Reducing Energy Bills - How goes it?

[joe90]

1 hour ago, SteamyTea said:

Will be different come November or December when the storage heater get flicked on.

Thermal underwear and fur coat 🤷‍♂️

[SteamyTea]

7 minutes ago, joe90 said:

Thermal underwear and fur coat 🤷‍♂️

Thermals are the norm, fur coat is tricky. Tends to make me wheeze.

My sister has my mother's old mink coat. If asked in the street, by a total stranger, if it is real, her reply is "yes, do you have a problem with that".

Mt normal reply is "do you know how women get minx: the same way minx get minx"

Usually defuses the situation.

[Radian]

13 minutes ago, SteamyTea said:

Thermals are the norm, fur coat is tricky. Tends to make me wheeze.

My sister has my mother's old mink coat. If asked in the street, by a total stranger, if it is real, her reply is "yes, do you have a problem with that".

Mt normal reply is "do you know how women get minx: the same way minx get minx"

Usually defuses the situation.

I had to stop the car for an american mink crossing the track to our house yesterday. Seen it before on our driveway cctv but thought it might have been a stoat or weasel. Up close it was definitely a mink.

[SteamyTea]

5 minutes ago, Radian said:

close it was definitely a mink

Was there not a mink farm that had them all released near you a few years back.

https://www.wildlifetrusts.org/wildlife-explorer/mammals/american-mink

Edited June 29, 2022 by SteamyTea

[joe90]

Mink are renowned for killing lots of wildlife.

[recoveringbuilder]

I was brought up in an agricultural small holding, brick built house with metal framed windows, my bedroom was previously known as the milk room where my grandparents had stored the milk from their cows, very cold room🥶 My mother at some point had been given a beaver lamb coat which I have no memory of her ever wearing- it was the top layer of my bedcovers for many years until we moved home!

[SteamyTea]

7 minutes ago, recoveringbuilder said:

I was brought up in an agricultural small holding, brick built house with metal framed windows

Many people where, my first house was similar.

 

Why I like insulation, airtightness and a heating system.

 

[recoveringbuilder]

Well it appears things are going to be even worse than predicted going by the news today! I just can’t see why this is happening with energy prices or why it’s being allowed to happen!

as far as cutting down our usage I find it impossible to get below around 8 kw per day . The house is empty 3 days of the week, I’ve cut down using the washing machine to only twice a week and doing 30 degrees washes. Dishwasher every 2nd day on a quick wash otherwise it’s tv, kettle fridge freezer ,sewage treatment tank and cctv. I try to only use the oven twice a week and my hob is bottled gas, lights are very rarely on at this time of year , god help us when winter comes 

[Radian]

20 minutes ago, recoveringbuilder said:

I just can’t see why this is happening with energy prices or why it’s being allowed to happen!

 

That'll be politics.

 

It doesn't help that there are numerous pressure groups like the "Renewable Energy Foundation" who say they do not see renewables as a large part of net zero strategy. We've got  lobbyists up and down the country trying to stop investment into our most cost-effective energy sources like the Suffolk residents who are objecting to the  wind farms off England’s east coast being developed by ScottishPower. The solutions to the carbon and energy crisis are all ready to go but the politicians aren't committed enough. Perhaps it will take a severe winter in which a significant  number of people will start taking direct action - either by protesting or dying through cold and hunger to turn around that commitment.

[SteamyTea]

12 minutes ago, Radian said:

The solutions to the carbon and energy crisis are all ready to go but the politicians aren't committed enough.

Have you been writing to the papers again.

 

No need to go nuclear to temper global warming (1)

Published 6 July 2022

From David Flint, London, UK

Graham Reynolds asks us to choose between long-term storage of nuclear waste and “worldwide, incomprehensible damage to the climate” (Letters, 25 June). That would be a good argument for nuclear power if we had only two choices. But we don’t.

We can also choose to sharply reduce energy waste and to rely on power from the sun, wind and tides to heat our homes and move our cars, buses and trains. This is the pragmatic solution because it needs only things we have already designed and built, and whose costs fall each year. It frees us from dependence on an industry that just can’t deliver on time and within budget. Why wouldn’t we choose the renewable option?

[Radian]

5 minutes ago, SteamyTea said:

Have you been writing to the papers again.

 

Maybe?

And please don't talk to me about nuclear waste. The absolute daftest person I personally know has a top job in the decommissioning sector and every night I heave a sigh of relief that we made it through yet another day without a serious cock-up in that department.

