Posted: Sep 06, 2017 2:55 am
You may have missed my point. It's those little things adding together that catch you. For example, I replaced every incandescent light bulb on my property with LED bulbs. I replaced some 3000 watts of load with a load less than a sixth of that, if I run every goddamned light I own at once.
One of my biggest savings so far was my new induction stove. It's twice as efficient as its predecessor. We do a bit of cooking for my family of four. That's a big savings there.
Next, will be my water heater. Probably this week, actually. I'm replacing a standard resistive water heater with a hybrid heat pump water heater. That'll use three quarters of the power of its predecessor.
My HVAC is centralized, a heat pump type. Not much I can do with that, it's a pretty good unit.
My next big users are the clothes washer, the dishwasher, our refrigerator, and another standing freezer. I still have a clothes dryer, and I'll have to learn what it eats for power, if I ever need to use it. We hang dry clothes, and that shouldn't be a big problem even in winter here (high humidity), because my HVAC dries the air (at least, I think it does).
I may have mentioned earlier that my new water heater will operate more efficiently because it will get the waste heat from the freezer in that equipment room. That's a bonus.
I have two additional solar projects in mind, to further reduce energy use: A recirculating water heater to pre-heat my domestic hot water before sending to the electric one. And, a solar cooker.
The solar water heater needs no engineering. Just to get the stuff and install it. At the least, it should permit me to go to full heat pump mode of operation on the electric water heater, shutting off the resistive elements entirely.
The cooker idea intrigues me immensely. I can concentrate and collect a huge percentage of sunlight, if I use its thermal energy directly. There are commercial models available, but they're not really much of a death ray. I want to be able to put 4000 watts into the bottom of a cast iron pan. Way more efficient than solar electric.
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One of my biggest savings so far was my new induction stove. It's twice as efficient as its predecessor. We do a bit of cooking for my family of four. That's a big savings there.
Next, will be my water heater. Probably this week, actually. I'm replacing a standard resistive water heater with a hybrid heat pump water heater. That'll use three quarters of the power of its predecessor.
My HVAC is centralized, a heat pump type. Not much I can do with that, it's a pretty good unit.
My next big users are the clothes washer, the dishwasher, our refrigerator, and another standing freezer. I still have a clothes dryer, and I'll have to learn what it eats for power, if I ever need to use it. We hang dry clothes, and that shouldn't be a big problem even in winter here (high humidity), because my HVAC dries the air (at least, I think it does).
I may have mentioned earlier that my new water heater will operate more efficiently because it will get the waste heat from the freezer in that equipment room. That's a bonus.
I have two additional solar projects in mind, to further reduce energy use: A recirculating water heater to pre-heat my domestic hot water before sending to the electric one. And, a solar cooker.
The solar water heater needs no engineering. Just to get the stuff and install it. At the least, it should permit me to go to full heat pump mode of operation on the electric water heater, shutting off the resistive elements entirely.
The cooker idea intrigues me immensely. I can concentrate and collect a huge percentage of sunlight, if I use its thermal energy directly. There are commercial models available, but they're not really much of a death ray. I want to be able to put 4000 watts into the bottom of a cast iron pan. Way more efficient than solar electric.
Sent from my completely solar powered iPad using Tapatalk