Domestic electricity baseload

[jmak]

Just trying to get some idea of how much it's realistic to reduce my baseload electricity demand.

 

Still in the early obsessive stage of having a smart meter and last night after the heating went off and before the car started charging with all lights turned off, the meter was showing a 302W demand. Seems high to me it; would add up to over 26kWh/annum. Tonight's project is to unplug the fridge, freezer and tropical fish tanks to find out (which are not optional) what opportunity there is for saving.

 

Proportionally it won't make much difference as ⅓ of annual usage is for the car and ⅓ is for heating, but every penny counts and I don't like waste.

 

Edit: as pointed out by @mavhc 2647kWh/year

Edited April 23, 2022 by jmak
Basic maths error (wrong units)

[mavhc]

2647 kwh per year

[jmak]

2647 kwh per year

Oops. Such a basic error by me [emoji15]

[elsiegee40]

Having looked at the data from our solar panels app, our base load is pretty similar.

 

Our smart meter installed on Jan 4th still doesn’t work but that’s another story.

[Steve21]

I'm in an odd position to answer that one as my own place has been empty the last few months for work to be done, so apart from low heating and a few things like TV/router on standby and fridge/freezer nothing would be on, and it's averaging about 50kWh~ a month (48.9, 48.3, 53.5 over the last 3), so about 1/4 of yours. So guessing you'd have a lot more stuff turned on standby etc if there's another 150~ a month being used, or something is draining a lot!

 

But I'm guessing that depends how many things you have on standby etc overnight (like your fishes etc), and that's all fairly new equipment in terms of fridge/boiler etc regarding energy usage.

 

Steve

[southhamster]

You could try turning off one breaker at time in the distribution board to narrow it down a bit. That does seem high to me but maybe there's an energy vampire lurking somewhere in your house!

[smurfomatic]

I was away for a few days recently, my smart meter said just over 1kWh per day while the house was empty - that will mostly be the fridge freezer

[elsiegee40]

 

But I'm guessing that depends how many things you have on standby etc overnight (like your fishes etc), and that's all fairly new equipment in terms of fridge/boiler etc regarding energy usage.

 

Steve

 

Yes, just off the top of my head have a large tropical aquarium which is running 24/7 with its heater, fridge, freezer and a fridge freezer, smart speaker, sky box, homehub and signal booster, nest box camera, a few clock radios… then there’s stuff like the microwave, the double oven, the Hive heating bits and CH/water system, the landline phone…

 

Some of these of very low usage and I have been ruthless about turning things off rather than letting them go on standby, but it all adds up.

Edited April 23, 2022 by elsiegee40

[jmak]

Really useful Steve - thank you.

 

Various fishkeeping websites suggest probably 150W to 200W for the collection of fish tanks we have. There's an Xbox, a TV and a HiFi on standby.

Trying to work out whether it's worth replacing a 20 year old fridge: still works fine, was AA energy rated when we bought it and has a fair amount of embedded energy/greenhouse gases.

I'm guessing that the WiFi network (four APs) will chew a fair amount - but ironically the smart meter monitor connects over WiFi, so I can't turn it off to test!

[Edu-IT]

Mine looks to be about 2 kWh per day of base usage.

[southhamster]

You might find one of these handy. Energy consumption per plug over time. Good for appliances that cycle so you can work out daily cost of your fridge or washing machine say. I have the older model and it's been useful. In particular replacing the old linear power adapter for our old set top box for a newer switch mode one saved a bit.

 

https://www.brennenstuhl.co.uk/en-GB/products/travel-adapters-adapter-plugs/primera-line-wattage-and-current-meter-pm-231-e-gb

[XiJ]

We use between 2.5 and 3.5kwh per day on average. Most is TVs and Lads PC. The oven if we’re cooking and now and again the tumble dryer In winter.

