On cold temperatures and gusty winds!

Can cold temperatures outside when combined with gusty winds rack up winter heating costs? That was the question that crossed my mind as I checked my power use for what turned out to be a very cold Christmas Day in December. ‘Why’, I wondered, ‘would windy conditions cause such a large heating surge especially when all the other factors were equal’? What came to mind was a very similar day earlier on the month, December 10, yet that day used 48.9 kWh while the 25^th managed to chew through 71.1 kWh. which also represented a 32% increase in heating costs!! Following are the side by side by side stats for both days;

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You'll notice that the mean or average temperature for the 10th was 28.3F, while that of the 25th was 29.1F. So, Christmas Day was actually a tad warmer. Likewise the sky conditions, dew points and relative humidity figures were also very similar. Also, when I looked at furnace settings, appliances and electronics used; both days were about average. So, it was apparent to me that the only real difference in the two days was the wind! In fact, December the 10th was much less windy than the 25th! So, I felt this so-called 'wind effect' deserves a bit more research. I'll plan on doing a followup post later this winter season.

New Nest thermostat is up and running!

I received my nest on this posting date and had it up and running in about thirty minutes. Between the technical support and what they send you with the unit, I have to admit it was easier than I had thought!

After I got it to communicate with the internet, the unit downloaded an update and then went into a setup mode that was sort of spooky as it was able to analyze my heat pump to a T. I then went to my computer and accessed the unit online (it works in the cloud) and was also able to set it up on my droid phone so that I can control everything from where ever I happen to be.

Weekly schedules can be easily set up

I was very happy with the simple interface that quickly allowed me to set up a custom schedule that can be changed on a whim. Also, this unit has a learning mode whereby it can figure out your heating and cooling preferences. Pretty neat little package all told.

At some point in the future, I plan to do a post on how well I feel the Nest performs overall.

Update: Well, that point in the future has come! The NEST has turned out to be one of my better purchases. It's performance has been flawless and being able to set up a custom schedule has saved me money - a lot of it! I also like the ability to access it via my smart cell phone.

Three day study of temperature versus power use

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 Here is an interesting chart that depicts indoor and outdoor conditions and the effects of cold temperatures on a 2 stage heat pump that has been set to heat a house to 60F. Auxiliary space heat was used to also heat one room to 71F. This test was part of an ongoing series of experiments to help determine how one could save money during the colder months of fall and winter.Note what happens when the temperature dropped below 35F outside and the heat pump was forced to change over to resistive heating as a result.

Coming soon – The Nest!

After finishing up some studies concerning the saving of energy during cold bouts of weather, I decided to go ahead and purchase a learning thermostat device called the Nest! I’ve determined that, while I can save significant amounts of money by retreating to one room over the course of a cold spell, I still needed to address the house energy envelope as a whole.

I think the Nest is just the device to fill the ticket as it is not only programmable, but it is also network friendly meaning I can access it via a computer or my smart phone. I plan to write a few posts on this topic in the near future.

Where heat pumps end up costing money!

I have a dual stage heap pump that services my home and for the most part it does a great job. That is, as long as the outside temps don’t get much below 35°F that is…

The graph above represents actual data of high and low temperatures taken November 2012. For this far in the month, the temperatures have average spot on to historical averages for the last thirty years; about 47°F. So, in fact, this has been a pretty average month, so far. (The mean temperature standard was taken from the weather service's figures for West Plains Mo. for the month of November and rounded).

Now, take a look at the area I’ve marked in yellow – there were 10 out of the 20 days where the overnight lows got down below 35°F. I took these days and averaged out the kilowatt hours of power that was used for those days and came up with 26 kWh. Next, I took and averaged out the power consumed for the other 10 days where it didn’t get quite so cold and arrived at a figure of 18 kWh! Now, since the heap pump will tend to switch over to resistive heating elements below 35°F, I’m guessing that the difference in cost to me will be about 30% more in terms of the electric bill.I'm also guessing that, for a large part, it doesn't matter as much how warm it is during the daytime as it does how cold it gets at night. It'll be interesting to see what happens during the days when the thermometer never gets above freezing, should we experience that later on in the year.

Over the coming winter, I’ll keep an eye on this and see if it holds true.

