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Step 1
Find out more about phantom loads. Phantom loads, often called standby power, standby loads or vampire loads are things in our homes and offices that continue to draw power even when they are in the off position. When it comes to home electronics the Department Of Energy estimates they account for fully seventy percent of home electricity use.
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Step 2
Find and eliminate vampire loads. The first step in eliminating phantom loads or vampire loads is to locate them. One way is to use a power monitoring device such as a "Kill A Watt". The Kill A Watt measures how much energy an appliance or electronic product is using when it is off or on. Using such a device check each appliance in your home. This includes major appliances in the off position, such as washers, microwaves and TV's. Write the power use of each one down on piece of paper.
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Step 3
Add up the wasted energy. Once you have checked every 120 volt device in your home and tallied the number of watts up, multiply this number by 24 hours and divide it by 1000. this will give you the number of kilowatts used per day by phantom loads in your home. If you multiply then number of kilowatts used times your electricity rate, say fourteen cents per KWH or kilowatt hour, you can find out how much energy phantom loads are costing you.
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Step 4
Place any phantom load drawing more that one watt on a power strip with an off button. Turn the power strip off when you are not using the appliance. For kitchen appliances you can use a power strip with holes in the back that you can use to attach it to the wall along the back of your kitchen counter. Now you can just turn on one button that controls several appliances and eliminate the phantom loads that they draw from the home electrical system and your wallet.
Comments
crazycatlady said
on 1/29/2009 Very interesting. Thanks
betterbody said
on 1/17/2009 Thank you for this info.