Electricity usage seems high

killerbyte said:
This is what I thought.

Here is a FULL breakdown of what we have running:
10x 3W LED downlights
3x 5W LED spots
3x 10W LED lamps (the ones with batteries in the bulb)
3x 5W LED globes
1x 42-inch TV
1x fridge (two adults so we open it only when we need to and close it quickly)
1x washing machine
1x dishwasher (used twice a week)
1x Android TV box
2x standing fan
1x ceiling fan
1x water feature pump
1x garage motor (gets uses 2-4 times a day)
1x Oven (gets used 1-2 a week)
1x Halogen convection oven (used 2-3 times a week) 1350W
1x Saeco Coffee machine (gets used 5 times a day when I WFH, twice when I work from office) 1800W
1x geyser (not sure on size but its not massive, a long 15min shower will drain it)
1x 1000W microwave
1x media server (i5, no GPU, has a 500W PSU [80Plus Bronze])
1x gaming PC (Ryzen 1700, GTX 1080, has a 1000W PSU [80Plus Plat]) I play Dota on it or just watch series, rarely play anything that requires serious power. I have used a meter on my PCs and monitors and at the time I measured it the monthly cost to run them was R250 (I monitored them for a full month.)


No Aircons, no weekly cake bake, no pool pump, no electric heaters.
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Use cold wash only with washing machine.
 
richjdavies said:
Never seen a TV or electronics have any real impact. Chargers or things on standby is an old wives tales at this point.
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Actually, I recently found I have an AV Receiver ( from the year 2012) with sub, which on standby pulls 60w :oops:

After moving said AV Receiver to the braai room where there is a smart plug turning if off most of the time, and using a soundbar at the main tv instead, house idle usage dropped by, you guessed it, 58w or so.

Doesn't sound like much, but that constant 60w counts up over a month. I mean thats 1440Wh/~1.45kWh just for a day. So you end up with about 43kWh by the end of the month just having that sound equipment on standby. The soundbar seems to be much better. Now the solar system's batteries also last longer overnight.

Basically what I am saying, its not really a myth. Some idle devices still do use too much energy. It is worth investigating any device using power in your house to figure out what it is using.
 
Tinuva said:
Actually, I recently found I have an AV Receiver ( from the year 2012) with sub, which on standby pulls 60w :oops:

After moving said AV Receiver to the braai room where there is a smart plug turning if off most of the time, and using a soundbar at the main tv instead, house idle usage dropped by, you guessed it, 58w or so.

Doesn't sound like much, but that constant 60w counts up over a month. I mean thats 1440Wh/~1.45kWh just for a day. So you end up with about 43kWh by the end of the month just having that sound equipment on standby. The soundbar seems to be much better. Now the solar system's batteries also last longer overnight.

Basically what I am saying, its not really a myth. Some idle devices still do use too much energy. It is worth investigating any device using power in your house to figure out what it is using.
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Hmm, interesting

Going to get a power meter plug thing to check that stuff on my side as well.
 
Tinuva said:
Actually, I recently found I have an AV Receiver ( from the year 2012) with sub, which on standby pulls 60w :oops:

After moving said AV Receiver to the braai room where there is a smart plug turning if off most of the time, and using a soundbar at the main tv instead, house idle usage dropped by, you guessed it, 58w or so.

Doesn't sound like much, but that constant 60w counts up over a month. I mean thats 1440Wh/~1.45kWh just for a day. So you end up with about 43kWh by the end of the month just having that sound equipment on standby. The soundbar seems to be much better. Now the solar system's batteries also last longer overnight.

Basically what I am saying, its not really a myth. Some idle devices still do use too much energy. It is worth investigating any device using power in your house to figure out what it is using.
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This is also the reason why when I was shopping for a mini-pc for my home server I went for the lowest consumption machine I could find.
 
Speedster said:
This is also the reason why when I was shopping for a mini-pc for my home server I went for the lowest consumption machine I could find.
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Ditto have an old intel Celeron in a Old Huntkey mini case sipping on 25W

Would love to replace it one day with a Misinform or Beelink & AMD Ryzen CPU but them import prices is still nasty.

Edit: and the R vs $ is not helping :(
 
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Tinuva said:
Actually, I recently found I have an AV Receiver ( from the year 2012) with sub, which on standby pulls 60w :oops:
... So you end up with about 43kWh by the end of the month just having that sound equipment on standby.
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Yikes! Yes, I'd put that in the "old devices" left on category :sneaky:
So yes, definitely keep an eye on anything that uses mains that is plugged in all the time.
Those older DStv boxes are bad too.
But things plugged into wall-warts not so much

If an unused charger isn’t warm to the touch, it’s using less than a penny of electricity a day. For a small smartphone charger, if it’s not warm to the touch, it’s using less than a penny a year.
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(That's US pennies)
 
richjdavies said:
maybe get a smaller kettle!
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or boil only the one cup and spend no additional money ;). Btw, not disputing that the one cup vs full kettle will have a close to negligible impact per month. Do the math for a full 2L kettle vs 1 cup five times a day for a year. For some people that saving will be meaningless, for others maybe something. (I get a difference of ~R600 for the year).

Any case,

killerbyte said:
1x 42-inch TV
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Some TV's have a lower power/green/eco option - use it or manually turn down brightness.

killerbyte said:
1x geyser (not sure on size but its not massive, a long 15min shower will drain it)
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take shorter showers / fit low flow shower head / turn geyser temp down / use geyser timer.

killerbyte said:
1x Oven (gets used 1-2 a week)
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If the oven has a fan assisted option use that over the static heat options. Use the grill option as little as possible. When cooking dishes in the oven, make a bigger portion and freeze the left overs for a meal another time (assuming the type of food allows for it). Check/replace oven door seals.

