How to reduce electric costs in a home…

[Liquid_Entity]

Yeah, I gave up trying to figure it out. Just did some simple things like turn my PC off every night. Turning off my dj mixer, speakers, work laptop. Lights are all LED. Turning off the tv in bedroom completely, turning off the baby monitor fully (not charging either) and it still didn't make much difference. Wife washes daily, cooks daily, we don't have a dishwasher so do wash up 3 times a day. It's amazing how much stuff 2 adults and 2 kids use in a single day.

We have one of those heated clothes driers instead of a drier and to be honest that's actually quite cheap to run so good to dry the clothes in winter.

 

[Reuben klang]

Before you start making huge changes. Other than being shocked at the cost, ask yourself if it's worth making changes? For the dishwasher, i'd sure as hell rather pay £15 a month than hand wash stuff every day. I'd rather leave a tv on whilst i go for a dump than worry i'm wasting a few pence and turning it off.

With electricity it's probably a case of lots of small things that add up and so to make a big saving you'd have to make widespread changes,

This. Stop worrying so much and get on with it. You could upgrade all major appliances and start saving money but it’ll cost you a fortune in the beginning. Which done a test a couple of weeks back about the benefits of having a top of the range eco friendly fridge, washing machine, tumble drier, freezers and the long term (year +) running costs where actually shocking. Ends up saving money over a 5 year period.

*edit*

Link added -

The least efficient appliances would add an eye-watering £490 a year to your energy bills, but choosing the most efficient would cut this down to just £154. This could save you £336 a year, or £3,360 over the course of a decade.

Read more: https://www.which.co.uk/news/2021/1...witching-to-more-energy-efficient-appliances/ - Which?

Would be well worth it for your daily dish washer and laundry long term.

 

[edscdk]

A daily dishwasher cycle is a big flag. How many are in your household? Make sure you're reusing cups/glasses throughout the day

I wish I could convince my wife used glasses, cup and spoons can be re-used without going in the dish washer

 

[robj20]

Can you not get hot water fed dishwashers, I know you can still get a few washers that take hot water, can really help reduce the leccy bill.

 

[413x]

Sounds like you are pretty much there

Just two of us in our house. Dish washer about every other day. Or 3.

Tumble dryer once or twice a week probably. Only tumble in the winter. Can't not really.
In my circumstances there's no point spending more for efficiency as I'd never get it back. Only if its many times a week is it worth it.

I wouldn't worry about standby lights that's pennies a year I believe.

I'm also at point not much else can do without compromising too much on life ie sitting in the dark. Not having the TV and reading etc.

 

[Semple]

r/theydidthemaths

Definitely a decent percentage.

I think that's the thing with leccy bills, it is properly death by 1000 cuts isn't it. I've progressively added a home server, raspberry pi, hive, hue hub; got into the habit of leaving the PC on... several monitors etc. No single device will make a big impact but collectively I guess that's a decent percentage of overall bills.

I bet most people would be shocked at how much their fridge/freezer costs to run a month. Unfortunately they're pretty much the necessity.

 

[413x]

We're with Bulb and have Economy 7 and dual fuel - 4 bed detached and 2 teenagers.

Oct 20 - £129 per month
Nov 20 - £169 per month
Nov 21 - £239 per month
Jan 22 - Bulb wanted £309 per month! But said it was an over estimate - so i am currently paying £249 per month.

Anybody else in a 4 bed detached? What are they paying?

3 bed detached. 2 of us. Was about 80 a month. Now 150 with new supplier. That's issue. Loads of us have changed supplier. I'm hoping 150 in winter. 100 in summer.

We are both WFH full time.

 

[Semple]

I wish I could convince my wife used glasses, cup and spoons can be re-used without going in the dish washer

 

[Liquid_Entity]

We're with Bulb and have Economy 7 and dual fuel - 4 bed detached and 2 teenagers.

Oct 20 - £129 per month
Nov 20 - £169 per month
Nov 21 - £239 per month
Jan 22 - Bulb wanted £309 per month! But said it was an over estimate - so i am currently paying £249 per month.

Anybody else in a 4 bed detached? What are they paying?

I am in a end of terrace, 3 bedrooms + office space. Large open (freezing) extension with bifold doors that leak heat like a sieve. Paying £178 a month currently with EON and £286.18 in debit to them altho payment from 4th not been processed yet.

This house is like a freezer, temp was down to 16c on the Nest today. There was a recent post about heat loss and said I needed to hire or buy a heat gun to figure out where all the heat is going. As said, it's the bifold doors that cause the most heat loss.

 

[Semple]

I am in a end of terrace, 3 bedrooms + office space. Large open (freezing) extension with bifold doors that leak heat like a sieve. Paying £178 a month currently with EON and £286.18 in debit to them altho payment from 4th not been processed yet.

This house is like a freezer, temp was down to 16c on the Nest today. There was a recent post about heat loss and said I needed to hire or buy a heat gun to figure out where all the heat is going. As said, it's the bifold doors that cause the most heat loss.

