29 March 2009
Beat the energy vampires in your house
Posted by Jerry Kidd under: Product Reviews .
I earned my EcoBroker Certification a few months back and had all of the best intentions to get started on “greening” my house right away. But, with all of my energy being focused on developing my Stealth Marketing course and then delivering it, those intentions ended up in the place where all the socks go that are eaten by the clothes dryer.
Then the most recent PG&E bill arrived! Gulp! It was over $300.00 and much of it was related to electricity consumption. We heat our house and water with gas and our stove uses gas, but every thing else is electric including the ovens (2) and the clothes dryer. We also have a spa that doesn’t get much use, but the circulation pump runs the water in the spa through the filter for hours each day.
We also have two computers on around the clock as I enjoy being able to remotely access the computers from wherever I happen to be. Aside from that, I didn’t think that we were running that many appliances to generate a bill of such magnitude, but I had no real way of telling who the energy vampires were so that I could determine how to change our ways.
So, when I ran across the Kill A Watt from P3 Industries, I had to have one. Easier said than done. I just knew that Home Depot would carry them. Wrong! And that is a big FAIL for Home Depot. Same goes for my local hardware store. Finally it dawned on me to check with Amazon. Of course they carried it and at a price lower than anywhere else. More on that later.
What is the Kill A Watt? It is simply a device that works much like your electric meter in that it lets you plug in an appliance into it. Then the device quietly measure the power used by the appliance over time. Then you take the rate charged by PG&E (Or whatever power company is in your area) multiply it by the KWH as determined by the device and you will know how much the appliance costs you to run. Watch the short video for details.
Ok, here is a convenient link to the product page on Amazon in case you want one of these. (Just click on the picture) That page also includes a link to a book that Amazon recommends along with the Kill A Watt. These might make a nice inexpensive closing gift for your client’s too.
So far I am still gathering data, but it looks like that spa pump that runs every day is the biggest energy vampire in my house!
