user.

Undervalued

Carrot007 wrote: »

It's hardly the suppliers remit to know the draw of any random item is it?

They are in the supply business, you are the user.

I assumed the OP meant the alarm supplier!

Ben84

The wattage should be printed on it somewhere. This number will be the maximum energy use of the appliance (it's there for choosing the cable and fuse rating for it). I imagine it will be the amount of energy the alarm uses when ringing, so it probably won't be the accurate energy consumption figure. But it's still useful. The true number cannot be higher than the one you calculate from the item's wattage, so it provides an upper limit.