Sudden leap in electricity use, seemingly after power cut

BooJewels

Green_hopeful wrote: »

This might not help you but we had a suspicious rise in energy usage and it was a low energy light bulb where there was a fault in the starter motor and it was drawing lots. It was on a timer in a room we don’t use much but we saw the usage on the energy monitor. We switched the circuits off in turn and worked it out.

Thanks for the suggestion - we have several low energy bulbs on timers, so that's a possibility, if something has gone awry with one - I didn't know they could do that.

I'm hoping this blocked pump in the garden is the culprit, but if the usage hasn't dropped significantly, we'll need to look at devices individually. When we're not there, the only things drawing power are 2 freezers on all the time, one of which is going next week, telephone answering machine, bedside clock, broadband router and an assortment of lamps on timers and a TV emulator. So the lamps would be next to look at. Thanks for the suggestion.

Gerry1

Green_hopeful wrote: »

it was a low energy light bulb where there was a fault in the starter motor

Light bulbs don't have motors ! :huh:

Green_hopeful

It was definitely a fault with the bulb. I switched it off and the usage went back to normal. It was an old style low energy bulb. Compact fluorescent one.

BooJewels

Good morning. I am delighted to report that the electricity usage has now dropped to even below what it has been before the sudden increase. Over the last 10 days since we unplugged the garden water pump, it has used around 2.6 kWh of juice per day - including my sister visiting to use the washing machine. The blocked pump was clearly the culprit.

I installed the monitor I'd got on TallDave's recommendation (I'd been using it at home since it arrived to see how it worked) and that showed the same amount of usage as the meter reflected - in that the monitor showed 3.7 kWh yesterday and the meter had clicked over 3 whole units in the same time. It becomes fascinating to watch to see what effect different appliances/lights have on the consumption. So I'm happy that the meter is okay - I hadn't really thought otherwise. But it was worth the tenner to confirm that. We did put many more lights on than are normally in use in the empty house - like outside and porch lights, just to make it look very visibly occupied and varied. So days that we're there, we certainly use more, as we use the kettle, hot water etc. (I hadn't realised until I got the monitor, just how much electricity the gas boiler/pump uses, both mine and at the house)

We used this opportunity to review the appliances and light bulbs (I've done the same at home and done some more swaps) and he already had low energy bulbs in most of the lamps we have on timers, but I swapped one to a very low wattage LED, plus a couple of the overhead single bulbs - it's astonishing to me that better light levels than an old 100w bulb can be provided by an LED at 9 watts. We've also emptied and unplugged the porch freezer now too.

In a well timed coincidence, the builder working next door came round to ask something about fence lines and trees and we walked over the lawn to look where he was discussing and the lawn was significantly more solid than it had been and we noticed it immediately - no standing water, which with this weather we would have expected. In mentioning this and the pump situation, he said that he'd gone to install a new soak away at the bottom of his garden and found that there was an old one under a flag stone, long forgotten and it was badly blocked, so he cleared it and it was like pulling the plug on a bath and his garden had totally drained within the day. So it looks like this may have had something to do with the water levels in our garden too - as it is tangibly drier now than we'd expect. So maybe that will negate the need for a pump at all now. So we're leaving it off for now to see how it goes over a bit more time.

So thank you everyone for the support and ideas, it has been truly appreciated. I am confident now that the culprit has bee identified and usage returned to acceptable levels. Thank you!

Talldave

Thanks for coming back with an update (so many don't!). Glad to hear the mystery is solved and that more you're "consumption aware". The gains on lighting are amazing - I'm in the midst of a kitchen lighting project, nearly a kW of halogen bulbs to be transitioned to LED, but AR111 bulbs are pricey and there are lots of colour temperature and beam angle options to get right too.

victor2

Likewise, it's nice to see some feedback, and positive at that.
It is easy to become obsessed with electricity consumption, once you have a means to monitor what devices use. You soon realise what utter nonsense it is about not leaving your TV on standby, when you see what boiling the kettle uses!
Unless of course, you've got a very old CRT based TV from the days when electricity consumption just didn't matter...;)

BooJewels

Talldave wrote: »

Thanks for coming back with an update (so many don't!).

I know, it drives me nuts when you never know if you helped or not.

Talldave wrote: »

Glad to hear the mystery is solved and that more you're "consumption aware".