 

Although I’m pretty sure the SkyQ box uses about the same energy whether in ‘standby’ or switches on. Certainly the old SkyHD boxes were like that. Grrr

[steve]

Over the last 7 years I've been tracking my electricity usage in my apartment. Its just a 2 bed 2 bath - but everything is electric, heating, hot water, oven etc. no gas supply possible.

 

During this period, I've lived on my own or with my brother so demand hasn't been the same year on year. I'd say I'm "frugal" but not to the point I'm prepared to sit in the cold.

 

My typical per year usage is between 3700kWh and 5000kWh (average about 4500) per year depending upon how cold the winter has been, working at home frequency and if I'm living solo.

 

Usage across a year varies between 8kWh per day in the summer and up to 20+kWh in the depths of a cold winter. I'd love to track my usage more accurately but due to the unique way the meters were centrally installed in the building, smart meters can't be fitted without huge expense.

 

So I've used a couple of TP-Link smart plugs to monitor some of my appliances:

 

Average kWh per day (measured over a couple of months per appliance).

Fridge/freezer - 1.74

Hot water tank - 3.5

Dishwasher - 0.8

Washing Machine - 0.3

 

The rest of my usage comes from heating (up to 10kWh per day in winter), cooking (oven / hob / microwave - about 1.5kWh per day) lights (all LEDs), TV, computer, etc.

 

I've tried to use my oven a bit less (2.5kWh per hour), those cheep and easy baked potato meals that need 1.5 to 2 hours in the oven aren't as cheep as first thought - now start in the microwave and 30 mins in the oven. But home cooking is always cheaper than a takeaway.

 

I think the only big change I could really make is a new fridge/freezer would save me about 1kWh per day, saving about £112 per year at current prices - with pay back in under 4 years. But I'm hoping to move this year so won't do this as its integrated and would be left behind.

[mavhc]

The variety of units here is great, there's kwh per year, kwh per month, kwh per day, kwh per hour.

 

Just use watts. Then multiply by 9000 for a year.

 

Simplest thing is to feel the device, if it/the psu gets hot/has a fan, it's going to cost more.

 

Then get a watt meter, get a spreadsheet, time on * average watts, make a pie chart of your total energy broken down by device

 

According to Ofgem, the average household in the UK has 2.4 people living in it, and uses 8 kWh of electricity and 33 kWh of gas respectively, per day

 

That's 333 Watts of electricity, and 1375 watts of gas.

 

If everyone is out of the house in the day, and asleep at night, set your "always on" devices like smart speakers to only come on when people will be using them, either on a timer, or triggered by the house's occupancy via gps on your phone, who's connected to your wifi, alarm state, IR movement detectors, or a "turn on the house" button.

[Davit2005]

I picked up 4 TPLink HS110 smart plugs, they have energy monitoring, coupled with HomeAssistant I can see historical usage.

 

I am about 550w under normal usage

[fiendishlyclever]

Tracking all the devices may be a challenge. My brother-in-law was under the floorboards a few years ago laying a cable and found an old bakelite transformer, wired into the ring main. We have no idea what it was for and nothing stopped working when it was disconnected. I dread to think what we haven't found yet[emoji23]

 

Having a smart meter didn't make much difference to us, probably because I'd already swapped to LED bulbs and disconnected everything I could get away with[emoji23]

[jmak]

The only reason I wanted a smart meter was to get access to the cheaper EV charging tariffs, but it has made me have a look at usage patterns. I was surprised at how much of it is background use when we're either not here or asleep. I'm also going to move some more load to the cheap time; previously it was 22p/kWh peak and 17p/kWh off peak. Now it's 35p peak and 7.5p of peak

 

Our general household use is not far off average for the size of house/number of people living here, despite the fish tanks (which I'd happily ditch, but definitely isn't up for negotiation), so I think I'm not doing badly.

 

I've looked at fridges and I think I'll wait a couple of years; almost everything on sale is currently ranked as F for efficiency, but they changed the criteria last year, so that includes stuff that was previously AA. Presumably they'll improve...

