Energy and water use?

[Minnesota]

Yeah,
I see what you mean, I just thought that the average in the UK or in any country is kind of irrelevent to the average "ish" energy consumption. At least that is my experience in the USA, we (in the USA) are energy wasters, a few talk the talk, BUT very few walk the walk, and I'm not saying I have got there yet. You are right, we need to continue to attempt to reduce.

[Big Al]

Wow, that's great, can I ask how many of you there are in the household and the size of house? Any tips for how you cut down your usage? That must be way below average!

My own usages are:

gas: between 10 (summer) & 40 (winter) kWh per day
elec: between 3.5 (summer) & 5.0 (winter) kWh per day
water: around 48 cubic metres per 6 month period.

And just for info, there are 4 of us, in a 1920s mid-terraced house, with gas central heating on a modern condensing boiler and all-gas cooking. No dish-washer or tumble dryer.

Don't mean to question your figures too much but each unit on a gas meter measured in cubic ft is equall to just over 32kwh so in the winter you are using just a smidgen over 1 cubic ft ?

Crack on if it's true but I find that hard to belive [ in a nice sort of way as I'm the preverbial tight arse and I have a brand new condensing combi and I use an averave of 1.8846308 units a day so far this month.

Take care,

BA

[Memphis Slim]

Yeah,
I see what you mean, I just thought that the average in the UK or in any country is kind of irrelevent to the average "ish" energy consumption. At least that is my experience in the USA, we (in the USA) are energy wasters, a few talk the talk, BUT very few walk the walk, and I'm not saying I have got there yet. You are right, we need to continue to
attempt to reduce.

It is really sad that I am one of the enlightened and I still use as much energy as I do.

Natural Gas: 120 ccf/mo winter, 11 ccf/mo summer
Electricity: 400 kwh/mo winter, 650 kwh/mo summer

Eesh.

But I can feel good that adding attic/loft insulation brought my energy use way down from my first few months in the house.

[Big Al]

note to you brits, I am not sure what your unit of measure is for Natural Gas.
But 1 therm equals :
2.75 cubic meters, or
105.5 Megajoules, or
100,000 Btu, or
97.3 Cubic Feet

My gas bill charges me for cubic metres used but tells me my average daily usage of gas in kWh which must be a conversion but I'm not sure how to convert. Maybe someone else can?

Brett53, I'm interested in converting my toilet to run on rainwater - can I ask how you did yours? Do you have a diagram or anything you can share? I'm really *not* very good with DIY stuff, but I'd really like to give this a go.

Just read the rest of the topic... note to self ; must do this more before opening gob.. but as you are metered in cubic meters the conversion is as follows.

It's late and I'm tired but here's a crack at the conversion calculation. I'll check it again later. If your meter is on cubic ft then this is the conversion formula

1 x 2.83 x 1.02264 x 40.3 / 3.6

In English this is The number of units you have used (1) multiply by conversion figure(2.83) multiplied by the correction factor (1.02264) multiply by the calorific value of the gas in your area. (40.3) [ this can vary but generally is between 39.3 and 41.3] divided by 3.6 this will give you your gas consumption in KWhrs.

Byt as you are on a cubic metre meter then miss out the 2.83 in the above equation.

Hopefully that will work, I need some more pain relief now.... and some sleep.

Take care,

BA.

[Julysea]

Oh, I'm confused now. The kWh I posted for my gas consumption is definitely correct as that is what was on my bill. Everyone seems to measure gas differently and have different formulae for conversion, so now I've no clue where I am.

[Millymollymandy]

Found my last leccy bill - 7146kW for the year. Seems to fluctuate from about 6,600 to that figure which was our highest yet! I blame all our fridges and freezers.

[Big Al]

Found my last leccy bill - 7146kW for the year. Seems to fluctuate from about 6,600 to that figure which was our highest yet! I blame all our fridges and freezers.

MMM you make me smile so much........

My leccy bill is 3080 KWH
Mind you three whole years ago as in 01.01.2007 my leccy was 10800 or so then it has been reduced year on year until this year to the current 3080. That includes a conversion to all leccy cooking last may 1st.

I agree that your fridges and freezers may be the culprits as my fridge freezer is 16 yrs old and F rated then!! I reckon I could reduce my leccy down by 1500 kwh a year just by changing the FF.... when I get the £180 together,lol.

[Millymollymandy]

This is after I have cut down considerably!!! And I hardly ever use the oven in winter due to my special leccy tariff I'm on. I never use it for stews and just do most things on the bottle gas hob. Mind you I do have two electric hot water tanks for this big 3 bathroom house, but they are turned down heatwise and not put on every night.

And if you really want to laugh, I was bemoaning the fact that you lot in the UK can get those energy plug reader thingies to see how much power an individual appliance is using to my husband yesterday, who turned round and said "I saw one of those in Lidl this morning and I was going to mention it to you".

Aaaaarrrrgggghhhhh so why didn't you then?!!!

My 2 freezers and fridge are out in the cellar where it is very cold so I doubt that even the newish A+ freezer is working at that rating. But then without them I wouldn't get to bulk buy meat on promo or store own grown veg and fruit.

[Millymollymandy]

And if we're talking about the past I used to have a greenhouse with an electric fan heater in it when I lived in the mountains near Geneva.