Notes: During this period of time, the heat pump thermostat was set at 60°F.

Night time lows below 35°F put the kibosh on energy savings!

This post concerns the effect of home heating when using a heat pump who’s T-Stat was been set down to 60°F for a home while a small 1,400 watt space heater was employed to heat just one room.

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It may be interesting to note that many heat pumps become quite inefficient whenever the outside temperatures fall much below 35°F. It’s at that point that many of these units switch over to resistive heating in order to warm a home. Please read the excerpt below:

“Heat pumps are only effective to about 35 degrees. Anything lower than that, and you have to use your emergency heat. The two reasons for this are that when the outdoor air temperature gets too cold, the unit cannot extract as much heat from the outdoor air to keep up with heating demand.

Second, condensation forms on the outdoor unit when it is running. In temps above 32 deg (freezing point of water), the condensation simply drains away from the unit. Below 32 deg the condensation freezes to the coil and blocks air flow. When this happens, the unit must go into defrost mode to clear the ice. During this time the heat pump is not heating your house. It’s heating the outdoor unit to clear the ice.”

So, at about 35°F, your heat pump also switches over to a set of resistive heating coils located in the inside furnace. This form of heating is much less efficient and power consumption can soar. My heat pump is a two stage heat pump which can even be less efficient as will be explained below:

“A single stage heat pump uses the same rate of transfer at all times during operation.  A dual stage (also called a 2-stage), uses 2 different rates of transfer.  Put simply, these 2 stages are kind of like a “high” and a “low”.  When the desired temperature and measured temperature are fairly close in number, the unit will not need to work as hard, thus using the “low” setting.  In this case, a low rate of transfer is all that is necessary for getting to the desired temperature, so why push it and use more energy than is necessary for the job?  Conversely, when the difference in temperature is high, and the unit needs to change the temperature several degrees quickly, the dual stage heat pump will switch over to the high rate of transfer and more energy will be used to get the job done.”

This ability to go from a low setting to a high setting simply means that at the high setting, my house will get warmed more quickly. Useful if it’s really getting cold outside and the unit is struggling to keep up. However, not so good from an energy consumption standpoint!

Let’s see this from the standpoint of actual data. Below is a graph of what happened to the outside temperature during the night of November 17-18, 2012. As you can see, at about midnight the temperature dropped into the freezing range (yellow area of graph).

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 Correspondingly, the heat pump began to kick on into Stage 1 (note it never made it to Stage 2 due to both the low setting for the house proper and the fact that it never got seriously cold outside).Let's now look at the corresponding power graph for that period of time as measured by my TED energy monitor:

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All those little spikes represent my small space heater kicking on and off all night long. In spite of how it looks, this little unit did not consume much power as it was heating just a 1600 square foot area (my bedroom). The stage 1 spikes were indicative of the switch over by the heat pump sensor to relatively frequent bouts of resistive heating (5 from 12 midnight to 8AM). Once again, my low thermostat setting for the rest of the house combined with the fact that the lowest low was 27°F. is really what saved the overall situation. Had I been trying to heat the entire home using just the heat pump, the situation would have been much different. Now, take a look at the actual power consumed both before and after the mercury dipped below 35°F.:

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Wow! There was roughly a 50% increase in the amount of energy consumed (all things being equal) after the drop below 35F. I also noticed a residual effect as the house, once cooled, was reluctant to come back up to a 'normal' reading of 60°F.

Disclaimer: There is no way that the information present here could be construed as scientific. It was presented honestly but be forewarned that the author has absolutely no credentials in the areas of heating and cooling.

My winterizing efforts for the 2012-13 winter season!

It’s October and nobody has to tell me that winter ain’t too far off! I’ve already noticed that some of the trees around my house are turning and every time I look out back, there are more of them lying on the ground. So, I got up off my butt and began to look at how best I could get the old homestead prepared for the cold months ahead.

The way I see things, when all the dust settles, there are two issues that have to be addressed for any all-electric home like mine; 1) how much money can I save on heating and 2) what amount of comfort will I have to give up in order to save on said heating? (Both these concepts are certainly at odds with each other in that if I keep the house warm all winter, say at 72F or so, I then get hit with large monthly electric bills). This going on at a time when I’m on a fixed income and slowly going broke. If, on the other hand, if I elect to freeze to death, I’ll save a few bucks to put towards my funeral costs. Either way, it seems to me a lose-lose situation.

