Yet another article in the Daily Express with incorrect running costs - a fridge does not cost £3.40 a day to run

[cakeorwine]

This is the article from the Daily Express

Dishwashers

According to the experts, the majority usage on your energy bills will come from the wet household appliances, such as dishwashers and washing machines. They shared: “The average dishwasher cycle lasts around an hour and a half, but some lower quality ones can run from two to four hours. Running a dishwasher is one of the most expensive household appliances, using around 3.3 kWh of energy.
“It's possible to estimate how much energy each appliance uses by multiplying its power rating in kW by the number of minutes/hours it’s left on. Wattage information should be on the label or in any manual that comes with your appliance.
“For example, a dishwasher may have a power rating of 2200W (there are 1000W in a kW). If you run it for 90 minutes it uses 3.3 kWh, costing around £1.12 for a 90 minute cycle. Here are the workings of the equation: 2.2 x 90/60 = 3.3kWh.”

Fridges

On average, fridges and freezers will account for around 13 percent of your household’s energy bill, according to Energy Saving Trust. The average fridge/freezer will stay on 24/7, with a Wattage of 400, using around 9.6 kWh of energy per day.

Ovens:

"The average wattage of an oven is around 3kW, meaning it uses around 1kwh if run for around 20 minutes, which is about 34p."

Washing machines

Washing machines and dishwashers account for around 14 percent of a typical energy bill. On average, a typical washing machine will run from around 45 to 90 minutes.

A washing machine will have a similar power rating to a dishwasher, with an average rating of 2200W. Typically, though, the running cycle for a washing machine would be shorter, therefore costing less per cycle.

On an average 2200W washing machine, the appliance will use about 2.2kWh of energy if running for an hour, which will cost around 75p, says the pros. Again, households should avoid half-loads and opt for a grade A energy-efficiency

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So what are the issues?

They tried. They really tried. They looked at the wattage of a fridge / freezer - about 400 watts and then said, hey, it's on 24 /7 so that's going to be 0.4 kWh every hour, so 24 * 0.4 a day = 9.6 kWh - so £3.26

Mathematically correct - but scientifically inaccurate as the fridge / freezer is not constantly running at that wattage.

Also - that would be about 3600 kWh a year of electricity a year just for a fridge / freezer. Which is strange as the average electricity use is 2900 kWH for all devices.

And also a surprise as the article also says "On average, fridges and freezers will account for around 13 percent of your household’s energy bill, according to Energy Saving Trust"

The other devices are not running at that wattage constantly. It fluctuates a lot - especially with the fridge / freezer. A fridge uses between 400 - 600 kWh a year (about 1 - 2kWh a day) A freezer uses about 200 - 300 kWh a year (about 0.8 kWh a day)

This kind of article is dangerous - especially the fridge advice - as it will worry people and get them to turn their fridge off for a time. Which is dangerous for food safety.

I think that media that publishes false information like this should face a punishment.

A typical dishwasher is about 1.2kWh per cycle.

So about 34p - 40p

Not £1.12

They have done this before. And had to correct it.

An "expert" sends them an article and they publish it without thinking. And they get the calculations massively wrong.

Why should I automatically trust you over this article? What’s your credentials???

YANBU. I've got a large fridge and a separate large freezer, and I run my dishwasher daily. My daily electricity usage is often under £3.40 in total. And that includes everything else - TVs, lights, washing machine, kettle, charging phones etc.

My fridge is in its last legs and terribly inefficient too, still doesn't cost anywhere near that.

My hourly use with big things like the TV and kettle not in use is around 3-6p an hour. That'll be the fridge, freezer, fish tank and router.

Articles like this are scaremongering shit.

Same with electric oven.

Once it gets to the temp it turns off. The starts again to keep the temp constant.

It isnt running constantly for 2 hours when you're making a roast or something that takes longer to cook.

As you say, this shows a distinct lack of critical thinking. If fridges cost £100/month to run then this would be a major, major issue! And even before the price rises would have been about £30/month - when many people were paying less than £50/month total for electricity in the “good old days” (and EVERYONE pretty much runs a fridge, unlike electric ovens, immersion heaters etc).

You can trust critical thinking.

Do you think a fridge uses 9kWh a day of energy?
Given the typical electricity household use is 2900 kWH electricity

£3.40 per day would be over £100 per month. That's more than my entire combined bill by itself, even now. Yes we're pretty frugal but we have a fairly large fridge-freezer.

It's pretty obvious that these sort of articles are written by some random with a calculator rather than someone with experience of the real world & a decent amount of common sense.

A Masters science degree?

What does that have to do with the cost of running fridges?

The ability to understand science equations, how energy works, how fridges work, to do research and to think critically - and to question what you read.

You don’t need credentials, you need basic arithmetic and some common sense.

if the “typical” annual use is 2900kwh/year, and we can safely assume the “typical” number of fridges is >1 (as it’s not uncommon for people to have more than one fridge) then there’s no way one fridge can use more than 3000kwh/year. That would mean the average family ran a fridge and only a fridge, no lights, kettle, heating, TV, washing machine…it logically can’t be true so then you have to look at the assumptions they’re making and then you can easily see the problem (assuming a fridge runs at full pelt 100% of the time - you only need to stand in the kitchen and listen to know that’s not the case).

Typical fridge running costs

From doing research

This is from a poorly rated fridge freezer

currysprod.a.bigcontent.io/v1/static/602317_cfg3552w_pis-31888.pdf

It's 274 kWh a year .

Well the last time cakeorwine took on the Daily Express on this subject they were forced into a humiliating climb down.
www.mumsnet.com/talk/am_i_being_unreasonable/4662677-another-irresponsible-thread-about-energy-saving-save-ps2000-a-year-by-turning-things-off

@cakeorwine - yes I forgot they even put that information out publicly and it takes about 30 seconds to find! No excuse for a national newspaper to get it so wrong.

Yabu.

Its the Express. They print nonsense to a degree that even the Mail go 'wtaf'.

And this time, they really tried with the energy calculations but didn't realise that devices like fridges don't run constantly.

It's not exactly difficult to do the research on typical running costs.

It's nonsense.

But when you have people turning off fridges to save money, it's dangerous nonsense.

I can “trust critical thinking”

and by that you mean your critical thinking?

Anyone who reads the daily express is not someone I am automatically going to trust their critical thinking tbh

I read the Express to see what other people are being exposed to.

Can you tell me whether you think those figures are correct or not?

Do you think a fridge uses

a) About 9.7 kWH of electricity a day
b) About 1 kWH or less a day

Haha well I believe you op

as the alternative is that my energy costs per month for everything are less than it apparently should be costing solely for my fridge according to that article

@Gumreduction i don’t see what your problem is. @cakeorwine is trying to call out irresponsible reporting. I’m sure she’d be happy to be corrected if someone came along with some actual facts but so far you’re short on those. All you need is a calculator, or a quick look on any manufacturer’s website. Just because something is in a publication that prints nonsense doesn’t mean they should be allowed to continue to print nonsense. It’s well known that people do believe this stuff and they should make the minimal effort needed to make sure what they print is accurate.

Absolutely agree with the OP. And it's easy to prove. Go into your kitchen. Make sure your TV, radio etc are off, it needs to be quiet. Close the door. Listen to the noise level in your kitchen. Open the fridge. You'll hear the motor kick in. And after a few minutes it will turn off, as the thermometer will sense that the interior has got back to the required level. Freezer, oven etc works the same. The motor only works full power when it needs to.

The most casual glance at my smart meter tells me that the dishwasher is only at full whack briefly and occasionally during its cycle.