Why do you think your energy bill is higher than the national average?

Ultrasonic

mar7t1n said:

Whenever mentioned on the news they have people saying we just won't be able to afford to use a tumble dryer, or maybe we should think about turning the heating down a bit

Both of these changes are very sensible, and I'd much rather see comments like this on the new rather than the more typical focus on costs to households assuming that energy consumption isn't modified. 

wild666

We never got low energy stuff

Novice_investor101 said:

This made me chuckle & also kick myself. I just used the bathroom & washed my hands with the hot tap. It indeed did not get hot before I’d finished. 

I’m already a very low energy user, I’ll use the cold tap in future. 

Using the hot tap to wash hands will in most cases see the water coming out of the tap as Luke warm at the most but the water in the pipe might be hot and just not reached the tap which is a waste of energy.

wild666

We never got low energy stuff

None of the appliances I have are the latest tech, the washer was rated A+ in 2017, the fridge was B in 2017, the freezer C in 2017, the TV was rated F in 2020, the two desktop PC's are a 3450 i5 and an AMD Pro A10-8770 R7 with a 32" monitor on the main PC and a 24" monitor of the second PC.
I recently bought a heated airer so my dryer is now obsolete but used around 4 kWh to dry a load the heated airer uses around 2 kWh for the same load. 

kuratowski

We like it toasty, thermostat is at 25 all year round

My energy usage, overall, is lower than the national average, but up until this year it has been higher than it could have been, given I had the heating thermostat set to 21°C (not 25°C, I just picked that in the poll as the nearest option).  The recent price hikes have rather woken me up to the waste, so the thermostat is now set to 19°C, and we'll see how this winter goes.  I am intending to follow some of the useful advice posted lately on these boards for keeping warm whilst working from home.

Spoonie_Turtle

Ultrasonic said:

t0rt0ise said:

The only thing on your list that I've needed to change recently (as in this year) is using the hot tap to wash hands. It's been fine all summer using the cold tap but as it's getting colder the water is now getting very cold and I'm not sure if I'm going to keep it up all winter.

If it helps encourage you I'll mention I've not used hot water to wash my hand for as long as I can remember, without this being any kind of hardship. 

Must be nice, coming away without pain and being able to use your hands after washing them in cold water in winter.  What's it like? 
(I don't actually usually wash mine in *hot* to be fair, but lukewarm from the hot water pipe in winter is infinitely better than water that comes out of the tap colder than the fridge.  And I do sometimes have to run them under or submerge in warm water to ease them up, far quicker and more effective than attempting to heat each side on a hot water bottle.)

Ally_E.

I live in solid wall detached house - that's the main reason I use more gas than national average. The options are very condescending in my opinion. 

mar7t1n

We always wash our hands using the hot tap, despite it not actually getting hot before we're finished

To clarify a few points - the intention here is to say to people don't waste a single unit of energy, and focus it when and where you need it. Personally I'd rather heat the house in winter, and to achieve that I've been using cold water to wash hands and the tumble dryer stays off during the summer. But it's taken a while to get out of the habit of just going for the hot tap. People with bigger families and older homes will of course use more energy, so the question maybe should be - where do you waste your energy. If you cut back a little and a little more it's less of a shock than just switching off entirely.

michaels

We don't do any of the above and the meter must be faulty

I wonder whether electricity (and hot water, less so heating) usage is generally a per household function or a per person function?

Our household has 5 teens/adults and high usage but generally each person 'does their own thing' rather than all of us sitting watching TV together for example.  WE do make sure there is only one meal cooked (although there is also some microwave reheating) and I guess there is only one fridge/freezer but it probably gets opened 4-5 times as often as if there was only one person living here.

Would be interesting if the high users recalculated on a per head basis, I suspect the difference between the 3kwh per day and 18kwh per day houses would appear a lot smaller.

MuckChucker

What average are we looking at OP?

Is this Ofgems price cap average you're talking about? Or the actual house breakdown archetypes? 

I think we might be a smidge over the average home usage figure related to the price cap but looking at Ofgems figures below, we're ~700kwh over the elec but almost exactly 1/3 of the gas consumption. Also, we're actually archetype 10 according to the descriptions but I pick this one as it says itself, it mostly resembles the average. 



Biggest users of electricity are the oven and the shower - no surprise. By no means wasted (wife's showers debatable!) but they are what spike the meter. Also, the big living room telly could be more efficient but where's the fun in that and it was purposely bought for performance.

deano2099

The TV, Computer, xbox, and lights are on pretty much permanently

mar7t1n said:

Previous generations lived long lives in cold houses

Not as long, to be fair.
And if your hot water tap isn't giving hot water by the time you're done washing your hands you're probably not doing the full three happy birthdays.