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How to save money on your electricity bill
Categories > Money Saving > How to save money on your electricity bill
While I do participate in Earth Hour, I believe that we need to make these changes every day to see a significant reduction. The good news is that many do not require huge amounts of effort or money. I am going to focus on just three small things that I have changed in my own home over the past six months. Just these alone have halved my electricity bill, not to mention the environmental benefits.
1. Switch off those appliances
We've all heard this one, but it really does work. The basic guidelines are anything that has a standby light, digital clock or stays warm is drawing power when not used. If you're not using them, switch them off. Even if they're used daily, it's really not much effort to flick a switch before you want to use it. Also try to reduce the amount of time appliances are being used or even how many you have. To give just one example that is common in a lot of houses, do you really need multiple televisions? Most of us have far more stuff than we need and a lot of it is probably electrical.
2. Analyse your lighting requirements
Do you need half a dozen (or more, depending on the size of the room) down lights on while you watch television, or could you switch to a single table lamp instead? Modern homes are often over-lighted and it's really not necessary for most purposes . Obviously, you want enough light to safely do whatever task is at hand but turn off the rest of the lights - especially when you're not even in the room. The next step would be to replace all of the high energy fixtures in your home with low energy alternatives. They've come a long way, our entire house is lighted with warm CFLs and I can't tell the difference from standard incandescent lighting.
3. Reduce your hot water consumption
A big chunk of your power bill is probably going towards heating your water. It's not always possible or practical to convert your system to solar or other green options, particularly if you rent so cannot make these decisions. So do the next best thing and use less hot water, you'll probably reduce your overall water consumption as well. Cold water is adequate for most tasks, from washing your hands to washing your clothes. Most modern dishwashers can even be configured to use only the cold water supply as it heats the water internally regardless of the supply temperature. Try taking cooler showers and I think this one goes without saying, but cut down the amount of time in the shower too.
Bonus - Change your heating and cooling thermostats
The reason this is not in my personal list is that we don't have any heating or cooling. We are lucky enough to not need it as we live in a temperate coastal location so don't have huge swings away from average temperatures and almost always have the sea breeze for cooling. But I know we are in the minority here, so even running your system one or two degrees warmer/cooler will help. If you have a programmable thermostat, set it even lower (or off, where possible) when you are at work or asleep. You won't notice any difference other than a cheaper electricity bill.