Appliance Usage

How Much Electricity Do Your Appliances Use?

Take a look at what you can do for just a few pennies with the help of electricity:

• Use a 75-watt lamp for 14 hours for about 7 cents
• Refrigerate food for a day for about 20 cents
• Operate a window fan for about 1 cent an hour
• Cook a meal on an electric range -using all the burners and the oven – for about 84 cents an hour
• Use the self-cleaning feature on your oven for a total of 35 cents
• Wash a load of dishes in a dishwasher for about 7 cents
• Electricity really is a bargain. What else can you buy that costs pennies and does so much work? You definitely couldn’t do this amount of work or hire someone else to do it for the same value.

Miscellaneous

Kitchen Appliances

Home Office

Home Entertainment

Refrigeration

Swimming Pool & Spa

Farm Operations

Heating

Forced Air Systems

Cooling

Room Air Conditioner

Central Air Conditioner

Air Source Heat Pump

Ground Source Heat Pump

Water Heating, Laundry & Cleaning

Water Heating

(Rule of thumb calculation: 100 kilowatt-hours (kWh) per person per month + 100 kWh per month to keep water heated)

• All computations based on a 10 cents per kilowatt (kW) electric rate
• Estimated kWh are based on average estimated consumption of electric home appliances
• While electric rates may vary among electric suppliers, we will use the average of 8 cents per kWh for the above examples

What is a Kilowatt-Hour?

• We pay for electricity in kilowatt-hours (kWh)
• 1 kWh is the equivalent of using 1,000 watts for 1 hour or using a 100-watt light bulb for 10 hours
• When these kWh add up, electric bills get higher
• And kWh usage is adding up more and more each year
• According to statistics, the average family’s use of electricity is increasing at a rate of 4% to 7% per year
• If we become more aware of how we use these kWh, we can learn how to use them more efficiently

What Does it Cost to Run My Appliances?

The appliance use chart above shows the most commonly used appliances and office equipment in homes, the average wattage of that equipment and the estimated average cost.

To calculate the exact use of your appliances, or for those not listed in this chart, use the following formula:

amps × volts = watts
watts × hours = watt-hours
watt-hours / 1000 = kilowatt-hours
kWh × 10 cents = estimated cost of using appliance

Calculating Usage at Home

• Look for the serial plate on the bottom or back of the appliance
• It lists the power used in terms of watts (120 watts might be written 120 w) or amps and volts

We will use an electric hand mixer as an example. This appliance requires about 127 watts.

Here is how you would figure its usage for 15 minutes:

15 minutes = ¼ hour, so
120 watts × ¼ hour = 30 watt-hours
30 watt-hours / 1000 = .03 kWh
.03 kWh × 10 cents = .003 cent

• For a larger appliance such as a water heater, remember that it is only running when it has clicked on and is actually heating water
• The time your water heater is on varies according to how much you do laundry, take baths, or run the dishwasher

Let’s say your water heater is on for 3 hours on a particular day (the national average):

4,500 watts x 3 hours = 13,500 watt-hours
13,500 watt-hours / 1000 = 13.5 kWh
13.5 kWh x 10 cents = $1.35

From another angle, you can see that you would be using 4.5 kWh for every full hour that your water heater is on. That means it costs you 31.5 cents per hour.

Use Electricity More Efficiently

There are several things you can do to use electricity more efficiently.

• Your electric furnace, air conditioner and water heater will make up the greatest percentage of your electric bill
• These are the areas in which to concentrate your energy management efforts
• Change furnace filters at least once a month
• Use LED lightbulbs
• Make sure the coils on your refrigerator are clean so it runs more efficiently