How to save electricity
They are really starting to panic here.
All their virtue signalling about saving the planet and trying to power us with wind is a chicken that has finally come home to roost. We are in real danger of being under-powered this winter with real threats of widespread blackouts.
Their latest move is to increase the cost of the electric between five and seven in the evening. This will apply to all commercial users and also to those poor suckers who fell for the “smart meter” trick. They can’t do anything about the rest of us on the old meters so they are just appealing to our better natures [assuming such a thing exists] and are begging us to not use electricity between five and seven.
Right.
I have been giving this a little thought. There must be some way of reducing the electric consumption. I came up with a couple of ideas that might work.
The first is obvious. If you are driving after dark make sure you don’t use headlights. In fact, don’t use any lights at all. The car will still drive normally and you’ll save quite a bit of electricity. The power companies will love you for that.
Another little trick is to buy a load of 6-socket extension leads and daisy-chain them. Plug everything into those so you’ll end up drawing electricity through only one wall socket. That will save a hell of a lot. While I’m on the subject of sockets, make sure something is plugged into every socket. Electricity easily leaks out of those socket holes and can make a right mess of the carpet.
If you’re cooking, or more precisely, baking, leave the oven door wide open. It’s a good way of heating the house as well.
Record all your favorite television programmes between five and seven and watch them later.
And don’t forget to unplug your fridge and your freezer. All that humming uses a lot of electricity.
I hope that helps?
I think they should have built all those wind turbines underground. There wouldn’t have been as many objections and they could have built far more of them. Same with solar panels
It’s very hard to find any flaws with that plan. Ingenious!
Face it, the only way to “save” electrickery is with a battery. Using it to pump water up hill is only for governments who have lots of spare, your, dosh.
Just like saving money in a bank.
You “invest” your little bit of surplus and then later you can make a withdrawal.
However, you will find that what you withdraw is worth a lot less than what you invested. This is called prudent fiscal policy or Inflation
Then you get taxed for
(a) the cost of the battery and charging system.
Or
(b) actually having some spondulicks to extract from the bank.
Either way your are Royally (can I even say this in the Republic) fecked.
Best to invest in some stout or whiskey.
We have one of those “pumped storage” schemes just up the road. I did the grand tour when they were building it, seeing the pump/generator caverns all in the heart of a mountain. It was quite impressive. It never stopped us having power cuts though.
Save electricity by retrofitting gas mantles. While your at it get a gas fridge and a gas radio (they are or rather ware a real thing).
That will save you a fortune on the lecky!?
I know about gas fridges but gas radios? I hadn’t heard of them. A much cheaper option is a crystal radio. That doesn’t need any power at all.
The gullible public will probably try out your suggestions!
Also, there are ‘new’ ceramic room heaters being advertised for the dumbos – they are promoted as much more efficient, blah, blah.
No they’re not: watts in equals watts out within a room, regardless of how it’s used for air movement or temperature. But the twits will believe it until the ‘leccy bills arrive.
The more expensive it is, the more thy believe they’ll get out of it. Whatever happened to Cold Fusion?
The way I understand it, unlike gas and water which each arrive in single pipes, electricity has two cables, the first one (usually red) brings the stuff in, the second one takes it out again, even though you’ve paid for it. My economy tip is to block off that second channel, then at least you get to keep the damned expensive stuff.
That is an excellent idea. I’ll try that.
I liked your extension lead idea, so bought the longest one I could find on amazon and plugged it into my friends house in Canada. He pays 3p per unit and charges me 6p per unit so everyone is a winner.
I’m installing three modest UPS units for when the power does go out. One will keep the heating and water going as we have our own filtration and softening plant. Another will be for the fridge and the third for the Interwebby connections and TV. If I’ve got my sums right, we should be okay. Failing that, it’s winter drawers on and set a fire in the old front room fireplace like everyone else.
I’m thinking that the best course of action with a power cut is a diesel generator that automatically kicks in via an auto transfer switch that backfeeds the consumer unit. A 7500 KVA gennie would run the entire house, with the possible exception of an all-electric cooker, through a 50A MCB. Advantages of a diesel generator is that it can be made to run on a variety of fuels like vegetable/cooking oils if fuel became scarce. The bigger gennies are also electric start which can be made automatic on the disappearance of mains voltage.
Energy-wise I’ve tried to prep a bit already – had a wood burning stove installed in the living room and am setting up a wood storage and making briquettes from collected waste paper, cardboard and sawdust/shavings. I’m not looking to replace the central heating entirely but I can save a huge amount of my gas costs. Also LED lighting throughout.