I'm absolutely delighted to get it sorted. I had thought that I was consumption-aware - but it has certainly served as a refresher course. And made me think more about our own consumption - as you do start and get complacent over time, when you think you know what's what. When we're happy with the power use at the house, I'll bring the monitor back here and use it routinely.

The gains on lighting are amazing

We decided that lighting development has gone in several phases since the original tungsten bulbs transitioned to the first low-energy bent tube versions. The latest LED bulbs I've got are white plastic, very light (the previous generation were very heavy at the base) and were around a quid each. The first LED bulbs were several times that and not even as low wattage as they are now and these should last about 4 years or more.

Talldave wrote: »

- I'm in the midst of a kitchen lighting project, nearly a kW of halogen bulbs to be transitioned to LED, but AR111 bulbs are pricey and there are lots of colour temperature and beam angle options to get right too.

Good luck with that. The very first LED spotlight bulbs I bought were to replace some hallogens in the hall that blew frequently, but they were blue-ish and icy cold in temperature. They lasted about a week, it made the whole house feel cold, we didn't like them at all. I don't think I've actually replaced an LED bulb yet, they're all still the originals. But as you say, there are now many colour temps to choose from.

victor2 wrote:

It is easy to become obsessed with electricity consumption, once you have a means to monitor what devices use. You soon realise what utter nonsense it is about not leaving your TV on standby, when you see what boiling the kettle uses!

Tell me about it, I put the display unit on the kitchen table and we both got obsessed with watching it as things were put in use - it's quite an education. A new TV we got recently doesn't even have an on/off switch, it just uses the remote, but on standby it's about 1.7 watts or something. I think the one in the house I've been talking about is an earlier generation and does use a little more power on standby, so we've moved the plug so we can unplug it when we leave.

I could have done without the scare of this peak in usage - it's somehow feels more of a responsibility when it's not actually your own property - but in hindsight, it has caused both us and my sister to re-evaluate our own circumstances and hopefully make improvements in all 3 properties. Not just to potentially save money, but to be more responsible about wasting resources.

victor2

BooJewels wrote: »

... A new TV we got recently doesn't even have an on/off switch, it just uses the remote, but on standby it's about 1.7 watts or something. I think the one in the house I've been talking about is an earlier generation and does use a little more power on standby, so we've moved the plug so we can unplug it when we leave....

Since 2013, EU regulations have been that such equipment in standby must not use more than 0.5W.
Last time I worked it out, my TV cost about 25p in standby per YEAR! As I said, these things can become a bit obsessive.

Talldave

BooJewels wrote: »

.... Good luck with that. The very first LED spotlight bulbs I bought were to replace some hallogens in the hall that blew frequently, but they were blue-ish and icy cold in temperature. They lasted about a week, it made the whole house feel cold, we didn't like them at all. I don't think I've actually replaced an LED bulb yet, they're all still the originals. But as you say, there are now many colour temps to choose from.

I've always hated the cheap LEDs with a colour temp of 4000K or more, so have obsessively stuck with 2700K from reputable brands and, as you say, never had to replace any.


However, the kitchen is one area where I do tend towards something cooler and made the mistake of trying 2700K which looks too orange compared to the existing halogens which are around 2900K. So I'm going with 3000K and a 40 degree beam angle to get less hotspots on the worktops.


On the TV side of things, EU law has for a long time ensured that worst case standby power is 1W and for some models when they're actually not doing anything in standby they get as low as 0.1W. Not worth worrying about. It's the 24hrs a day, 365 days a year devices that make the difference - hence it's always worth getting rid of ageing cooling products when you spot a shiny new A++ one on special offer!

BooJewels

I hadn't realised that it was now law for the standby level on TVs - and the limit was that low - I was only guessing when I put an actual number, it just sounded preposterously low to me and certainly below the level where I'd give it any thought.

I too find 2700k to be a nice temp for most lights and I get what you mean about that maybe being too warm for a working kitchen. I still have an overhead fluo tube, supplemented by several other warmer side lights and we switch the tube off when eating etc. But you need decent light when cooking and using sharp knives etc. It's a project I want to look at sometime soon - the kitchen lighting, but it might necessitate the hiring of an electrician.

But I want to look at replacing the thermostat that controls the CH - it's a very old one that still actually works, just not very efficiently - I think modern ones are much more efficient and flexible - so that's my next project.