[Marvin]

On 28/06/2022 at 18:45, recoveringbuilder said:

I check my usage through the app on a daily basis for no other reason than I’ve become a bit obsessed with it. We have been using between 8 and 10 units a day. Yesterday was the start of me working a longer shift at work so I was out of the house 2 hours longer than normal. My usual routine sees me getting up and putting on the telly and drinking numerous cups of coffee before I leave however of course this was two hours less than normal. Looked at my usage for yesterday and it was down at 6.8 ! Does the tv and kettle really use that much? It’s the only thing that happened differently so I’m assuming it does in which case I think I need to stay at work!

Depends how far you have to 🚗 to work.

[SteamyTea]

9 hours ago, recoveringbuilder said:

sewage treatment tank

That may be using quite a bit.  Have you checked its usage?

 

I have cobbled together a new energy meter, one the counts the pulses from a meter's LED.

Put it on my fridge circuit and it counted 298 pulses of 1 Wh each. That works out at 0.298 kWh, mean power of 12W.  I can live with that as the last time I did this test I was away, and it was mid winter, with no heating on in the house.

When I have done a few more days testing, I shall write up a bit more about it.

[Radian]

1 hour ago, SteamyTea said:

I have cobbled together a new energy meter

 

You've really got the hang of LED pulse counting 😀

But where do you find all these LEDs? Wouldn't it be great if there was a standard for manufacturers to modulate the "power on" LED for appliances to signal their power consumption. Something like a 100us dip to signal the passing of 1Wh would be very handy and trivial for any controller that already knows it's power draw.

[ProDave]

Germany is on the brink of rationing gas.  It's going to be an "interesting" winter ahead.

[SteamyTea]

33 minutes ago, Radian said:

You've really got the hang of LED pulse counting

What I am testing at the moment. 

More to come.

[JohnMo]

There's an App "my electric meter", that does the counting for you, and give you an ongoing consumption.  It just used the phone camera and allows you set to set the imp/kWh rate for your meter.

[SteamyTea]

2 minutes ago, JohnMo said:

There's an App "my electric meter", that does the counting for you, and give you an ongoing consumption.  It just used the phone camera and allows you set to set the imp/kWh rate for your meter.

Does it require you to glue a spare phone to the DNOs meter?

And does it log the data in a simple format?

Could have saved me a few hours work while I stuck at home.

[Radian]

16 minutes ago, JohnMo said:

There's an App "my electric meter", that does the counting for you, and give you an ongoing consumption.  It just used the phone camera and allows you set to set the imp/kWh rate for your meter.

That could be useful to me. My homebrew PV diverter is "losing"  0.1kWh to the grid every couple of days or so. Really small error but annoying as I'm sure I've got it calibrated correctly. My calibration reference, however, is another power meter (a Chinese one). I was about to go down steamy's route and make a pulse counter but this could save me the bother - especially as I only need it temporarily.

 

But one issue is that when exporting, I think the LED on the meter stops flashing altogether. Will have a closer look.

[SteamyTea]

4 minutes ago, Radian said:

But one issue is that when exporting, I think the LED on the meter stops flashing altogether. Will have a closer look.

I think it turns on the LED permanently when exporting.

Not an area I have looked at as I don't have PV.

 

While sitting having a coffee, I have had a couple if thoughts about mimicking a meter, should speed the testing process up a lot.

I shall start a new topic on all this, there is enough brains, and brawn, on buildhub to make a useful, and very cheap, device that is easily customisable and useful.

[JohnMo]

32 minutes ago, SteamyTea said:

Does it require you to glue a spare phone to the DNOs meter?

And does it log the data in a simple format?

Could have saved me a few hours work while I stuck at home.

It gives you an instantaneous reading, just a simple hold phone in front of flashing led.  You could glue the phone to your hand if you wanted.  Not it would help much.

[SteamyTea]

15 minutes ago, JohnMo said:

Not it would help much.

Depends. If I move my hand up and down, rapidly, infront of Redtube.com, it may pick up some pulses and show how much power I am burning.

May have to close curtains to stop stray light ruining the readings.

Edited July 9, 2022 by SteamyTea

[MikeSharp01]

22 minutes ago, SteamyTea said:

 

I shall start a new topic on all this, there is enough brains, and brawn, on buildhub to make a useful, and very cheap, device that is easily customisable and useful.

Seems like a plan. 

[SteamyTea]

2 minutes ago, MikeSharp01 said:

Seems like a plan. 

Give me a few hours and I shall post up what I have done.

Still out, but in the sub tropical park now.

 

 

[ProDave]

13 minutes ago, Radian said:

But one issue is that when exporting, I think the LED on the meter stops flashing altogether. Will have a closer look.

Some do, some don't.  In our last house it flashed when exporting but obviously did not count that as import.  Our present meter goes solid red when exporting and the display now cycles between the meter reading and "rED"  meaning Reverse energy Detected.  Designed to alert a meter reader to someone being naughty with their supply.