It seems that everyone and his dog is talking about wind and solar as if these are the only alternatives, without exploring other possibilities. How many here, for example, have ever heard of the Griggs Cavitation Heater?
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=n0wjZTGfDAA
I had a look at some domestic generators. The problem there is that anything that will power more than an electric kettle runs into four figures. On top of that there is some major rewiring required if it’s to feed the house system.
I have gone the alternative route – gas heaters, gas camping stove and oil lamps. One of the advantages[?] of living in the wilds is that I’m quite used to power outages. They used to be very common but not so much these days. I have survived worse.
GD, I suppose that the cost of the generator would depend on how much it is intended to be used. A small generator suitable for a couple of lights and boiling a kettle (around 3kW output, the equivalent loading of one 13A socket) cost around £350 the last time I checked, though in my own case the generator would have other work as well, so I’d be looking at around 7-8kW and equipped with 12v outlets. These do stretch to 4 figure prices so I would be considering how long and how much work it would take for it to pay for itself.
Wiring in is surprisingly simple. An automatic changeover switch fitted to the distribution board automatically switches over from the mains to the generator when the power goes out. Input to the switch is from mains and generator (the generator is plugged into a 50A outside socket). Output of the switch goes to a 50A MCB and feeds the consumer unit bus bar through that. There are more crude ways such as plugging the generator output into any wall socket but that is dangerous because if the mains is not turned off whilst the gennie is running, the current from it gets fed back through the grid transformers, creating high voltage on the power lines and risking electrocution for any repair workers working on it.
Living in a flat with only an electricity supply may cause me problems about heat and light if the power goes out. A local camping shop has made a few bob by selling me a camping gas bottle (with regulator), a camping stove, a camping heater plus cartridges, plus some battery operated lights. I hope I won’t have to use them, but would rather have them and not need them, than need them and not have them. When, or if, we ever have warmer weather, I can use what’s left to take grandchildren camping. You may be able to hear their grumbling and howls of protest over lack of Wi-Fi where you are, and we’re in England!
There are all kinds of tricks you can employ. I have a trick that will allow you to heat one room pretty well in a flat. Having worked in engineering all my life there have been times when the steel (inside the factory) was white with frost and it was too cold to function on the night shift.
To heat your room, go to a scrap merchant and obtain a 300 x 300 piece of steel, something like 8mm thick. Put this on your camping stove and heat it up on the LOWEST flame you can. You can start by getting the plate to temperature then turning the stove down to minimum. At work we would use an oxy-acetylene torch clamped in a vice. Also get yourself one of those fans for a wood burning stove and stand it on the plate. These fans have an electric motor but don’t use either mains or battery, the electricity is generated from the heat through the fan’s stand. The plate generates the heat, then the fan circulates it, like a fan heater. Don’t get the fan too hot or the device that generates the motor power gets damaged. They usually come with a magnetic thermometer so that you can keep an eye on the temperature. Optimum is about 150-250*C. These are the fans:
https://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/393690879181?hash=item5ba9ce14cd:g:mJIAAOSwAChhikY~&amdata=enc%3AAQAHAAAA8JbX8aAxjcRlRIk%2Fw1DbDSfNMqOovRwrAMJ%2FhXSOqedRWR0wFrJF4PMkFvUYkJTT3c2bG674TgSr6OqXTBaJFOINv6FsA6pRHh%2FzezxxKn92EiAcDfRfvS3VrYyoSKmqmbexx0ooVDkCfMl2DusfFUQHUs1%2BUrWBOoxDg3UgOOQTw%2B0ouom2gRq03yrr0%2B5FgnYW95aVYuRGM7YLzuXkOTE9huMf2Jjkt7i2ijisWrq8Ic4%2B7EFxyxmuZ8R0wSUowZO5kpEslzPOXdskVN2%2BC%2FcXn2JXXtHzTDZ%2FeGsNtWS7sYNfqVZ9IFmq%2Fl07BsDwTw%3D%3D%7Ctkp%3ABFBMjq6p0PJg
Light – Go to Aldi and get yourself one of the Workzone LED work lights. You can stand, hang or stick them (magnetic). They are very tough, with two levels of brightness and rechargeable when the power comes back on. Also a portable power bank wouldn’t come amiss but not a requirement. If you want light that goes with you whilst leaving your hands free, get a LED head light. I have a Good Year which works from 18650 e-cig batteries and it will run for about 5 hours on a full charge. Failing that, the batteries are removable and I can use the ones from my e-cig in an emergency. Alternatively, you can use a LED wind-up lantern. No need to keep buying batteries.
Ripper,
Many thanks for this. Some good tips.