Home energy saving tips /ideas...

[Kim]

I do have the smartplug on the microwave programmed to switch off when we're in bed / the house is empty, which saves a whole 2 watts (1.5W when you factor in the power drawn by the smartplug itself).

I have wondered if it was worth having the telly on a smart plug being as it's off for most of the day but can't be arsed doing the maths.

In this case, the smartplug has the more important duties of  a) making blinkenlights happen when the microwave finishes cooking, because barakta doesn't hear the beeping  b) monitoring power consumption  and  c) power cycling it at 13:01 to keep the sodding clock vaguely in sync with reality.  So programming it to switch off when appropriate is effectively free power-saving.

ETA: Also  d) switch off in response to the fire alarm, because why not?

[FifeingEejit]

I've abandoned my dining table room (read sun porch) for the winter, which was something I was trying to avoid doing because it means eating in front of the telly or computer.
I've left the heater on frost star though  because I don't want to freeze everything else in there.

Heavy curtains over the windaes helped a bit with the heat loss, the roofs been converted previously, think the floor is  tiles on concrete slab and the dwarf walls have normal plasterboard rather than insulated, and the house was has been deharled and smoothed, so no insulation there, worth it or ignore?

Sent from my IV2201 using Tapatalk

[grams]

I have wondered if it was worth having the telly on a smart plug being as it's off for most of the day but can't be arsed doing the maths.

TVs got so much regulatory attention from the standby consumption mafia that they’re now amongst the best devices. My 2012 47” LG measures 0.0 watts, which is less than the reading for a USB charger with nothing plugged in.

It’s other appliances (including smart plugs) that are worth worrying about.

[rogerzilla]

The crappy Freesat box is so unstable that turning it off at the mains means it may not work when turned back on.  Unfortunately there is no choice in the market since Freesat took manufacturing in-house, which is why used Humax boxes, which work, sell for more than new Freesat (Arris) boxes, which often don't.

[MikeFromLFE]

It’s other appliances (including smart plugs) that are worth worrying about.

I must get me a plug in monitor to see how much my Chinese smart plugs are wasting. I do wonder if they are using more than I'm saving with some of the devices they control.

[Kim]

All mine seem to be in the half-watt range.  With atrocious power factor.  So comparable to any other reasonably modern appliance on standby.

Certainly a lot better than a mechanical timer.  I've got one here somewhere that I measured at about 5 Watts.

[Polar Bear]

I have one of those mechanical plug in timers into which the dehumidifier is plugged.  I run the dehumidifier for a couple of hours overnight when the need arises such as for drying laundry at this time of year.  The timer itself has no indication on it about how much energy it uses so I simply unplug it when I get up and then set the timer dial and plug it in when I go to bed if it is needed.

Would be nice to know how much juice it burns but we are low use already and the extra load from the timer has been imperceptible against the dehumidifier and more lights at this time of year.

I like the idea of smart sockets but wonder about their consumption being in an always on status.

Still not using the heating but the Met Office forecast suggests that mllePB will be looking to supplement body heat and fleeces soon.

[phantasmagoriana]

I'm not sure I want to know how much my dehumidifer is costing to run. I'm hoping it's less than either using the tumble dryer for all the laundry, or having the heating on (it's not been cold enough to use the heating otherwise yet, which is unusual for November!).

[Asterix, the former Gaul.]

Cooking rice

Put the rice in a saucepan with water several hours before you intend to eat it. When you come to cook it, the rice will have absorbed the water and won’t take nearly so long to cook.

[Cudzoziemiec]

Same with lentils and I'm sure many other things. But probably not potatoes.

[ian]

If you put rice in a pan and boil for about five minutes, you can then just leave it slowly steam until you need it.

Not potatoes though unless you want watery soup.

[Cudzoziemiec]

It might work with rusty nails of course. As long as you take them out at the end.

[TimC]

If you put rice in a pan and boil for about five minutes, you can then just leave it slowly steam until you need it.

