When it comes to really high electricity bills, your home appliances and how you use them are the usual culprits.
Certain home appliances consume more energy than others. For example, your ceiling fan will not consume as much power as your air conditioning.
As for cooking, pressure cookers are considered one of the energy-efficient appliances in your home. They’re cooking devices that use steam pressure inside to cook food quickly. Whether you want to bake, sauté, or slow cook food, you can do so with a pressure cooker.
Unlike other cooking appliances, pressure cookers don’t use much energy since they use less liquid, making the food boil faster, and they have good insulation, which traps the heat during the cooking process. So, if you’re looking for the best pressure cooker that consumes less energy, consider checking out some reliable product reviews online to get more information.
But before listing down all the home appliances that offer energy efficiency, it is also essential that you understand how to minimise energy consumption in your home.
So, if you want to save cost on electricity bills, figuring out what home appliances use the most electricity is the way to go.
We will explore the different home equipment that uses the most electricity in this post. But first, let’s look at how electricity is billed.
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How is electricity billed?
When you have an idea of how your electricity bill is calculated, you won’t be so shocked when the bill comes. Electricity usage is billed as 1000 watts (1kw) per hour.
Take a look at your recent electrical bills to see how much you are being billed per Kw in your location.
This and knowledge of how much energy each home appliance uses per hour will give you a rough idea of your bill every month. The average electricity bill in Sydney will be around $90 for a person living alone.
Four home appliances that use the most electricity
1. Fridge
Your refrigerator stays on all day long, so naturally, it will consume a huge amount of electricity.
Also, many people have more than one unit in their homes, which doubles or triples the amount of electricity used.
For example, If your fridge is kept on for about 10 hours daily, and you are charged 10 cents per Kwh, you could be charged up to $1 per day for your fridge alone.
This is a lot, especially if you own more than one unit.
Apart from usage, other factors like size, age, location, and temperature setting also affect how much electricity your refrigerator uses.
For instance, a two-door fridge (top and bottom doors) saves more energy than a side-by-side fridge.
How to improve the energy efficiency of your fridge
Get an energy meter to track the usage and set your fridge to the optimal temperature to save money.
You can also turn off your fridge for a few hours daily and reconsider the extra fridge you plan to buy.
2. Air conditioner
Australian summers get really hot, so it is normal for homeowners to leave the AC running every day. This often leads to a very high electricity bill at the end of the month.
Air conditioners need a lot of electricity to function properly. If your AC is on all day, you could be using up to 45kwh of electricity daily.
This could round up to $4 daily and over $100 per month. This number increases exponentially in the summer when the AC can easily be left on all day and even at night.
How to improve the energy efficiency of your air conditioner
One easy tip for managing this bill is to regulate your AC usage. For example, you could set the timer and leave it on for two hours at night. You can turn it on if you get sweaty and hot at night.
Also, it goes without saying that you should turn your AC off when you are not home. It would surprise you how many people forget to do this and incur high energy usage even when they aren’t home.
You could also ask yourself, how much electricity does a fan use? And see if this is a backup cooling option you are open to exploring.
Many people opt for fans as a backup option for an air conditioning unit to save energy.
Before switching to fans, you should ask vital questions like how many watts does a fan use? Do ceiling fans use much electricity?
Your everyday ceiling fan can use up to 65w every hour, and Your outdoor fan in your backyard can use up to 250W every hour.
However, regardless of how often you are using your fans, they still don’t match how much energy an AC consumes, so fans are a great alternative if you want to save cost.
3. Water heater
Those winter months can be quite harsh, and no one wants to take a cold shower. However, it takes a lot of energy for a full water tank to be completely heated, which will definitely show in your water bill.
Also, many people not only use water heaters for showers but for laundry too.
A typical water heater can use about 4000W per hour, which adds up to about 4ocents per Kwh.
A 2000 Watt heater cost per hour is about 28cents per kWh, which adds up to 56cents per hour. Even portable heaters are quite expensive.
How to be more energy efficient with your water heater
If you are using hot water for showers and laundry, this can spike your electricity bill. You can save costs by taking short showers and using only cold water for your laundry.
You should also keep your water heater off for most of the day and only turn it on two or one hours before getting in the shower.
You can set a timer or do this manually. Adjusting the appliance’s temperature to about 120degrees can also reduce your charges by about 3%.
4. Dishwasher
If you hate doing dishes, then the dishwasher is a welcome blessing but one that takes up a lot of energy. A basic dishwasher can use up to 1.8kw per hour.
A wash cycle can last up to an hour, and if you do your dishes every day like most people, you may be incurring up to $14 monthly in electric bills.
The charges may depend on your location; however, it doesn’t negate the fact that dishwashers can be greedy with energy consumption.
How to be more energy efficient with your dishwasher
To save cost, try doing the dishes manually as often as possible and only use the dishwasher when you are too tired.
Many dishwaters have an ‘eco’ option which washes dishes at a lower water temperature and ultimately uses less energy.
You can use this setting for each wash cycle to save costs. Also, opt for energy-efficient dishwashers. They may take longer to get through a cycle, but they will help you save some money.
What other home appliances use energy?
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