Standby power in the home
A few months ago I was visiting our local library, when I noticed some interesting kits behind the the desk. They turned out to be “Home Energy Action Toolkits” (which has an acronym of HEAT!). I put my name down on the list, and finally last week it was my turn to borrow one of the kits.
They include the following items:
- Power-mate power meter
- Infrared thermometer
- Stop watch
- Compass
- Worksheet
I was primarily interesting in using the power meter to gauge how much power various appliances use in our home.
Here’s what I discovered:
| Appliance | Standby (Watts) | On (Watts) |
|---|---|---|
| DVD Player | 2.1 | 12 |
| VCR | 5.6 | 16 |
| CRT TV | n/a | 56 |
| 2400 W Heater | 1.3 | 960/1370/2210 (low/med/high) |
| CD Cassette Radio 1 | 5.3 | 8.5/6.5/6.3 (Cd/Tape/Radio) |
| CD Cassette Radio 2 | 4.0 | 5.9/5.3 (Tape/Radio) |
| Computer + CRT Monitor | 8.5 | 160 |
| Computer speakers | 2 | 3.6 |
| Small CRT TV | n/a | 44 |
| 1000 W Heater | n/a | 960 |
| Camera battery charger | 0.4 | |
| Automatic garage roller door | 10.4 | 100 |
| Mobile phone charger | 0.2 | |
| Microwave oven | 5.4 | 1550 |
| ADSL Modem | n/a | 8.3 |
| VoIP ATA | n/a | 2.9 |
Two other appliances were also measured, using a feature of the power meter which calculates running costs by allowing you to enter in the cost per kilowatt hour (I used 17.99 cents). The results were very interesting:
| --- | --- | | Dishwasher | 14.44 cents per standard cycle | | Bread machine | 8.3 cents to make 1.25Kg loaf |
So it probably is cheaper to make your own bread after all.
As a family we’re not too bad at turning off things that we’re not using. We’ve also started the move to compact fluorescent lights, and I intend to make use of a service like Envirosaver, which will come out and replace all your incandescent bulbs with CF ones for free.