Russell's Blog

My mom has been interested in energy conservation for a long time. She's managed to take a pretty considerable bite out of her electricity and gas usage by taking some very simple steps. Below, I've plotted her energy use over the last couple of years. I was only able to find a handful of bills, but it's enough to see the trend. The first big reduction is just from minor adjustments in habits -- turning the lights off when she leaves the room, and opening the blinds to use natural light in the daytime. The second big reduction is from installing compact florescent bulbs. That doesn't sound very exciting, but it cut her electricity use by 50-70%. If you've been doubting that those sorts of changes make a difference, seeing is believing. This is, by the way, without any new appliances. She's still got a washing machine and dryer that are almost as old as me, a non-EnergyStar dishwasher, and a massive professional refrigerator that predates EnergyStar altogether.

The most obvious place to start, of course, is the refrigerator, which I estimate to be sucking down between 2.5 and 5 kwh per day. Or, at least, that's what it would have used when it was new, so it could be as much as 20% more than that. To maintain that nice downward trend, I've advised her to trade up to a Sun Frost RF16, which absolutely crushes the competition, using less than half a kwh per day. The most efficient models from big brands use about three times as much. Also, they're built right here in the USA, in Arcata, California.

The cost-benefit analysis for washer, drier and dishwasher isn't quite as stark. The main reason for swapping those out are to save water and gas. For gas, the easiest savings can be had by replacing the water heater, and she's already got an awesome tankless water heater. For water, toilets and outdoor watering are the main culprits. She has a couple of dual-flush toilets on order, and a there are a bunch of rain barrels staked in the driveway. They will be hooked up when the new rain gutters are installed.

When that's all done, she'll be ready to push the trend line the rest of the way down to the axes. Ultimately, solar is the way to go in southern California, but as long as panels cost a couple of dollars per watt, you'd be crazy not to do the easy stuff first. In any event, she wants to have some excess capacity in her photovoltaic system. Someday, she swears, she's going to have an electric car.