Electricity use whilst away

MultiFuelBurner

sisisimoore said:

To be honest, I am constantly using around that amount. My smart reader is always at a minimum of 300w being used constantly. 

That would be considered a high base load

MultiFuelBurner

To the OP are you accidentally heating the hot water by immersion. Always worth checking.rhat switch isn't active.

Scot_39

My very small fridge freezer as rated uses c0.8kWh.

But bigger more efficient ones can be similar rated as new.

But older larger could easily take twice that.  Sure read some posts here with older large American style dual door in past consuming 3kWh plus whilst a more modern design model of similar size - might be sub 1.5kWh daily.

Try to search for nominal rating for your model.

Bad seals, excessive ice build up or a looping controller or auto defrost cycle etc can see far higher than new nominal consumption too.

Might be worth investing in a tapo p110 plug or two - to check key devices.

But it may not be the obvious big items.  5kWh daily is only an average of c200W.

How much power does say a gas boiler consume on standby (ive always assumed its mainly the pump contributing to thev100-200W google averages etc - but not had one and an ihd to measure ) ?

Everything else I run empty  - alarms - burglar, smoke etc, security lights - now led, router etc  - when FF compressor or defrost element not running -  pulls 20-30W base load. 

Doesnt sound much but even 30W =  0.72kWh daily

What is your everything as left empty base ihd electric power consumption when freezer not running ?

A  friend with fish pond and tanks says his nominal base is nearer 2kWh average - expensive "pets" these days - in winter when heats pond too.

I run a couple of led bulbs on timers - drags my total up to 1.7-2kWh per day empty.

In fact some days don't use 5kWh - occupied inc electric hw / shower  - if not in all day, eat out etc.

But I am pretty anal about switching off at mains these days -  stuff I used to leave on standby - like my desktop computers and peripherals etc and old smart wireless TV, bluray etc. Can pull 50W plus even in standby - 1.2kWh over 24 hours

Small loads can mount up if have enough of them.

Gerry1

Alnat1 said:

Gerry1 said:

Read the meter, unplug the fridge/freezer for a couple of hours the read the meter again.  Do this for several days.

The fridge freezer is the likely culprit but you'll be amazed by the number of things on standby if you check everything in the house.

Rather than unplugging, it might be good to get an energy monitor. The usual one mentioned on these forums is a Tapo P110.

Both tests are useful in different ways.

The Unplug The F/F is a quick no-cost test the OP can do today.  It will give an implicit indication of the F/F usage and also show the standby use (which may be more than the OP realised).

The Energy Monitor test will show the F/F consumption more accurately over a longer period, but it can't be used for hardwired items.

QrizB

matelodave said:

Netexporter said:

takemymoney said:

I have one question where do you want to install the solars and does your surroundings have dust, if it has a lot of dust then your sollar will have low efficiency.

And rain washes dust off. What evidence have you got that the millions of solar installations are being severely compromised by dust?

he probably read it somewhere 

Might be thinking of Mars landers?

https://abcnews.go.com/Technology/mars-lander-losing-power-dust-solar-panels/story?id=8480511

CanalBoatTime said:

 According to my Octopus app, whilst we were away in July/August, we clocked up a fairly consistent 5-5.5kWh per day.  This seems a lot (or does it?).

I agree that 5kWh per day for an empty house seems quite a lot. While the fridge freezer seems a likely culprit, you might want to carry out a bit of an energy audit.

CanalBoatTime

Thanks, I’ve got the fridge freezer plugged into a smart plug, it’s been on it since 7:15 this mor, and has so far clocked up .64kWh (in 10 hours), so that may not be good, but isn’t bad enough to equate to 5+ in 24 hours.  My son’s Xbox and the tv are both on smart plugs, and have been all year, so I have nil value readings for them.
No fish, the dog was at Mum’s, as far as I know I don’t have an immersion heater, the light bulbs outside haven’t been looked at since we moved in, so they probably are old style, but still, 5 kWh per day???!

Green_hopeful

We did a full audit a few years ago and went from an average of 27 kWh a day to about 10. We turned everything off and turned things back on in turn. We had a freezer in the garage and the door hadn’t been closed properly. It’s was completely solid with ice (in my defence it was my partners house and I hadn’t moved in yet) anyway the freezer and lightbulbs made a ton of difference. Perhaps you need to do a full audit. 

Veteransaver

Do you have a few hard drive type set top boxes, or a home server, cctv system? They can all use significant power on standby. Also ventilation systems.

EssexHebridean

Go for the low hanging fruit - make the lights your next priority to check tomorrow morning. 

CanalBoatTime

EssexHebridean said:

Go for the low hanging fruit - make the lights your next priority to check tomorrow morning. 

I’d switch the outside security lights off, but I don’t know where the switches are!  I guess taking the bulbs out would have the same effect!

i guess the fridge freezer is on borrowed time, but going to have to see some savings from the solar before I can afford any more outlay.