Best plug-in energy monitor?

[alank]

What are peoples views on the best plug-in energy monitor?

[guydewdney]

http://cgi.ebay.co.uk/Electricity-Power-Energy-Monitor-Meter-KWH-Watt-NEW_W0QQitemZ110459581012QQcmdZViewItemQQptZUK_Gadgets?hash=item19b7e77254

no connection - just easy to find picture.

It has good resolution

[Rooster]

There's always this one ... http://www.navitron.org.uk/product_detail.php?proID=339&catID=67 ..



I think thats the one that Ivan says is accurate on low power levels.

[roscoe]

the first ebay link is a bit greedy at 20w unit power consumption
the navitron doesnt quote a figure

i have one its handy to have, but usually a pig to read as sockets are usually in the most awkward places

[ecogeorge]

the first ebay link is a bit greedy at 20w unit power consumption
the navitron doesnt quote a figure

i have one its handy to have, but usually a pig to read as sockets are usually in the most awkward places

Just use a short extension lead !

[Hugo]

http://cgi.ebay.co.uk/Electricity-Power-Energy-Monitor-Meter-KWH-Watt-NEW_W0QQitemZ110459581012QQcmdZViewItemQQptZUK_Gadgets?hash=item19b7e77254

no connection - just easy to find picture.

It has good resolution

This is the one I use, I would recommend it.
I think I got it from Tesco for about the same price.

[RichardKB]

What range of power factor does the one from Navitron support.

Rich

[wookey]

The Navitron does indeed have good resolution down to about 0.2W which I find excellent for all those minor gadgets. My previous Brennenstuhl one was useless below 11W. Having to read it plugged in is a minor inconvenience but then it's also very cheap. Good gear IMHO. I bought 2 - one for work. Anything will work for finding out how much your fridge uses, few will tell you how much the router/radio/phone charger use.

[roscoe]

the first ebay link is a bit greedy at 20w unit power consumption
the navitron doesnt quote a figure

i have one its handy to have, but usually a pig to read as sockets are usually in the most awkward places

Just use a short extension lead !

I did, and I also made a remote extension to feed the plugin out and then another to take the power back.
Very bulky and just a hassle.

[noelsquibb]

I was going to buy one of the Navvi plug in monitors but when I went to TLC for a few bits, I saw something called OWL -CM119 and it seemed reasonable at about £24, so bought it on an impulse.

http://www.theowl.com/index.php?page=about-owl


'kin brilliant. Its turned me into a proper anal treehugger.

Clip the sender unit lead around a red wire and it reads the amount being transmitted through the wire and sends it to the portable receiver up to 30m distant. Updates every 6 secs and seems to be able to detect pretty small changes
Displays in £/p per hour, or kw, or carbon usage. Also got a thermometer and time /  date.

So now you know why Ive not been posting on the Navvi forum for a few days

What I have learned is that my 'base load' is around 4 - 5p per hour and that represents a weeks work each year to keep western power sweet !

On a more positive note though, our average use, at a cold time of the year, with minimum daylight and we are at home a lot,  is around 20kwh in a 24 hour period.   So the base load is about half our total use !!!

However the possibility of generating a bit under 1000w continuously from the stream that tumbles past my ( already connected) logshed, is now getting me thinking.

gotta go, someones turned on a light .... grrrrr

[wookey]

20kWh/day for (2?) people in winter is not good unless you are using electric heating (or have a huge house). You want to be aiming for more like 6-7kWh. Base load here is 1.1kWh when we are away (everything except refrigeration and solar/heating control turned off), and about 2.5 when all the 24/7 kit is on. Daily usage varyies from 3-8kWh/day when we are around, depending on lighting hours and equipment usage. We have taken numerous steps to reduce usage, although there are still quite a few things we can do. There are many threads on here giving others examples of typical usage, for you to compare against.

Have you worked out which things are responsible for the loads yet? The disavantage of the OWL type central meters is low resolution (so hard to measure anything below about 4W), and you have to go round turning everything off to work out what's causing what loads. THis is an incredibly worthwhile activity, as you are no doubt discovering. The plug-in meters are much better for working out how much individual devices use. Ideally you want both.