Do you have some heavy curtains in front of them?

Seasons are a bitch, i bet during the summer months those bifold doors are a blessing, but come winter they are the devil.

 

[413x]

Things I'd suggest that are easy.

Only fill kettle for how much you need that boil.
Look at other areas... Do you need sky TV? I don't even have a TV licence.
Expensive meals out?
Cook in bulk?
Wear warm clothes in doors?

 

[ivrytwr3]

3 bed detached. 2 of us. Was about 80 a month. Now 150 with new supplier. That's issue. Loads of us have changed supplier. I'm hoping 150 in winter. 100 in summer.

We are both WFH full time.

I am in a end of terrace, 3 bedrooms + office space. Large open (freezing) extension with bifold doors that leak heat like a sieve. Paying £178 a month currently with EON and £286.18 in debit to them altho payment from 4th not been processed yet.

This house is like a freezer, temp was down to 16c on the Nest today. There was a recent post about heat loss and said I needed to hire or buy a heat gun to figure out where all the heat is going. As said, it's the bifold doors that cause the most heat loss.

Mrs keeps reading on FB etc about people in similar houses paying £80 per month - i'm like "Get to ****! No Way!". Good to read some real figures from people

There are changes afoot in April 22 wrt utilities, so will see what that brings before i start looking at switching.

 

[413x]

Mrs keeps reading on FB etc about people in similar houses paying £80 per month - i'm like "Get to ****! No Way!". Good to read some real figures from people

There are changes afoot in April 22 wrt utilities, so will see what that brings before i start looking at switching.

I think our house has bad bad windows. Some of the temperature curves seem too sharp in the house. I need to look at this. I feel my bills are too high for heating.

 

[Liquid_Entity]

Do you have some heavy curtains in front of them?

Seasons are a bitch, i bet during the summer months those bifold doors are a blessing, but come winter they are the devil.

haha yes they are the best when summer is here, although whoever installed them never put any kind of door swinging protector on them. The amount of times the single door part of them all has caught the wind and almost taken the whole side of the extension off. Something I must get done before this Summer is put something in to stop it swinging like mad.

Wife says heavy curtains look granny and will ruin the look. I tend to agree, what I need is to get someone to do some proper sealing around the edges again. Not that will prevent the heatloss from the glass either but every little helps.

 

[Bug One]

We're currently paying £195 for gas and electric in a 4 bedroom detached (Octopus). Was up near £250 this time last year (and our unit price was lower then too).

Since then I've turned the heated kitchen floor off, that was adding about £30 a month and wasn't worth the cost. Added more insulation to the top floor and switched to a heat pump tumble dryer.

Don't have a smart meter, so won't be able to tell if we're doing better till later on. But I expect we're down in in kw, but not £ as energy prices have increased somewhat.

 

[robj20]

Big bay windows in our front living room and front bedroom really hurt us. You can feel the cold off them when you go near them and they're brand new so up to spec.
The condensation is doing my head in though every morning when it's really cold. What do you do leave the windows open and pay a fortune in gas.

 

[Bug One]

Mrs keeps reading on FB etc about people in similar houses paying £80 per month - i'm like "Get to ****! No Way!". Good to read some real figures from people

My previous house had incredibly low bills. 4kw solar panels and well insulated. During winter it was under £100 and in the summer they were paying me (until they changed the meter - then it was nearer £30).

Energy prices were quite different then, so it's hard to compare though.

 

[Armageus]

Yer NAS is seperate point noted just looking into how I can get it turned off for a schedule etc but do wonder the constant on/off for the HDD's and how bad it could be?

It's not ideal - frequent spin up/down (either via turning off completely or using the drive spin down power saving options) put more stress on the drives than leaving them running all the time.

SSDs obviously don't have this issue and have lower power draw as well, so even something like a Raspberry pi with a usb attached SSD may be better if you need something always on (but comes at a capacity/cost sacrifice), and then leave the HDD nas for anything rarely used e.g. weekly backups etc.

DIY nas' (i.e. self built from PC parts) will generally have higher power draw than dedicated devices, but also have more flexibility, so worth turning off unused ports and devices in the BIOS, checking power states, switching to single stick of ram (rather than 2 or 4) and even underclocking/undervolting if you don't need all of the performance.

 

[Semple]

Big bay windows in our front living room and front bedroom really hurt us. You can feel the cold off them when you go near them and they're brand new so up to spec.
The condensation is doing my head in though every morning when it's really cold. What do you do leave the windows open and pay a fortune in gas.

Do you sleep with your bedroom door closed? That'll make condensation as worse as it can be.

I'd suggest getting a window vac to hoover off the condensation in the mornings.

 

[413x]

Big bay windows in our front living room and front bedroom really hurt us. You can feel the cold off them when you go near them and they're brand new so up to spec.
The condensation is doing my head in though every morning when it's really cold. What do you do leave the windows open and pay a fortune in gas.

Same issue in the bedroom. Thinking about opening windows during the day in the with the trv off. Can't see any other way