How much of an issue is a fairly empty fridge/freezer in terms of excess energy use?
My fixed tariff has just come to an end, and at the same time, my energy provider has started giving information in the app about daily use, and I can see that already in March, on the new tariff, it’s costing me 2 to 3 times as much per day as in previous months. So I’ve been looking back at the usage trying to see where cuts could be made.
Generally I use 4 to 6 kWh per day, with occasional days where it’s more like 7 or 8, which is usually when I’ve used the tumble drier or other appliances. This has been pretty consistent over the past few months.
But I can go back and look at when I was away for a a couple of weeks in December/Jan or other times, and those days the usage is consistently 2.2 kWh, even when I am not home.
This seems like quite a large proportion of my overall bill.
The things that I can think of that were being used during this period are primarily the fridge/freezer, the modem/router, the MVHR air vent, one energy-saving light, a few things on standby where there might be a bit of use to keep the clocks on etc (printer, TV, microwave, cooker), and a couple of things left on chargers fully-charged (straighteners, robot hoover). The printer and TV are both supposed to be energy efficient on standby.
There are lots of other things plugged in, but nothing turned on or using energy as far as I know (lamps, coffee machine, dishwasher, computer etc).
So really the only two things that should be using much in the way of electricity are the moden/router (which I don’t think is loads) and the fridge-freezer.
It’s a Bosch, A-rated energy I think, normal size with a fridge on the top and freezer below, only about 5 years old.
I can’t find the rating of use at the moment, but looking online it says fridge/freezers usually using only about 0.8 kWh per day on average.
However, mine is very empty, especially the freezer, and even more so when I go away.
Is that likely to be enough to bump up the energy use to more like 2 kWh a day?
Should I be filling it with frozen water bottles or the like, just to fill it up?
I haven’t bothered before as it seems like a hassle and I thought it was unlikely to make much of a difference, but maybe I am very wrong about that!
Does 2.2 kWh seem high as a daily amount for just fridge/freezer and internet?
Should I be turning off the internet when I’m away/at night etc too?
It is a small one-bed new-build flat and just me here, so energy use should be low.
Although there is a smart reader (hence the info in the app), I do not have an indoor display and it is not easy to access the meters, so it is much more difficult to isolate appliances to check what is using the most energy. I am certain that the meter is connected to my flat correctly, as the days when I have been away are shown clearly on the bill with the lower daily usage. But whether that usage is normal or not, or whether there is more I can do to reduce it, I don’t know.
any other ideas for reducing the standard daily consumption of thigns that are just left on all the time? I don't want to go to ridiculous efforts turning off everything at night and again in the morning, or waiting hours to charge something up instead of leaving it ready to use - but if things like that would make a really significant difference to energy use, then I will.