Not potatoes though unless you want watery soup.

I was given/acquired/stole a tip for rice many years ago. Put rice in pan, cover with water to 1/4" above the grains. Bring to the boil, then simmer until the water level goes below the top of the rice. Turn it off and leave it for around 20 minutes. Result - perfect rice, no water. Doesn't work so well for brown rice, but it's not too far out as it takes longer to absorb the water.

[Mrs Pingu]

Today I've been getting super nerdy and calculating the heat requirement for our bedroom and the radiator size.
Based on the heat geek website that reckons a semi well insulated home (i.e. not built to modern standards) should require 40-65W/m2 and a Type 22 rad that puts out 1500W/m2 at 50C or 1050W/m2 at 40C, I reckoned that to be in the middle of that range we'd need a 0.6m h x 1.9m long radiator for 40C flow or a 1.6m long radiator for 50C flow.
What we currently have is a 0.9m long radiator.

I guess I'm missing 2 variables/options. I dunno exactly what my return temperature is but given that the boiler is 2 yrs old and I've got fancy weather/load compensation on it now (so I can't set it manually) I'm guessing it is going for the low side.
Current thermostat setting in the lounge below the bedroom is 18.5C so I guess I can either stick up the stat a bit higher, or get a bigger radiator. (Yeah, I need to improve the insulation but that involves getting the flat roof replaced and getting all the dormer cheeks insulated on the inside which will be £££££).
And I suppose what I really need to do first is see if the bedroom is getting to the desired temp or not. (I suspect it may be one of the last rads on the circuit).
Time to consult the Shellys I spose.

[rogerzilla]

I have one of those mechanical plug in timers into which the dehumidifier is plugged.  I run the dehumidifier for a couple of hours overnight when the need arises such as for drying laundry at this time of year.  The timer itself has no indication on it about how much energy it uses so I simply unplug it when I get up and then set the timer dial and plug it in when I go to bed if it is needed.

Would be nice to know how much juice it burns but we are low use already and the extra load from the timer has been imperceptible against the dehumidifier and more lights at this time of year.

I like the idea of smart sockets but wonder about their consumption being in an always on status.

Still not using the heating but the Met Office forecast suggests that mllePB will be looking to supplement body heat and fleeces soon.

Doesn't it have a humidistat (not all do)?  If it does, better to set that to a level where you don't get mould/asthma/rust and leave it on, letting it take care of when it runs or doesn't.  Otherwise it's not doing its job.

[Polar Bear]

It's an ebac 2650 and I have it set on smart mode by default. 

We only need it a couple of times a week after a laundry session so leaving it "always on" even if it only kicks in very occasionally feels both unnecessary and counter intuitive.  We also still have that quaint economy 7 type of cheap overnight juice so running it overnight feels like the right thing to do as it's running on cheap leccy plus we are snoozing away whilst it does it's job.

[Ham]

Well, our new boiler is on place and while it is difficult to make any comparisons, as it coincided with the arrival of a colder spell, it does seem noticeably more efficient. Been playing with flow temperature (WHY does the manual tell you it's most efficient between 55 and 60, but then have no way of establishing that on the controls - thermometer on the flow pipe is the only option)

Also playing with the hot water heating, and while turning down do you don't mix with cold works on some days, it doesn't on the others. So, having an app controlled thermostat makes some sense. Only, they just aren't available as far as I can see. Anyone know better? All the "smart" controllers only have on-off facilities, then relying on a mechanical thermostat to control the heat. Molding something shouldn't be too hard, but it would be much easier to get one off the shelf.

