10 Ways to Save Electricity

With the present situation I wanted to write something that could help people who are facing rising electric bills. There are many solutions, some like photovoltaic shingles, photocells that cover the roof and give enough electricity to supply power for the house but these solutions cost several tens of thousands of dollars to implement and have payback periods longer than the expected life of the equipment. They aren't a good idea unless you are like Al Gore and want to make an environmental statement, but then, Al isn't installing them. I ask, "Why not?" The answer is simple, he doesn't believe in global warming or conservation, and neither does the Hollywood elite, Barock Hussein Obama, Michelle Obama, Reverend Wright or Nancy Pelosi. They believe they are the elite who can squander while the peasant class suffers.

So I want to provide some help and I will pull from my experience as an evil heartless conservative and see what value I can contribute. My electric bill is going up thirty percent next year because the Pennsylvania legislature checked their brains before voting on a bill some years ago. The legislation, if written properly would have brought competition and permanently lower rates along with an incentive for power companies to go more green. The flawed legislation nearly has eliminated competition, stunted the green efforts and insured a thirty percent increase in electric bills. Don't blame the power company or the legislature, look in the mirror. I am. If I had read the bill when it passed I would have known then.

The electric companies kept their prices down, taking very small profits, for ten years. They knew they only had to keep that for ten years, then the law let them have carte blanche. The law should have said the price caps would hold till there was thirty five percent of the electricity being generated independently. By then competition would have leveled the market. So my bill is going up. I can't do much about it because I have already cut almost as much as I can. Understand, I have enjoyed lower bills for forty years because of this action. One of the rules of conservation is, "The guy who conserves early gets the benefit early but can't do much more when everyone else does." Right now California has cut about as much as they can. They are in for a rude awakening when more cuts are not possible and the lights go out. But that is another story.

So here are some of the ways I have practiced cutting energy costs - and unlike the photovoltaic cells, these work and don't require large cash outlays.

1. Turn Off What Isn't Needed

   This has been said so many times it almost seems trite but it is one of the most effective ways to cut usage. Leaving things on just wastes energy. It is simple, it is a way of life and it costs nothing to implement. It just means you get accustomed to turning off the switch when you leave a room.

2. Reduce Outdoor Lighting Where Possible

   I look at empty, brightly lit parking lots at night and wonder. For safety, some of that lighting is necessary even if the business is closed. But there are switches that allow the light levels to be dropped, not enough to compromise safety and security but enough to cut electrical usage as much as seventy percent. They have an implementation cost but it pays back quickly. Homeowners who want some security lighting can use CF (Compact Fluorescents) or LED's. The CF's use about one sixth of the electricity of the incandescent that has the same light output. They are available in spot models. I have several of them on timers. They make enough light to prevent falls and keep intruders at arms length.

   CF's are cost effective if you had to pay thirty five dollars each for them, some careful shopping at discounters can get them for under two dollars each. Buy them as replacements and start replacing them in the ones that are on the longest. The LED's are too costly at this time to use in most places but that is dropping. CF's and LED's have a second good feature. Their lives are measured in tens of thousands of hours, not thousands. A CF will usually last as long as six regular bulbs and an LED is generally a life time purchase. Either save a lot of ladder climbing. How many CF's can you buy for the price of an Emergency Room visit? But I was using circle-line fluorescents in a screw in adapter for over thirty years before there was a CF. One of the first I bought in 1968 is still in service with the original bulb. The other one of the pair had a bulb replacement last year.

3. Replace Lamps With Smaller Ones

   If you really don't need the larger bulb, cut the wattage. No matter what bulb you use this makes sense. Don't make stairways and halls into dingy fall hazards but every area need not be brilliantly lit. The more time a light is on, the more benefit of proper sizing. Falls can be reduced with as little lighting as the solar powered yard markers although I prefer a little more. A single 15 watt yellow CF lights my back yard enough that I can walk safely and it doesn't attract bugs.

