Are our bills excessive?

Cardew

s.c. wrote:

Cardew, my figures are no more exagerated than yours.
The few watts you state are those used by the displays, on dvds vcrs and microvaves, after all that is all that is powered when not in use.
However unless you have a lcd tv, the Cathode ray tube in most conventional tvs is what consumes the most on standby, having three heaters one for each colour left on to extend the tubes life.
In the stand-by mode they draw a varied amount of current.... 4 to 12 watts. If you take 8 as a medium the every 7 1/2 hours it is like having a 60 watt light on for one hour.

If a TV is in standby for an average of 20hrs per day.... that is 160 watts. 2 tvs ( second one in the bedroom or kids room = 320 watts per day (around 2.3p per day) times 365 days is 116,800 per year. Multiply that by your local kwatt/hr rate and you will know what it costs you. ( over £8)

This is what Oxford university has to say about it.

http://66.249.93.104/search?q=cache:-TNMnaN1DSUJ:www.admin.ox.ac.uk/estates/environment/indep.doc+standby+consumption+of+tv+sets&hl=en
http://www.admin.ox.ac.uk/estates/environment/energyandw.shtml

Quote from the above documents on energy conservation, re tvs,

" avoid switching appliances on to stand-by mode.
A colour TV on stand-by consumes 24% of the energy when the TV is fully on "
A Computer, monitor, printer and modem left on standby consumes around 60 watts. would you leave a 60w light bulb on permenantly?
The latest computers have 550W power supplies, CPU can consume in excess of 100W alone (25 to 40w unloaded)and need more than one fan to keep them cool. so three fans are used, water cooling is already offered.
So the more modern the computer the more power consumed as opposed to domestic appliances, which tend to consume less, the more modern they are.

S.C.
Those links make interesting reading although, for understandable reasons, they do present a worse case scenario.

A ‘Google’ on the web produces thousands of sites that give a different picture.

If we take TVs. I don’t doubt that older TVs might draw 8 watts on standby. However the industry adopted a(voluntary) standard some years ago, for TVs and other devices, to reduce the standby consumption below 1 watt.

I do not have a LCD TV. My conventional 28inch Panasonic TV has a standby power of 0.9watts and my 32 inch Sony is 0.6watts. Both sets are approx 4 years old.This is approx 1% and not 24%(76watts and 132watts) of the fully on consumption. So the annual consumption of these is a few pence per year. Even your figures of £4 a year for 20 hours a day is hardly likely to break the bank!

Perusal of the web will show that the latest equipments have even lower standby consumption.

If we turn to Computers I do not dispute that they should be switched off where possible – particularly CRT monitors. However even the website you give shows the average consumption of a PC as 40 watts and a monitor as 80 watts(and LCD monitors consume only a fraction of that); and that is the consumption when operating and not standby. I suggest that your earlier statement: “Computers are even more expensive if left on and can average 400watts.” is rather misleading.

I think we can both agree that regardless of whether your figures or mine are representative, the standby consumption of most electrical devices is not a major factor in the average household annual bill – which is where this discussion started.

Chris-palmist

Roughly how much electricity (in pence per hour ), does my computer use ? It has a built in cd/ dvd drive, and I usually play a cd whilst I'm "surfing".
I forgot to mention, I think my separately-powered speakers use approx 100 watts.
I also forgot to mention my desktop computer and monitor dont have a "standby"
Thanks

dogshome

Having bought a wattmeter, it's novelty led me to check every appliance. My Dell comp & monitor and Epson printer were drawing a total 4W on standby, but the wake-up call was BT's broadband box that was pulling 5W on it's own - this 9W total costs £8 a year - the cost of a Fish & Chip supper for 2? I now switch the whole lot off at the wall socket - the phone still works and the broadband box has re-established it's connection before my comp has booted up