tracking down high electricity usage

km1500

i turn most things off at the plug and my idle consumption is around 30w. The small fridge freezer kicks in from time to time on top of that.

QrizB

We're a household of four people - two adults, two late-teenage children, practically young adults themselves - with the usual assortment of electronic gadgets and our overnight energy use is around 100-120 watts.

anthdci

Thanks everyone, lots of useful insights.

The Ivie app for my smart meter said that yesterday between midnight at 7am I was using 220w. So I’m already saving 150w per hour since starting this thread. Another 70-120w should be do-able. I know my caravan leisure batteries were still on the trickle charger as was my drill battery.

I need to look into why my PC isn’t sleeping. Shouldn’t be too hard to figure out. I was last on it at 4pm, it’s set to sleep at 15mins and hibernate at 30mins. I purposely left it on to make sure it would go off. It hasn’t. So the NAS/PC combo is sucking down 130w right now. (it is pretty high powered, ryzen 9 3900x, RTX3070). 

I’m definitely turning the microwave off at the wall when not in use now, but the oven is hardwired in, I think it has a switch but it’s right at the back of a cupboard so I think my wife would kick off if I started turning that off.

I am also thinking the fairly old 32” TV that’s in my bedroom will be using some in idle. I’ll try the monitor on that too. It is only ever used for an hour or two when we go to bed. My wife is a pain for wanting the TV on to fall asleep to. I’m the opposite so 99% of the time stay awake until I know she’s gone to sleep so I can turn it off, but by off I mean standby.

victor2

Stoves, microwaves and most modern TVs use next to nothing in "standby".

Worth putting the monitor on the TV though, as they can be set to update the EPG when in standby, but normally it should use less than 1W when off but still powered.

I have an auto-off setting on ours, so it goes into standby after being on for 4 hours without the remote being touched. It gives you a two minute countdown so you get advanced notice of it going, and can prevent it if you're still awake!

nxdmsandkaskdjaqd

I carried out a review of my idle power consumption overnight.  The lowest standby/idle power I have recorded on my IHD and Home automation is 53 Watts.

STANDBY - 11pm to 7am
Alarm	15
BT Router	10
Ipad on charge	6
Gates	6
Router Amplifier	5.6
Light kitchen	4.7
Ariel Amp	4.4
Light hall	3.5
Digibox	3.33
Internal Camera	2
Garrage Door	2
Picture Frame	1.85
Bedroom Radio	1.65
Wine Cooler	1
Outside Freezer	1
MP3	0.8
Nest	0.8
Phone	0.7
Inside Fridge Freezer	0.2
Mac Book Pro	0
Weather Station	0
Security Sensor
Mirror Downstairs bathroom
Mirror Main bathroom
Mirror Toilet

victor2

nxdmsandkaskdjaqd said:

I carried out a review of my idle power consumption overnight.  The lowest standby/idle power I have recorded on my IHD and Home automation is 53 Watts.

STANDBY - 11pm to 7am
Alarm	15
BT Router	10
Ipad on charge	6
Gates	6
Router Amplifier	5.6
Light kitchen	4.7
Ariel Amp	4.4
Light hall	3.5
Digibox	3.33
Internal Camera	2
Garrage Door	2
Picture Frame	1.85
Bedroom Radio	1.65
Wine Cooler	1
Outside Freezer	1
MP3	0.8
Nest	0.8
Phone	0.7
Inside Fridge Freezer	0.2
Mac Book Pro	0
Weather Station	0
Security Sensor
Mirror Downstairs bathroom
Mirror Main bathroom
Mirror Toilet

That is really not very representative, for example two freezers taking a total of 1.2W. When their compressors cut in, it will be much higher. Conversely, the iPad will not be drawing 6W constantly when charging, it will drop to close to zero.
A better way to look at "idle" power use is to take the average overnight kWh taken over several days.

nxdmsandkaskdjaqd

victor2 said:

nxdmsandkaskdjaqd said:

I carried out a review of my idle power consumption overnight.  The lowest standby/idle power I have recorded on my IHD and Home automation is 53 Watts.

