Save yourself £100 on the leccy bill. Unplug some stuff.

[Jonny69]

Suffering the trolls and haters on the other forum I thought I'd let you guys know about this. I did a little calculation while working out how much my router was costing me to leave on all day while I was at work and I happened to break it down into how much 1W of power adds to my bill each year. I'll skip the calculation but with current electricity prices something that is drawing 1W 24 hours a day will add about £1 to your electricity bill each year.

Not much you think. Look around you what's plugged in. Every little item that has a transformer to run (mobile phone charger, digibox, etc) draws about 5W when just plugged in not doing anything. Every item you have that has a little light that doesn't go out unless you unplug it is the same.

From where I sit in the living room there are 12 items plugged in which need transformers to run, so that's 60W minimum with everything switched off. In the kitchen the fridge and freezer you can't do much about but the boiler is draining off a little with the timer and blue light, then the microwave with it's LED display, the oven has a little clock that ticks over, dishwasher with its little red flashing light. In the bedroom the TV stays on standby so the timer wakes us up, switch it off and the settings get lost, there are 2 phones in the flat, toothbrush charger, alarm clock, girlfriend's phone charger that she doesn't unplug.

So I make that about 20 items around the flat that I can't actually switch off without unplugging them. Most only drain 5W a piece but allegedly the computer draws about 25W when shut down and the TFT nearly as much.

So if you were to go round and switch off some of that stuff at the socket it would put £100 in your pocket by next year. Not bad eh?

Anyway, I've got a power meter in the post so I can give you some real figures and see what's real and what's b.s.