Archives for November 2011

So on with the show.  Most will have about 3 days worth of readings now.  Here is how my calc table looks (click to enlarge)

I have been at work the last two days, and in my absence and to my surprise our total kWh per day has gone up, not down like I expected!  WTF?  20.7 kWh in the last 24 hours!  I have been unable to figure it out for two whole days, and thought someone was stealing our electricity or that one of the meters was wrong.

After questioning Kim, it suddenly dawned on me.  About a year ago we refurbished the kitchen and purchased a duel fuel oven.  We can cook with natural gas or electricity.  I was hedging my bets come energy descent and wanted to get the most out of the oven.  Also, I can cook with gas even when there is no grid connection.

Kim had been cooking in our duel fuel oven using the electric oven setting which uses at least 3000 watts, and she had it on for 45 minutes on Tuesday, and over an hour today!  We normally use the oven on natural gas, however she finds the electric bakes muffins, bread, and biscuits better.  It uses a massive amount of what I thought was our humble daily energy requirements.

So it was time for my very own family meeting tonight, and we discussed when the best time to cook with electricity was (after sunset to maximise export and the feed-in tariff), and to cook as many things as she could during the same time.  In other words, fill the oven up when using electricity!  We discussed the pros and cons of using electricity vs natural gas.  She also agreed to do laundry at night and hang it outside in the morning.  This conversation reminded me of a few tips that I can share today.

• Think about energy usage by room.  Do a mental audit of all electrical items in the room.  If needs be, right down the items for future reference.
• Look for waste and educate others as we go along.
• Don’t spend any money until you assess your/family behaviours. Try simple efficiency first of all. 
• Remember, it is easier and cheaper to save electricity than to generate.
• Use a microwave for cooking, they’re more energy efficient than conventional ovens 
• Stir or turn food in the microwave often to ensure the heat spreads evenly – speeding up the heating process.
• When cooking on the range make sure you use the lids on your pots.  You don’t need to use as much energy to get the same result.
• Make sure the seals in your oven fit properly. The seals should hold a piece of paper in place when the oven door is closed.  We replaced ours about 2 months ago because the manufacturer found a fault with the design and sent us a free replacement. 
• Use small appliances for small tasks e.g. use the toaster not the oven for toasting.
• Use the correct size pot for the element or burner, it is more efficient and you don’t waste heat.
• Avoid cooking food that is still frozen.  Defrost it in the fridge or use the microwave.
• Avoid opening oven doors when cooking – each time you do the internal temperature drops by at least 15°C.
• Use appropriate cooking temperatures
• Cook several dishes at once in the oven.

A big thanks to Farmer_Liz and Kane for pointing me in the right direction regarding the not-so-pretty spreadsheet. I have fixed all of the issues, and the calc sheet now works very cleanly. Nothing like a good IF statement to fix ones messiness. You can download the new spreadsheet from the original link if you would like to use a cleaner version.

Now that we have our baseline couple of days of electricity consumption for our homes, may I offer the first steps towards a lower electricity bill.  First thing first always works.

1. Have a family meeting! It sounds corny, but it works.  Encourage all family members to join the challenge.  If you have buy in from everyone in the household, you are more likely to succeed.
2. Set some energy targets for the each week of the challenge that you believe is achievable.  For instance. 5% reduction in the first week, 10% for week two, 15% by week three etc.  The choice is yours.  Try to make your goals realistic, and get buy in from everyone that way you are more likely to continue the behaviours after the challenge is complete.  Write your goals down and put them on the fridge for all to see!
3. Make it a competition, give rewards to little ones for remembering to do as instructed, and the big ones too.  Give encouragement and praise as behaviours are bedded in.
4. Take the time to explain to everyone why we are practising energy efficiency.  Let them know what is at stake.  Whether it be savings in the family budget, or reducing your emissions, your motivation for participating in the challenge should be shared with everyone in the household.

These steps are vital to achieving the goals that you will set yourself.  Once you have commitment within the household, try to begin to make small changes at first and continue to monitor to see the effect on consumption each day.

Share the daily results at the evening meal, check to see if you are going to meet your target for the week.  A problem shared is a problem halved.  You may find that it helps to share the pain and bring others along for the ride.

Praise, reward, and have fun as you go along.  If your not having fun, you are not doing it right!

More tips tomorrow.  

Thanks for all the emails and comments so far during the challenge.  I believe that we have between 25-30 people on the challenge so far and the numbers are growing.

With your second reading some time today, you would have been able to calculate your baseline.  The baseline is the figure that we are going to attempt to beat every single day.  When I started reading my meter many years ago my baseline began at 40 kWh per day.  It was a shock to the system, and we managed to get it down to between 9 and 11 kWh per day.  Even less in winter, but lots more in the hot summers that we get here.  The biggest drain on our energy consumption is our swimming pool, where I have to run the pump for at least two hours in winter, up to about four hours in summer.  So there is between 2 and 4 kWh a day that I cannot seem to shake off.

So imagine my shock today when I calculated my baseline for this challenge.  The figures are below (click to enlarge).

So my total consumption today was 16.6 kWh.  Now I haven’t told anyone in the house that we are on this challenge yet, just to get an accurate reading, so I know we can do much better than that.  It looks like a few things have happened since I stopped reading our meter.  Because we were not measuring our performance, we have slipped back into some old habits.  Some very old behaviours that I noticed today were computers left on when no-one was using them, ceiling fans on in empty rooms, lights on in empty rooms and extractor fans left on and forgotten.  I have read that the average daily household electricity consumption in Australia is between 16 – 20 kWh.  I don’t want to be average.

Tomorrow I will have a family meeting and discuss my concerns which is probably the best way to tackle the situation.  I am sure we can do better tomorrow.

From here on in, the challenge will pan out as follows;

1. Everyone should now be taking their daily readings and recording them.
2. I will be posting daily energy reduction tips to nudge you (and my family) in the right direction in whatever format I can dig up (text, photos, video, podcasts)
3. Every Monday we can all post via a comment the percentage of reduction for the week compared against our baseline day.  I will help you figure it on the day.
4. Celebrate our successes and learn from our mistakes!

How does that sound for a plan?

P.S. For those interested this is what my data sheet and calc sheet look like.  The calc sheet will only calculate the last day correctly, so ignore any future dates.  I am not sure how to stop the random calculation for the next day.  Any suggestions from any Excel guru’s out there?

Data sheet

Calc sheet