Yet, there are some alternatives out there and they don’t have to cost very much. Here they are in no particular order:

Kill those Drafts

Almost any old house has what I call leakage. That is, air that come and goes through cracks either in the structure of the house itself or through various openings around holes through which plumbing pipes enter or exit the house. A can of foam costing about $6 bucks took care of those in short order. Weather stripping also works great to help seal outside doors!

Corral that Water Heater

Two simple things can be done here to lower your heating bill as much as 10%; 1) set the t-stat to 120F and 2) wrap that sucker in insulation.

Lower the Thermostat a few degrees

Some expert once told me that for every degree you lower the thermostat setting, expect a 12% savings in your monthly electric bills! I’m not sure if that’s the truth or not and would guess that there is probably a lower limit after which you really wouldn’t save and still freeze to death. This year, I’ve opted for a setting of 65F for the majority of the house with a small space heater to use for my office/bedroom. Oh, and an electric blanket also helps tons!

Manage those blinds and drapes

No matter what sort of window covering you have, keeping them open to let the sun in and closed at night to keep the cold out makes sense. You can also elect to use one of those plastic shrink wrap coverings like those sold by 3M. They can increase the R-Value of that opening by as much as 90% by creating a dead air space between the cold window surface and you.

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There you go! That was pretty simple and it didn’t cost an arm or a leg to implement. I hope to do some additional postings as I go through the winter months to see if any saving actually materialize. Oh, and I'm hoping Global Warming really kicks in too, this year!

LED light bulbs make cents!

 At some juncture, while looking at ways to winterize my home and make it more energy efficient, I got to looking at the light fixture by my bed. As is my habit, I like to read in bed and so inevitably leave the light on after I fall asleep. So, the light burns night after night for about eight hours. It’s a regular 60 watt incandescent bulb as opposed to a CFL light bulb which I found can cause skin cancer when used close to the body. Over time I found that this little bulb, being on every night, could cost around $18 per year to operate. Not a great savings, that’s true, but if there’s a cheaper alternative I'm all ears.

Enter the 40 watt LED light bulb from a company called Hitlights. An alternative light source that costs about $11but which boasts a 40,000 year lifespan! (That’s about 13 years if I were to use it 8 hours a day). And, at only a power consumption level of 6 watts (.006 kWh), that would bring the cost down from $18 for a 60 watt bulb to about $2 over the course of a year. Not a bad savings in my book! So, what’s the downside?? – In a word, color. This bulb’s color rating is 6500 K – which puts it more toward the blue end of the color spectrum when viewed by human eyes. (Note: for $18, they also offer a 75 watt bulb that uses 9 watts of electricity, but which is much closer to a regular incandescent at 2700 K). Will that work for a bedside lighting source? I’ll update this post when it arrives sometime in October.

Update: Hold the presses! My light came recently in the mail and when I installed it I was amazed at how good the light looked!  Here. Judge for yourselves....This photo was not altered in any way and shows just what the light looks like.

My 2012-13 winter power goals!

Let me set the record straight! Last year's winter was pretty darn mild. And so were my electric bills when compared to the year before. Over the four month period November through February, I used 4,066 kilowatt hours of electricity to run and warm my home. That was 2,639 kwh less than the winter season before and represented a 39.4% savings in hard cash! Yowser! This year I'm hoping we have yet another warm winter thanks to Global Climate Change. (I think the odds makers are saying we have something like a 34% chance of a plus 3 degree winter over the norm). If that comes to pass and along with other improvements I've made, I'm hoping for a drop yet another 25% off last year. In real terms, that would be about 1000 kilowatt hours less over the four month period and would represent one heck of a drop when you average the past two years out!

I'll post updates on how well I'm doing after the winter season gets underway.

Energy saving comparision for 2010 versus 2012!

I finally go around to tabulating the results of my energy savings program’s effectiveness for the year 2010 compared to 2011 when many of the changes were put into place. I think it is apparent that this program was successful and I hope to continue to explore other ways to save a watt without sacrificing comfort or convenience!

January 2012 – Another great energy month!

