As electricity costs continue to rise, homeowners in the United States have been forced to look for ways to reduce energy consumption in their homes. Many have opted to replace their home appliances with more energy-efficient ones. If you suspect some of your home appliances are pushing your utility costs up, you should replace them with eco-friendly ones. This article tells you which appliances use the most electricity.
Home Appliances that Consume the Most Energy
Many factors influence the amount of energy an appliance consumes. Therefore, before you judge your appliance’s efficiency by its energy consumption, consider other important factors like its age, frequency of use, size, frequency of maintenance, and model.
You also need to remember that some of the latest home appliances use a bit of gas and electricity. All the same, here are the home appliances that are likely to consume more energy.
- Central air conditioner (two-ton): the central air conditioner is estimated to consume up to 1450 kWh per month.
- Refrigerator (17-20 cubic feet): this refrigerator can consume up to 205 kWh per month.
- Water heater (4-person house): an electric water heater consumes approximately 310 kWh per month.
- Electric oven: a standard oven will consume about 30 kWh per month.
- Dryer: a normal dryer is estimated to use up to 75 kWh per month.
- Washing machine: this home appliance can consume up to 9 kWh per month.
- Microwave: if you use a microwave every day, it will consume about 16 kWh per month.
- Dishwasher: your dishwasher consumes a lot of energy when used regularly and can use up to 30 kWh per month.
- Lighting: depending on the number and type of lights in your house, your home lighting can consume up to 50 kWh per month.
Even as you look for more energy-efficient home appliances, it’s important to ensure that your appliances are appropriately used in the house to reduce their energy consumption. For instance, you need to unplug your appliances when they’re not in use because they’ll continue to consume energy even when they’re idle if you keep them plugged in.
The U.S. Department of Energy claims that 10 percent of an appliance’s energy consumption occurs when it’s turned off. But you can prevent this energy consumption by unplugging the appliance when it’s idle.
Installing an electricity plug monitor lets you know how much energy your home appliances consume. This monitor is simply plugged into a power outlet, and the appliance is plugged into it.
