Background electricity usage

[sunshineandsuddenshowers]

We’ve been away for half term week, and before I went I turned off everything I could think of (not the washing machine or dishwasher, tho they were ‘off’). We have a fridge and a freezer. House used 12 units while we were away. Is that a lot? Fridge is super-efficient but I think freezer (small chest freezer) is not.
Id like to get our background usage down as much as I can.

Don't overlook your gas boiler if you have one, they also use a small amount of electricity. Some things on standby like TV, printer, etc use as much on standby as when they are on. I found an old Panasonic mini hi-fi system was using 50W regardless of whether it was on or in standby by looking at my energy usage display - you have to watch them for a while to guage how much turning something on and off changes usage by because things like fridges and freezers turn their compressors on and off according to their thermostats. I found that an old fridge freezer, a high quality low usage one, that was over 25 years old was actually using about 20-25% of all my electricity (possibly slightly more). I had noticed when I was in bed one night, unable to sleep, that it kept rumbling into life on quite a frequent basis - we sleep in a bedroom above the kitchen and the fridge freezer is in the utility room off the kitchen. The fact that the compressor was coming on so frequently suggested to me that over the years the coolant in the system had leaked away - this is a known thing. The compressor turns on to convert the coolant gas back into a liquid, the liquid then evaporates removing heat from the contents of the freezer and then needs to be compressed neck into liquid again - the compressor and pump running to keep cycling this small about of coolant around the fridge freezer was what was using a lot of electricity. Again, just use your energy monitor to try and get a feel for how much one device is using by turning it off, watch the monitor and then turning it back on again. Old laptops left charging also use electricity. Check transformer based chargers - if they are warm to the touch it's a source of wasted electricity - don't leave them switched on when they are not connected to a device that you want to power or charge. I turn off my microwave, the grill/double oven at the plug, dishwasher, etc if we're away in the campervan for a few days. So far this year I have also turned the boiler off when we've been away - I won't do that if there is any risk of the temperature falling below about 4C overnight - I'll leave the heating on and set the thermostat to 15C, maybe a bit less.

We went away for a few days, leaving the fridge freezers and freezers on. We have 3 in total. Over 3 days they used 12 ish units, so 1 and a bit units each per day as a rough idea.

12 units in 7 days is equivalent to 1.7 kWh per day.

Divide that by 24 and you get 0.07 kWh, so you are using the equivalent of 0.07 kW or 70W continuously.

To give an estimate of how low that is, it's probably about equivalent to having your TV switched on all the time.

Its equal to 0.35p x 12units x 52weeks = £220 a year.

Maybe you might get rid of £100 of yearly use by getting rid of the chest freezer completely and maybe £50 by replacing it, but my guess is that it would cost £300 to replace so would take 6 years to pay back. These are guesses due to incomplete information.

You are probably better off focusing on how to save on heating and hot water.

Some things on standby like TV, printer, etc use as much on standby as when they are on.

There may be exceptions but somehow I doubt that that is the norm. Particularly for TVs. I know ours don’t.

@GasPanic that's really helpful, thank you!

Sounds like our background use is not too bad, it's the real everyday while-we're-here use that's what we need to focus on - especially as I have just read the meter again now (3.5 days later) and we have used 52 units!! Yikes! What I think that shows is just how much energy we use to do laundry - we came back with 5 people's clothes for a week to wash, plus every bed in the house. No dryer, but the dehumidifier ran solidly for 36 hours.

Hot water is one of our real money sinks, I know. I have a bath every day (water always shared w 1 other, sometimes more, but still...) Heating not on this year so far, but that can't be far off.

@Yarrawonga generally that's probably true if your gear is relatively new - my printer was an ex-office refurbished laser printer which I got in 2005 so it's 20 years old I think and my relentlessly reliable Sony TV is not quite as old - I'd rather it break down so I can get a newer bigger smart TV - in fact the huge monitor I have for my Mac M1 is far higher quality and bigger than my TV.