Actually January was a great month for me, energy wise, not so much because of anything done on my part, but rather due to the relative warmth. January was over seven degree warmer than the average and that play very well when it came time to pay the electric bill for the month.

In 2011 my bill was $182, and this year, it was all the way down to $121! That’s actually a thirty plus something savings as my rate was increased 13% this year versus last. Now, with the weather forecasters anticipating a warm February, I’m hoping to have done rather well for the entire winter season!

December can be a tough month on the wallet!

Last December, I used 1,629 kilowatt hours of power to keep my home warm and to run my assorted appliances and electronic gadgets. December 2010 was a perfectly normal month from the standpoint of outside temperatures. The mean was 35.1F versus an historical average of 35F. That translated into an average daytime high of about 45F and a low somewhere below freezing. I own a heat pump and as you may know, they struggle to work at any temperature much be 32F. So, for most of the month, the ‘emergency’ mode went into effect whereby heating elements were turned on to make up for what the heat pump could not provide.

Last year, however, I made some changes both physically (installed plastic over the windows) and in terms of how I used power. I employed the aid of a device called the Total Energy Detective (T.E.D.) to help me monitor my power us real time. I also set a budge of no more that 52 kilowatt hours of power per day and that worked out pretty well. Whenever I could, I would avoid appliances like the stove in favor of the more energy efficient microwave. I used space heaters deployed in select rooms to facilitate point of use heating. I made sure to run my dishwasher less often as I did the washing machine (no more partial loads of laundry). I was on a budget and I stuck to it!

The end result was a 34% savings in 2010 over 2009! That lower electric bill was a real blessing during a month when all my other bills were high! Now, this year, I’m hoping to improve on 2010 and have reduced my electric budget by another 25%. That translates out to 52-13 kWh less power a day or about 39 KWh. If I get lucky this coming December will be a little bit warmer than the average of 35F. If that happens I’m sure I can make this work. Otherwise, if it gets colder than normal, I’ll certainly have a challenge on my hands.

If you’re wondering how I did for November 2011 – it was a 34% decrease!

A roomy experiment!

Just for fun, I thought to take advantage of a cool spell when the mean temperature was to run at about 42 degrees and perform an experiment. The day was clear with high pressure overhead and winds that were expected to come out of the northwest initially at 3-8 mph and then die down in the late afternoon and overnight. This would aid radiational cooling in the nighttime hours resulting in a winter like morning the following day.

In this experiment, I wanted to see how fast my house cooled down (or warmed up during the day) without the furnace on (TStat column) and whether or not I could save on electricity by heating just my bedroom with only a small 900 watt space heater. I tracked the information pertaining to this on a spreadsheet throughout the day and evening. Here are the results I obtained:

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Technical -The area I heated, has a volume that of 1560 cubic feet. The space heater I used was a radiant element type made by a company named Lasko. It was set on low and put out about 600 watts of heat. It also has a crude thermostat so that once a comfortable temperature is reached; it will cycle on and off. Now this room also has a sliding glass door that is 35 square feet in area and a window that is about 11 square feet in terms of surface area. Both use thermopane glass, yet during the coldest part of the experiment, I could feel the cold if I held my hands close to the glass.

General Observations

I settled on a room temperature setting of between 69F and 70F as I find that to be a relatively comfortable climate. Once I had the space heater set properly, it worked pretty well and did maintain a room temperature that was close to the desired value (see data).

At around 2:30PM, I noticed sunlight coming in from the window that faces west. This added a significant amount of heat to the room as the space heater did not run for about a three hour period of time (note the increase in the room temperature).

As the evening approached, I could tell that this was a perfect scenario for a radiational cooling event! The temperature began to drop at about a 4 degree rate every hour. By seven PM, the winds stopped completely enhancing the effect.

Summary

Normally, when the mean temperature was in the forty degree range, my home had used anywhere from forty to fifty kilowatts of power. (That’s with the furnace set for 69F and when the usual stuff like TV’s, light and computers are running). In this experiment, however, I used only about 25 kilowatts* which is at least a forty percent decrease over whole house heating. Only about 4 kilowatts were used by the space heater itself. Now, the real test will come when it gets really cold as the other side known as Yang makes an appearance. In a situation where the temperature drops to say 20 degrees or less, I will have to make sure the house does not drop much below 58F so as to insure that no pipes freeze. This will mandate the furnace being on and running at some point during the early morning hours. Still, this should be an interesting test to see if a significant amount of power can be saved during really winter cold events.

