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October 6, 2008

Sooke household cuts electricity use by 23%

Computer keyboard with band-aid Leave it to the Beavers.

Barbara Corbett is a Sooke-based homemaker who cut her family’s energy consumption by more than 23%. She was kicked into action when her young son started a month-long recycling program as part of his participation in the Boy Scouts’ Beavers program for five to seven year olds.

Corbett soon realized that with a family of five (six, when her 15-year-old stepson comes to visit), she could tweak a few more of their behaviours and save both money and the environment. So she joined Team Power Smart and made a few adjustments that gave her big results.

They were spending about $100 a month on average on energy, says Corbett. She has nearly cut that by half, according to her most recent bill.

“And that’s with energy prices going up,” she adds.

It was a serendipitous series of events that led to her discovering the benefits of unplugging appliances. The computer broke down, and then the television broke and both went off to the repair shop for two weeks.

During that time, Corbett noticed a serious reduction in her energy bill. She’d discovered that the phantom power used when an appliance is kept plugged into the wall was costing the family money. Although her husband likes the computer left on, the family TV is now kept unplugged when not in use. Corbett also keeps the coffee maker and microwave unplugged. And she rinses all the family’s dirty dishes so she can use the quick clean cycle on her dishwasher, which runs for 17 minutes compared to the usual 60 minutes.

“If I could, I would unplug the stove and refrigerator,” she says.

A note to Corbett from Power Smart. If you must rinse your dishes before putting them in the dishwasher, make sure it's with cold water. And the best method is to just scrape food off the dishes.

The family lives in a 1,900 square foot single-detached home that is heated with oil. Corbett’s husband has installed double-paned windows and has plans to install better outside doors. Their three boys, ages 2, 4 and 6, are home-schooled, so the family house gets plenty of use. Corbett now wonders how her energy consumption will measure up with the weather turning colder.

“Over the summer it was easy to reach that 23 per cent because we didn’t use our heating,” she says. “But now we have the furnace kicking in more, so I’m eager to see what our savings will be once we’ve heated the house for awhile.”

Corbett is also eager to arm herself with more information so she can continue to keep saving on her energy bill. She has a question for a BC Hydro expert:

“Please explain how the two-step tier system works. I’m not aware of how energy consumption is measured. Is it in time or in units? I know there are two different readings on my hydro bill and I don’t understand the difference.”

BC Hydro's explanation:

Under the new Conservation Rate, which started October 1, customers pay a lower price for the first amount of electricity used (Step 1) in a billing period and a higher price for the remainder of consumption after that (Step 2).

The threshold between steps is 1,350 kWh per average two-month billing cycle. This translates to 22.1918 kWh per day.

If you look at your next BC Hydro bill, you can get a rough idea whether your consumption will move into Step 2 by looking at the daily kWh usage graph on the bill. Each bar on the graph shows average daily consumption per billing period.

If average daily consumption is below 22.1918 kWh per day, you will only pay the Step 1 price.
If average daily consumption is more than 22.1918 kWh per day, you will pay the Step 2 price for a portion of electricity consumed.

Source: BC Hydro

Last Modified: Oct 6, 2008