STANDBY - 11pm to 7am
Alarm	15
BT Router	10
Ipad on charge	6
Gates	6
Router Amplifier	5.6
Light kitchen	4.7
Ariel Amp	4.4
Light hall	3.5
Digibox	3.33
Internal Camera	2
Garrage Door	2
Picture Frame	1.85
Bedroom Radio	1.65
Wine Cooler	1
Outside Freezer	1
MP3	0.8
Nest	0.8
Phone	0.7
Inside Fridge Freezer	0.2
Mac Book Pro	0
Weather Station	0
Security Sensor
Mirror Downstairs bathroom
Mirror Main bathroom
Mirror Toilet

That is really not very representative, for example two freezers taking a total of 1.2W. When their compressors cut in, it will be much higher. Conversely, the iPad will not be drawing 6W constantly when charging, it will drop to close to zero.
A better way to look at "idle" power use is to take the average overnight kWh taken over several days.

The ipad is on charge all night, and does take 6 watts for most of the night.  The purpose of the exercise was to find the standby/idle watts of the house.  Hence when the compressors on the freezers are not running their standby/idle wattage is 1.3 watts.  Since doing the tests I have shut down a number of the items to reduce the power consumption.

In addition, my overnight power consumption, with freezers running, is 0.8 KWh in the winter and in the summer 1.1 KWh.

Gerry1

'In addition, my overnight power consumption, with freezers running, is 0.8 kWh in the winter and in the summer 1.1 kWh.'

FTFY !  😀  (It's an important distinction.)

nxdmsandkaskdjaqd

Gerry1 said:

'In addition, my overnight power consumption, with freezers running, is 0.8 kWh in the winter and in the summer 1.1 kWh.'

FTFY !  😀  (It's an important distinction.)

Fixed the kwh

victor2

nxdmsandkaskdjaqd said:

victor2 said:

nxdmsandkaskdjaqd said:

I carried out a review of my idle power consumption overnight.  The lowest standby/idle power I have recorded on my IHD and Home automation is 53 Watts.

STANDBY - 11pm to 7am
Alarm	15
BT Router	10
Ipad on charge	6
Gates	6
Router Amplifier	5.6
Light kitchen	4.7
Ariel Amp	4.4
Light hall	3.5
Digibox	3.33
Internal Camera	2
Garrage Door	2
Picture Frame	1.85
Bedroom Radio	1.65
Wine Cooler	1
Outside Freezer	1
MP3	0.8
Nest	0.8
Phone	0.7
Inside Fridge Freezer	0.2
Mac Book Pro	0
Weather Station	0
Security Sensor
Mirror Downstairs bathroom
Mirror Main bathroom
Mirror Toilet

That is really not very representative, for example two freezers taking a total of 1.2W. When their compressors cut in, it will be much higher. Conversely, the iPad will not be drawing 6W constantly when charging, it will drop to close to zero.
A better way to look at "idle" power use is to take the average overnight kWh taken over several days.

The ipad is on charge all night, and does take 6 watts for most of the night.  The purpose of the exercise was to find the standby/idle watts of the house.  Hence when the compressors on the freezers are not running their standby/idle wattage is 1.3 watts.  Since doing the tests I have shut down a number of the items to reduce the power consumption.

In addition, my overnight power consumption, with freezers running, is 0.8 KWh in the winter and in the summer 1.1 KWh.

So the lowest column on your graph is between 3am and 4am, where your used just over 0.1kWh, which is equivalent to a constant load of 100W for the hour. Still a good tool for looking at your overall consumption though.

Fridges and freezers are not normally idle for the whole night, so a snapshot at any one moment is not really useful. 

Hardly a power monster, but if your iPad charger is drawing a steady 6W for most of the night, it might be time to look for a new iPad!