* - In terms of actual power, the figure was closer to 12.1 kilowatts since I was running the furnace in the overnight hours prior to the experiment beginning (7AM reading of 24.5 minus the 7AM read of 8.4 on Oct 20).

Getting set for the winter of 2011-12!

My how time does fly! Here it is, already the fall of 2011, and time to get ready for another blast from old man winter! As it is still only the latter part of October, I still have some time left to check and do the following:

Have the heat pump checked by service personnel.

Change the air filter in the furnace.

Inspect the outside of my home for leaks.

Check all outside door seals.

Set heat pump thermostat at 68F.

Deploy my two space heaters; one in the living room and one in my bedroom.

(This year I will not be installing plastic over the windows as I don’t feel that they lose that much heat).

Goals for this season

Following are the kilowatts of power I used during the three coldest months of the year 2010-11:

Month             kWh                Avg kWh

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December        1629                      54

January            2071                      69

February          2087                      70

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Totals              5787                      64

At about ten cents per kilowatt hour, my bills added to more than $500 for those three months last year! I'm hoping to do better this year, but at the same time I realize that I'm somewhat at the mercy of Mother Nature and here's why.  Consider that a key variable which will dictate much money I will have to pay, is determined by the mean temperature (a total of the highs and lows averaged together) for that month. Let’s look at last December as a case in point.

December of 2010 normally has a mean temperature of somewhere close to 35 degrees Fahrenheit. This means that if you take the high temperature and the low and average them out you would get a figure of 35.

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As you can see by the graph, a typical day is likely going to fall somewhere inside the yellow box whereby the sum of the high and low for the day add up to 70 with the average being 35 degrees. This means then, that for most every day, the temperatures (usually at night) will drop below the 32 degrees. A point below which my heat pump works. In other words, pretty much the entire month will see the ‘emergency heat’ lamp on fairly often. This means that heating elements have been turned on in the furnace to provide heat which the heat pump is unable to provide.  When that happens, you can basically count on having a high electric bill by month's end.

So, a month like December (and January and February, for that matter) are going to cost you quite a bit unless you can figure out a way to beat the ‘physics of the situation’. In my view, there are three ways to accomplish this on a realistic level; one, move to Florida for the winter, two, you can move to a basement (if you have one) where you’ll be able to utilize the buffer that is the earth to lower your heating costs, or three, you can employ the use of space heaters in only the rooms you absolutely need to occupy while setting the furnace stat to a lower than normal (say 60F) temperature setting. Then, hunker down and think plenty of warm thoughts! For anyone that might be interested, here is a graph I constructed that allowed me to estimate the electric power I would likely be using for a given mean temperature. This assumes that the furnace is heating the whole house! It worked surprisingly well:

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As you can see, if I am experiencing a mean temperature outside of 35F. (red line), then I can expect to use somewhere in the neighborhood of 65 kWh of electricity. I can control this figure to some extent by cutting back on an unnecessary use of power like the TV, radio, etc. Also, if the sky is sunny, I can open the drapes and catch a little heat that way. But other than executing the 'basement' alternative, I'm pretty much stuck!

Well, that's my plan for this winter! I'm hoping for a wet and snowy one as that will ratchet up the mean temperatures quite nicely. 

Heating a house just one degree!

Here’s a graph of the power needed to raise the temperature in my home from 68F to 69F that was part of an experiment just prior to the heating season for 2011. Notice the second stage kick in? It also too half an hour to accomplish the feat! It’s early October and the temperatures in the mornings are only dipping down to the low forties. So for now, I can get along with very limited use, but come November I’ll have that baby cranking pretty much full time!

Last winter, I had the thermostat set at 69F and was able to live with that as long as I had a couple of space heaters going in key rooms. The wintertime is by far the most expensive season in terms of electricity used. Here is a list of the power used lat season starting with November:

Nov 2010        1734

Dec 2010         2282

Jan 2011          2049

Feb 2011         1359

Believe it or not this was much better than the season before by about 15%. I think the reason for this is that heat pumps become less efficient as the outside temperatures get much below 32F. More and more often then the ‘auxiliary’ or ‘emergency’ heat kicks on which are a set of heating coils in the furnace itself. This form of heat is much less efficient and can really racks up the energy cost. However, if you are selectively heating some rooms with portable space heaters, you are helping to actually reduce your overall heating bill. That’s my theory anyway.