 

Other things on my list:

Thermal blankets for the fish tanks at night and possibly turn them down by 1°C. Lighting is already optimised.

Get rid of my bedside radio alarm with backlit LED display

Turn microwave off at wall when not in use

Put AV kit on a single PDU and only turn it on when in use.

Run hot water tank at a higher temperature for fewer hours (currently runs all the time as that's most efficient use of heat pump, but might be cheaper to run less efficiently in the cheap period).

 

The actual bill is terrifying, because we run an electric car (soon to be 2) and an ASHP for heating, but at the minute I'm still comparing those to what we used to spend on petrol and central heating oil.

[steveg]

Ours is around 400w with nothing actively in use. That's our house and my parents annex which is powered from same meter.

 

Always running we have:

 

2 Large fridges

3 under counter freezers

3 sky boxes in standby

router

POE switch with 3 AP's powered from it and 1 cctv camera

1 pc acting as a server for CCTV and wireless

6 Alexa's

 

I've assumed modern TV's and power supplies etc use pretty much nothing when not in use. At some point I want to get a plug in monitor and see if any of the above are significantly higher than others. I'm assuming fridges / freezers and the pc are the highest.

[mavhc]

Leaving a desktop/server PC on 24/7 is easily the worse thing that's not heating.

 

Use the POE switch to power the alexas, then turn them off when you're asleep/out.

 

Sky boxes could be 20W each.

 

I'd aim for 100W total in a house with no server running, 200W with one running.

 

Why do people make efficiency ratings that go from A to F?, Start at M at least, then you have room for improvement. No need for A++++++++++++++++++++++++

[ZeroHour]

Just to say I linked a graph of the washing machine plug I have at: http://www.edugeek.net/forums/general-chat/227399-cost-living-crisis-2022-what-have-you-cut-back.html#post1949999

 

I bought plugs that use tasmota (so go into Home assistant easily with MQTT) and are made in the UK.

 

NOTE: Watch out for smart plugs as MANY cant handle a high amp throughput and although they may be rated as a high ampage they very often can only handle this as a short peak as opposed to consistent high ampage draw.

 

 

Leaving a desktop/server PC on 24/7 is easily the worse thing that's not heating.

Use the POE switch to power the alexas, then turn them off when you're asleep/out.

Sky boxes could be 20W each.

I'd aim for 100W total in a house with no server running, 200W with one running.

Why do people make efficiency ratings that go from A to F?, Start at M at least, then you have room for improvement. No need for A++++++++++++++++++++++++

 

The ratings did change in 2020 I believe to get rid of A++++++ and I think they tightened the rules washing machines etc have to follow to advertise their 100 wash kWh usage.

 

I have used Rasp Pi 4 to handle a lot of monitoring as the draw is very very low unlike my desktop that draws 150w-200w when in low power modes and half the cores cut etc.

[localzuk]

My "nothing optional is switched on" base load is between 20W and 50W.

 

The only thing on though is my fridge freezer, router, Philips hue hub, a powerline adapter (only 1 side, the other side is switched off unless my PC is on) and my phone charger.

[howartp]

My house (3 Adults) typically runs 700w at rest.

 

I've got a MacMini and a Zoostorm server running 24/7 - my project is to get the Zoostorm shutting down when we go to bed (I run Indigo HA so perfectly doable) then on again the next morning.

 

Oh, and getting my Dad not to boot his PC at 8am when he gets a glass of water before returning upstairs for 2-2.5 hours, finally surfacing at around 10.30am earliest. He leaves it on 8am-11pm regardless.

[jmak]

 

Oh, and getting my Dad not to boot his PC at 8am when he gets a glass of water before returning upstairs for 2-2.5 hours, finally surfacing at around 10.30am earliest. He leaves it on 8am-11pm regardless.

 

You need to set a Group Policy to hibernate it after 30 minutes inactivity [emoji57]