[noelsquibb]

bl00dy ell Wookey

how am I going to get my base load down from 10Kwh to 2.5Kwh, everywhere I look I see little standby neon lights ....

You want to know where its all going ?

tumble drier
cold fill washing machine
cold fill dishwasher
freezer
fridge
busy kettle
halogen lights in kitchen/diner
random lights left on everywhere
several toasty transformers driving Christmas lights
3 hot water circulating pumps
computer
phone chargers
2 TV's

but no intentional electric heating

Generally 3 peeps here and probably not a huge difference to usage if only two.

'Whats the big deal about £150 a quarter electric bills anyway ? '  is the only response Ive had so far.
Could only come from someone who doesn't pay the leccy bill, couldn't it.

Hence my thoughts turn towards hydro generation, rather than attempting to give up the lifestyle that the plugins have seduced us into.

Simpler to be laughed at for eccentric behaviour in the stream, than the continuous tightwad tirade.

Everyone accepts that we've got to 'do something' about our energy use but when the choices have to be made, they are generally deferred or ignored.

[petertc]

Here is my list of thing to do starting with no cost.
Switch off things when not in use,
dishwasher, washing machine, tumble dryer, computer router etc only switch on when you need them. ( i.e.when not in use switch off at the mains ) this also keeps the firemen happy less risk of fires
change all lights to CFL get rid of the halogen down lighters they eat power you may find that cfl's give more light than the halogens as the light spreads over a larger area.
Switch off lights when not needed my 2 kids now nag me both under 8
Reduce your energy usage first before looking at hydro.

don't do the bah humbug bit with the Christmas lights were all aloud a little bit of cheer
i would suggest that you also buy a navitron plug in monitor as this then allows you to target the worst energy offenders and look at the economics to change them  we just changed a fridge freezer to a fridge ( we have another chest freezer in the garage ) this is going to save us 900 watts a day in 4 years the fridge will pay for it's self.
Do you have any old stereos in the hose we had to old stack systems that cost us £15 per year in standby! we could not switch off because the CD's would stop working we now have 2 small geto blasters bay back 3 years

[Flamethrower_]

Best plugin monitor.......?,

Get on http://www.imeasure.org.uk/ then you become the monitor,

I have amazed myself this year when I thought I was pretty good at switching things off,  I work from home so a lot of stuff has to be running all the time!

Rob

[wookey]

So you have plenty of room for improvement :-) You won't be able to do all the below (especially if there is pushback from the natives), but do the ones you can over time - many of them make no difference at all to 'the lifestyle'.

tumble drier - these can be really shocking, but at least turn it off when not in use (TOWNIU)
cold fill washing machine - when you've got your thermal going read the threads to make it use hot water. TOWNIU
cold fill dishwasher - Ours works fine using solar thermal hot instead. TOWNIU
freezer - measure this as soon as you can. Old ones can be deeply inefficient.
fridge - as freezer. (but ours is old (and free) and surprisingly good - lives in very cool kitchen, so it varies)
busy kettle - same here! Very low duty cycle on these so not too bad overall. More efficient ones now exist.
halogen lights in kitchen/diner - Burn them! This could be a really big load. Get some LEDs
random lights left on everywhere. - Turn them off.
several toasty transformers driving Christmas lights - Get switch-mode ones if these are old-style.
3 hot water circulating pumps - see if the lower speeds still work. More efficient ones exist but can be v. expensive..
computer - TOWNIU, configure sleep modes if ti tends to get left on.
phone chargers - TOWNIU
2 TV's - TOWNIU

'Whats the big deal about £150 a quarter electric bills anyway ? '  is the only response I've had so far.
Could only come from someone who doesn't pay the leccy bill, couldn't it.

If you don't spend it on leccy you could spend it on something more desireable?

Would mentioning the drowned cities, floods of immigrants, ruined world for children, and expensive food that are coming if everyone doesn't get their finger out, help at all? Probably not, but worth a try - it works on some people.

Maybe point out that a bad attitude to energy efficiency is likely to make one a social pariah in the next few years, so getting some smug green points now is a good plan.