[Mrs Pingu]

Ham, if you get an OpenTherm and Boiler Plus compatible controller/thermostat then it should come with either or both 'weather compensation' or 'load compensation'. The weather comp can be either by means of an external temp sensor fitted to a N facing wall of your property (think Worcester who aren't OpenTherm do this), or it looks up the weather in location on the internet (how my Wiser system works).
Boiler Plus gives other interesting options too:
https://www.boilerguide.co.uk/articles/opentherm-heating

[Adam]

I was given/acquired/stole a tip for rice many years ago. Put rice in pan, cover with water to 1/4" above the grains. Bring to the boil, then simmer until the water level goes below the top of the rice. Turn it off and leave it for around 20 minutes. Result - perfect rice, no water. Doesn't work so well for brown rice, but it's not too far out as it takes longer to absorb the water.

My mum always cooked rice that way 50 years ago.  When the power was on of course, during the blackouts!

[Ham]

Ham, if you get an OpenTherm and Boiler Plus compatible controller/thermostat then it should come with either or both 'weather compensation' or 'load compensation'. The weather comp can be either by means of an external temp sensor fitted to a N facing wall of your property (think Worcester who aren't OpenTherm do this), or it looks up the weather in location on the internet (how my Wiser system works).
Boiler Plus gives other interesting options too:
https://www.boilerguide.co.uk/articles/opentherm-heating

to

All that is about the general thermostat control. In that area, Ham Hall with its two heating areas and two nest thermostats is well served. The Nest does predictive and adaptive heating, meaning that you have to change your mindset when using it, so that you set target temperature for a certain time instead of what you would have done which was to accommodate the heating up period into your heating on time. Eg, you might have had heating coming on at 6:00, with Nest you have to say, I'd like the house up to temperature by 8, or some such. It also adapts to outside temperature, as it measures the time to get to heat set.

But that isn't what I'm after. None of those systems (if I am reading it right, and I think I am) does anything more than switch hot water on or off. What I want is to be able to change the hot water tank temperature remotely, that way bypassing the problem of setting it low, which is running out of hot water when you need more.

[chrisbainbridge]

Would an immersion heater with a wifi switch work?

[Ham]

An idea, but it would have to be severely hacked to disable the heater (and, to leave it working for emergency use in boiler failure scenario)

The main option would be to build something with an Arduino, which would typically be used for temperature control, but it is fascinating that there is no commercial product for something so widely used with substantial potential energy saving benefit.

In my experimenting to date, I have found that the mechanical thermostat (Honeywell) has a substantial dead zone, tuning up and down. That alone would be reason to go digital, each extra unnecessary degree costs ££.

[Diver300]

An idea, but it would have to be severely hacked to disable the heater (and, to leave it working for emergency use in boiler failure scenario)

The main option would be to build something with an Arduino, which would typically be used for temperature control, but it is fascinating that there is no commercial product for something so widely used with substantial potential energy saving benefit.

In my experimenting to date, I have found that the mechanical thermostat (Honeywell) has a substantial dead zone, tuning up and down. That alone would be reason to go digital, each extra unnecessary degree costs ££.

Honeywell make a water temperature sensor that goes into the thermostat well of an immersion heater. I don't know if you could make use of that.

I suspect that the large dead zone is to make the thermostat contacts turn on and off sufficiently quickly.

[Ham]

d


Honeywell make a water temperature sensor that goes into the thermostat well of an immersion heater. I don't know if you could make use of that.

With WiFi control? If not that would have limited value, also the immersion is placed at the top of the cylinder, and the water temp at the bottom, because of the way they heat, I could see that causing issues in normal operation

I suspect that the large dead zone is to make the thermostat contacts turn on and off sufficiently quickly.

Yup, and for why I expect any other will be similar. There also has to be a gap between switch on and switch off of a number of degrees, otherwise the valves would get very annoyed.

[Tim Hall]

My Glowworm has a MiGo stat. It does all the predictive stuff for the heating as described above and is controlled from an app on my phone.
Digging into the settings it allows adjustment of hot water temperature from the app although I don't think it can be linked to the timeswitch part. My knowledge of the hot water side is pretty much zilch though, as I use it with a combi boiler, so scheduling etc for hot water doesn't apply.