4. Replace Lamps With CF (More Important in the Summer)

   CF's, Compact Fluorescents are the bulbs that look like screws in case you haven't heard the term. One that makes the light of a sixty watt regular bulb burns less than fifteen watts. That is a 75% reduction. Take that one hundred watt light that is in the TV area that burns six hours a day, change it to a CF and you will reduce the cost of electricity from about $22 a year to under $5. If you use a 100 watt electric lamp in the house during air conditioning season nearly 200 watts are needed to remove the heat it generates from the house. The equivalent CF will burn about 20 watts and need 40 watts to air condition it. Want to know how much I follow this? My fish tank has a CF!

5. Use Natural Cooling Instead of Air Conditioning

   Where possible, open windows when it is cool enough and keep the compressor in the A/C from running. Much nighttime cooling in climates like Central Pennsylvania is unnecessary. You just have to turn off the A/C and open a window. I run the circulating fan at times with the "cool" turned off if the basement air is cool enough to make the house comfortable.

6. Watch Washer and Drier Loading

   A washer burns nearly as much electricity on a big load as a small one, and this applies to both the top loaders and the front loaders. The reduction in the water usage isn't that big either. Likewise turning the drier drum is not proportionally larger with the larger load. So make the loads as large as possible without pushing the washer or drier capacity. Use as little hot water as possible. This applies no matter how your water is heated. Cost to heat 1 gallon of water is about 2 and one half cents.

   Water weighs about 8.3 pounds per gallon. Cold water is about 50 degrees F, hot water usually at least 150 F a 100 degree increase. It takes 100 BTU to make each pound one degree warmer and there are 8.3 pounds so that is 830 BTU's to heat the water. To generate 830 BTU's using electricity takes 243 watts which is .245 KWH which at $.10 a KWH costs 0.025 cents. This does not include the cost of the water and sewer.

7. Watch Creating Heat in the House When You Are Using the Air Conditioner

   Have cookouts. Use the grill. Use the microwave. If you cook inside and have a vented range hood, run the fan. The electricity to take out the heat using the fan is less than what would be needed to have the air conditioner take it out.

8. Don't Dry Clothes in the House

   In the summer this is bad because it forces a lot of water into the air conditioning.

9. Get Rid of the Second Refrigerator

   For a long time I said I couldn't but I am seriously looking at how I can. This costs 4-6 dollars a month. I ask, do I really need it that much space?

10. Evaluate "Always On" items

    TIVO is wonderful. But I have two of them. Do I really need the second one? I haven't looked at the name plate but let's say it burns about 120 watts. The name plate will give that number or it will tell the number of amps. If I take amps, let's say, 1.0 and multiply it by 120 I get 120 watts. Amps times volts equals watts. Once I have watts I take that times the number of hours, The TIVO is always on, so let's say thirty days times 24 hours a day is 720 hours. Multiply that by 120 - 86,400 - this is a unit called Watt Hours. To convert to Kilo Watt Hours (KWH) we divide by 1000 and get 86.4. The current cost of my electricity is about 10 cents a KWH so that means each TIVO costs me 86.4 times .10 or $8.64 a month or over $100 a year. The electricity is more than the TIVO service.

If you want to work out the cost of any appliance here is a cheat sheet to help you. Start by checking the amps, watts or KVA on the plate on the appliance. One of these will be present. I have put an example in parenthesis.

If you have amps multiply it by 120. (1.0 * 120 = 120)

If you have KVA multiply it by 1000 (.12 * 1000 = 120)

If you have watts use it as is. 120 (Use 120)

Using the number from above, multiply by the number of hours being used (2) , divide by 1000, multiply by the cost per KWH ($.10) - generally this is in the 9-13 cents range.

120 * 2 / 1000 * .1 = .024 or 2.4 cents. This is for a 120 watt item (a small TV, TIVO, Small computer - not including monitor), etc. used two hours.