I can see the usage drops when I am away from home in my campervan and I leave the boiler on just in case there is a cold snap - thermostat at 15C - I doubt it came on at all - you can also see the 2 days when I turned everything off - fridge/freezer as well as boiler. The high usage days are when the oven/grill was used (my wife insists on using when she feels like it).

My two year old Xerox laser printer uses 1.1 Watts idle and around 500 when printing. Our TV uses 0.5 Watts on standby and around 300 when turned on.

Modern big smart TVs actually use quite a bit of power when they are on, especially in high definition mode. Just checked a 43” Samsung and it is rated at over 1000 Watts when on, 0.5 on standby.

Nah, I don't think that's true for the Samsung, unless it's a plasma.

My 48" LG OLED is 80W.

You'd need an absolutely huge LCD telly to draw a kw.

Nah, I don't think that's true for the Samsung, unless it's a plasma.

You are right. That will teach me to believe what John Lewis tell me. On the Samsung site the same TV is listed as 125 Watts max.

1000w is the same power equivalent as a super high end gaming PC, no TV uses that much.

most modern TV’s use between 50 - 80w.

Don't forget smart doorbells, security cameras, security lights, etc. Those will use power too. Not much, but some.

Oh yes tellies. We have been looking for a new one but they are SO energy greedy that we will put up w our little one for longer. It’s depressing that new tellies use MORE than old ones.

no security lights or doorbells here!

What kind of old TV do you have? The CRT type (not flat screen) use way more power than a modern (or even not so modern) flat screen LED or LCD TV of equivalent size. You can get an idea of the power consumption, just by holding your hand over the top. More heat equals more power.

@sunshineandsuddenshowers

They really don't. Or at least, not if you buy comparable screen size.

The issue more tends to be that these days people go for larger screens, which cancels out the power benefit.

A new flat screen TV will consume about 1/3 of the power of CRT for a given screen size. A 65" flat screen will consume about the same power as an old 24" CRT.

My guess is though that it would take a long time to recover the cost moving from a CRT to and LCD, plus the quality make CRTs were very reliable, so you don't have the cost of replacing them. I used to have a Sony Trinitron, sold it to a friend, it's been going 30 years and still gives a perfect picture. I doubt you would get much more than 10 years out of a modern flat screen TV.

We have a just before Smart TV (was an old model when we got it 6 years ago). Not CRT! And you're right, lots of this is indeed about screen size. If we got a new TV we would get a bigger screen, no doubt about it, which would also be much brighter than what we currently have - and the result of that would be higher energy use. So we'll stick with what we have for now.

I have a plug with an inbuilt power meter to find out what devices use - you can set the unit price - with Shell it is 35.98p kW.hr. I put a 1.6kg medium chicken in the slow cooker at midnight last night. It has 2 power settings low and high but it didn't tell you in the manual what the actual power rating is. The plug tells me it is 105W and 135W. I cooked this on low for 9hrs 50mins and you can see the total cost is less than 40p.

This is how I know that some of my very old devices use nearly as much on standby as when on.

@larkstar

That's actually a decent cooking price (40p) for a mumsnet standard (1.6kgs) fully cooked chicken.

I haven't bought a slow cooker but am tempted. They seem a bit less "trendy" at the moment than the air fryers so are a bit cheaper.

That's actually a decent cooking price (40p) for a mumsnet standard (1.6kgs) fully cooked chicken.

That will feed a family of four for a week.

My bills doubled this month. That's very strange. I already contacted energy suppliers to clear the situation cause I don't notice we consume more energy than last month… I need to know on what basis my bills doubled.

Colby if it's based on meter readings then it's based on usage.
If it's based on estimates just give them a reading. 🤷‍♀️

Yes, of course, I understand this. Which is why I need to figure this out.

Looking at your bill would probably be useful. Maybe linking to "pissed consumer" websites for american suppliers again will help you figure it out.