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I am trying to get our electric usage down, so I want to buy and install LED lights throughout the house.
We are currently using 2800 kW per month and even before the heat was turned on, our usage was substantially higher than our neighbors.
I need to buy about 30 indoor, dimmable recessed can lightbulbs. I need about 30
Ceiling fan bulbs and another 30 small bulbs to fit in the small flush mount ceiling lights.
I have looked online but the prices I am seeing cannot be the cheapest. Can they? $11-$18 per bulb?
Why are you using so many kW's per month? That's where you need to start to conserve, not buying lightbulbs.
No idea. I leave the heat set on 65. we only have one tv. None of the appliances are older than 2008. The hvac system is less than 5 years old. Windows are new. Hot water heater was just installed in March.
We were using over 1200 kW this summer when the hvac system was not even on. Light bulbs is my next possible conclusion.
What other sorts of devices do you have in the house that might use a lot of electricity?
Old refrigerator?
Electric water heater
Electric clothes dryer?
Omg thank you! I will check these links. My head is swimming with all the options
Main fridge is 2008, freezer 2010, not sure about beer fridge. I have all electric except for the gas stove insert. Washer and dryer are 2008. Hot water heater was just installed in March. The house is on a well, but so are all the other houses in the neighborhood.
I am trying to get our electric usage down, so I want to buy and install LED lights throughout the house.
We are currently using 2800 kW per month and even before the heat was turned on, our usage was substantially higher than our neighbors.
I need to buy about 30 indoor, dimmable recessed can lightbulbs. I need about 30
Ceiling fan bulbs and another 30 small bulbs to fit in the small flush mount ceiling lights.
I have looked online but the prices I am seeing cannot be the cheapest. Can they? $11-$18 per bulb?
The Walmart near me has a big stock of their great value brand LEDs. I bought quite a few and used them and they are great. I also purchased the great value brand of flood lights and they are great as well.
(Takes alot of power to suck/pump the water to the surface.)
Do you have a "Smart" meter? Often with smart meter you can download the Hour by Hour usage from your electric companies web site. Might give you a idea of the time you use thing and what using the power...
(Takes alot of power to suck/pump the water to the surface.)
Do you have a "Smart" meter? Often with smart meter you can download the Hour by Hour usage from your electric companies web site. Might give you a idea of the time you use thing and what using the power...
Hmm I am not sure. I will look into it. I had an over 6000 kW month in March. That bill was more than my mortgage on one house.
Why are you using so many kW's per month? That's where you need to start to conserve, not buying lightbulbs.
If they live in a house that has 90 bulbs, I would assume it is a larger house, which means it has more potential to have lots of energy demons sucking up power. My house has 28 bulbs plus 2 fan lights. So 90 would be 3 times the size of my house. My office building, which has lots of lights, still only has about 55 total (I just counted and got 48 inside and a few outside). I'm not at home to look at my power bills, but our office used 900-1700 kWh each month this year, depending on the season, and we have many lights on for 10+ hours a day, A/C (we have gas heat but it still takes power to run the blower), plus 6 computers, modem, router, a copy machine, a sound system, a telephone brain system, many phone chargers, 3 adding machines, several chargers for electric drills, and a fridge all pulling power all the time. We have a couple of LEDs, but not many yet. At home, most of mine are LED now.
If I was going through that much power, I'd suggest putting a wattage tracker on every outlet, and every appliance and figure out where all the power is getting sucked up (or just one and rotate it through each one and keep track). Remember even leaving your phone charger or laptop battery backup plugged in still sucks power even if the phone or laptop aren't plugged in. Remember that those digital clocks on your microwave, your oven, and your DVR all suck power, even if you aren't cooking or watching TV.
Also, it has been shown that for all modern bulbs, it is more energy efficient to turn the light out, even if you will only be out of the room for a few seconds, than to leave it on. Having 90 bulbs in your house doesn't matter if they are mostly off most of the time. But if you are leaving half of them on every day because you think it is more efficient not to turn them on and off, you are operating under a fallacy. Old fluorescents, that might be true, but anything modern, that is not the case.
Personally, I don't think that 1200 kWh for a house that is big enough to have 90 lightbulbs is all that bad. Of course less is better. But 1200 is pretty good. But 6000 is terrible. What you need to figure out is what you did differently between those two months. That is the most likely culprit for the power use.
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