Switch off things (physical switch on wall socket) when not in use and that does not *have* to be on 24/7. Even if very little savings are realised through this you also reduce chances of a power surge frying something when the grid comes back after a 01:00AM load shedding cycle.
 
one poster said:
Switch off things (physical switch on wall socket) when not in use and that does not *have* to be on 24/7. Even if very little savings are realised through this you also reduce chances of a power surge frying something when the grid comes back after a 01:00AM load shedding cycle.
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^^ my 2c. It is dangerous thinking the above when it comes to savings.
My in-laws un plug the kettle every night because of hints like above. All that time they keep their "low energy" halogen spot lights.

There's only so much effort people can make, so going around switching off adapters that use 0.1W is a waste of time, which is better spent actually making a difference.
 
Tinuva said:
Actually, I recently found I have an AV Receiver ( from the year 2012) with sub, which on standby pulls 60w :oops:

After moving said AV Receiver to the braai room where there is a smart plug turning if off most of the time, and using a soundbar at the main tv instead, house idle usage dropped by, you guessed it, 58w or so.

Doesn't sound like much, but that constant 60w counts up over a month. I mean thats 1440Wh/~1.45kWh just for a day. So you end up with about 43kWh by the end of the month just having that sound equipment on standby. The soundbar seems to be much better. Now the solar system's batteries also last longer overnight.

Basically what I am saying, its not really a myth. Some idle devices still do use too much energy. It is worth investigating any device using power in your house to figure out what it is using.
Click to expand...
Well my lounge just on standby which is a TV, router, Soundbar, Xbox, DSTV decoder and a Google mini uses 30 to 60w on idle, setting the series X to eco dropped that quite a bit, changing a few things on the router also dropped it from 60w to 30 to 40w on idle, almost halving it, what also happens is from 10:30 every evening the timer goes off and turns it off and turns it back on at 5:30.
My bedroom which is a 58" TV, decoder, router and smaller soundbar sits at 18w on idle.
 
richjdavies said:
What's wrong with a pi? Or ... Letting it go to standby?
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My HassIo was on Pi 4 for a while, virtual box HassIO is faster and more responsive on J4105 Celeron even with added web browsing or streaming

For Media/Data storage I use a Synology NAS in Eco mode.

NAS + Celeron PC + WiFI + Alarm + Mecer S01 PC = 67W (Always on even during LS)

Edit: Joke is during Load shedding weeks, I switch Xbox to Standby to up my power usage to 90W else my Inverter fan don't kick in during charge cycle.
 
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wingnut771 said:
I don't think geyser blankets are weather/UV proof and won't last long outdoors.
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You are right. In the Karoo on the farms, the geysers are mostly installed outside, but under shelter with removable sides to allow for access. In towns, I see the thing is sommer plakked onto the side of the house, mostly where it is an eyesore.
 
AlphaJohn said:
My HassIo was on Pi 4 for a while, virtual box HassIO is faster and more responsive on J4105 Celeron even with added web browsing or streaming

For Media/Data storage I use a Synology NAS in Eco mode.

NAS + Celeron PC + WiFI + Alarm + Mecer S01 PC = 67W (Always on even during LS)

Edit: Joke is during Load shedding weeks, I switch Xbox to Standby to up my power usage to 90W else my Inverter fan don't kick in during charge cycle.
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Try the pi again but don't use an sdcard....
 
richjdavies said:
^^ my 2c. It is dangerous thinking the above when it comes to savings.
My in-laws un plug the kettle every night because of hints like above. All that time they keep their "low energy" halogen spot lights.
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If they follow random advice to unplug unused devices but are not swayed by your arguments, and possibly empirical evidence of the energy use of a 50W halogen bulb vs a 5W LED - the message is not the problem...

richjdavies said:
There's only so much effort people can make, so going around switching off adapters that use 0.1W is a waste of time, which is better spent actually making a difference.
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If someone has the option to physically switch something off that is not being used, you lose nothing by doing it. This does not imply a universal rule that everyone must move a giant wall unit every night to get to a power switch for their [insert name of connected media device of choice]. Also does not imply you will cut your R5000 electricity bill by half if you do.
 
one poster said:
If they follow random advice to unplug unused devices but are not swayed by your arguments, and possibly empirical evidence of the energy use of a 50W halogen bulb vs a 5W LED - the message is not the problem...
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Problem is because they have read switching things off and "low energy" bulbs are things to do, and they think they have done the 2nd one.

People love to do dumb things that don't make a difference and they then don't bother doing other things. Just look at banning straws or plastic bags, I bet those people doing that will be less likely to other "environmentally conscious" things because they have already "ticked the box".
 
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Ps...

Anyone with a killawatt want to measure their DStv -- they don't seem to go into standby properly. Those things bad and are always left on, but hardly anyone mentions them (I only have an old one with a small 12v never normally plug it in, but will measure tonight...)

So, I will take back my "things left plugged in" statement. Chargers are nearly zero, but powered small electronics can be 100W which if 24/7 is 72kWh/month (nearing R200 nowadays!)
 
richjdavies said:
Ps...

Anyone with a killawatt want to measure their DStv -- they don't seem to go into standby properly. Those things bad and are always left on, but hardly anyone mentions them (I only have an old one with a small 12v never normally plug it in, but will measure tonight...)

So, I will take back my "things left plugged in" statement. Chargers are nearly zero, but powered small electronics can be 100W which if 24/7 is 72kWh/month (nearing R200 nowadays!)
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If you're already paying R1000 a month for that thing, what's another couple of bucks for the electricity?
 
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