This year, some weather watchers are forecasting colder than normal temperatures. If that happens, I will be able to see how well I do.

Using space heaters to save on heating costs.

If you’re a person that hates paying high electric bills, then the later fall months are the best in that regard. I’ve been able to go for half of September and all of October so far with both the AC and furnace turned off. For those occasional cool mornings, I’ve bought a couple of space heaters which are doing a nice job so far. I have one in my bedroom and one in the living room. At this time, I’m turning them on manually but plan to get a couple of timers so they can be set to turn on at about 4AM.

The jury is still out as to how effective these devices are in reducing heating costs. To that end, I’m planning on performing a little bit of research this coming winter to find out. Right now I have two types of heater; a resistive element type and a ceramic heater. Within the next couple of weeks I plan on purchasing an oil filled radiator type to round out the selection. These will be strategically placed in the house and timed so they turn on early to bring select areas up to 72F. The central furnace will be set for 60F. I will then watch to see how much I suffer, and or, how much electricity is saved…or not. This effort will more than likely end up as a You Tube video at some point.

A word on solar panel systems!

I've rarely been accused of brevity, but in the case of solar energy, I will exercise it now; in just two words, don't bother.

I've investigated home solar energy schemes for some time. It's a great concept after all; free power from the sun! Who wouldn't want that?

The problem is, there are only two ways the typical homeowner can go; either build a cheap crappy system (Power4Home and Earth4Energy come to mind), or invest in a high quality (read mega buck) system that might pay for itself twenty years down the road.

My advice is to stay away from solar (and wind power for that matter) until such time as the overall quality-performance to cost ratio vastly improves. When you see the companies that are in the business of making these panels fail left and right, there just may be a problem.

You would probably be better off in the long run by spending your time and money on lobbying your local power provider for lower rates! It also couldn't hurt to write or email your congressperson to suggest they stop building weapons of war and maybe switch to making cheap power available to everyone. Who knows, America might just rise again?

Just in case this winter is a doozy!

My hippie-dippie weather forecast post (US Long Range Winter Weather Forecast for 2011-2012) calls for things to possibly get a little on the extreme this coming winter, so I’ve begun to think of ways I might be able to save on electricity.

My first thought, and one that is running out front at the moment, would be to pack my bags and head for the Florida Keys. I seem to remember seeing efficiency apartments for a reasonable price if I were to rent by the month. Yes, Florida is my first choice.

My second choice will be to move down into my basement where I have a small bedroom that can be cheaply heated with a small room heater while the rest of the house’s thermostat is set back to the mid fifties. I could then pretend I was a Inuit Eskimo living in a small igloo who ate seal blubber and smelled accordingly.

That, so far, are my two well thought out plans should the temps really go crazy. Then again, I guess I could just set the thermostat to 80 and watch my electric meter go wild! More to come on this topic as it gets later in the year!

Crosley washing machine energy use profile!

As part of my group of entries depicting individual energy users, I decided to check the energy graph of running my Crosley washing machine set to medium load, warm cold cycle on 10 minute wash.

The graph, as you can see shows the machine running and using about 700 to 800 watts to run the motor while the rest of the early graph represents the water heater tank recovery cycle.

While I did not calculate the overall cost of one run of laundry, I can guess that it was only a few pennies. Surprisingly the dryer didn’t use all that much energy either (see post).

Sear Kenmore 70 series dryer electrical use profile.

Referring to the graph, the baseline energy use with most everything in the house tuned off is somewhere between 300 to 400 watts. Occasionally, the refrigerator compressor will come on adding about 200 watts to this for ten minutes or so. In the graph you can spot the ‘surge’ as the three phase motor kicked in. This unit uses sensor to step down the heat as it senses that the humidity on the dryer goes down.

I began the run at 11:17 AM and it finished at 11:43 for a total of 26 minutes. As you can see the unit used about 3 kilowatts of power over this time which still only amounts to about 30 cents worth of electrical power.