WEBVTT - Why are my power bills so high?

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<v Speaker 1>Welcome to Brainstuff from houset dot com where smart happens. Hi.

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<v Speaker 1>I'm Marshall Brain with today's question why are my power

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<v Speaker 1>bills so high? Which appliances used the most power? If

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<v Speaker 1>you were to make a chart of the electricity consuming

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<v Speaker 1>devices in a typical American home and rank them in

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<v Speaker 1>order of their hunger for power, the list might look

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<v Speaker 1>something like this. At the top, there would be things

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<v Speaker 1>like heat pumps and central air conditioning. They might consume

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<v Speaker 1>fifteen thousand watts. A water heater or a clothes dryer

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<v Speaker 1>can consume four thousand watts if they're electric. A space

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<v Speaker 1>heater or a hair dryer consumes a thousand or twelve

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<v Speaker 1>hundred wats. A refrigerator might consume seven hundred to a

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<v Speaker 1>thousand watts. A computer and a monitor might consume three

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<v Speaker 1>hundred watts. And then there's compact fluorescent light bulbs, which

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<v Speaker 1>might consume fifteen watts. So if your house has electric heat,

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<v Speaker 1>then the middle of winter is a time when you're

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<v Speaker 1>gonna be using a lot of power. A heat pump

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<v Speaker 1>might run ten to fifteen hours a day. If you

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<v Speaker 1>assume electricity costs a dime per kilowatt hour, you could

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<v Speaker 1>spend twenty dollars a day just to run the heat

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<v Speaker 1>pump over the course of a month. That's several hundred

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<v Speaker 1>dollars worth of electricity. The same applies in the summer

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<v Speaker 1>if you use the air conditioner a lot. Water heating

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<v Speaker 1>uses a good bit of power as well. When you

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<v Speaker 1>take a shower or run a load of clothes in

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<v Speaker 1>the washer, the electric water heater might run for an

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<v Speaker 1>hour reheating the water in the tank. That's forty cents.

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<v Speaker 1>A typical household can burn several dollars a day just

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<v Speaker 1>heating water. Because we don't normally think of it this way,

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<v Speaker 1>it's funny to consider that every shower you take costs

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<v Speaker 1>forty cents. When you add in the cost of washing

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<v Speaker 1>and drying the towels. Every load of clothes that you

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<v Speaker 1>run might cost a dollar or two dollars for washing

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<v Speaker 1>and drying, plus the soap and shampoo you you it

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<v Speaker 1>can cost nearly a buck just to take a shower.

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<v Speaker 1>Refrigeration is another big power drain because the refrigerator can

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<v Speaker 1>easily run for ten hours a day. That's a dollar

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<v Speaker 1>per day just to keep the melt cold. If you

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<v Speaker 1>leave the computer or TV on all day. It can

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<v Speaker 1>add up to a dollar per day as well. Compared

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<v Speaker 1>to these big consumers, compact thruscent light bulbs don't even

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<v Speaker 1>show up on the radar. Using a space heater or

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<v Speaker 1>an electric blanket so that you can turn down the

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<v Speaker 1>furnace at night is probably the easiest way to save

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<v Speaker 1>big on your power bill. Saving hot water is the

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<v Speaker 1>next easiest. Do you have any ideas or suggestions for

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<v Speaker 1>this podcast? If so, please send me an email at

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