444 Lower the Energy Bill, Keep the Standard of Living (Consumption Optimization)

[@DeputatKaktus]

"Before we talk about strategies, we first have to have a goal - not like in most companies I worked for" This had me snort....this is SO on point it almost hurts.

[@Lehpurdzzz]

That was gold😂😂

[@RealJohnnyDingo]

It's funny because it's true

[@michaelkeller5008]

i 2nd this statement!

[@bigbronx]

3:40 for those looking for it really good one

[@Cptnbond]

A thoughtful way to save energy if you like boiled eggs. Raise the temperature to the boiling point, then remove the saucepan from the heater. The duration the eggs are immersed in the slowly reduced water temperature dictates the final consistency of your breakfast eggs. Of course, it will take some more time than boiling the eggs at 100C, but with some planning, the results are the same, and you save lots of energy for free. Cheers.

[@RealJohnnyDingo]

I bet you could pour boiling water over eggs in a thermos and let them sit an hour. more water=more cooked. i have cooked wheat berries overnight using this method, it might be the most energy saving cooking method outside of using some kind of solar cooker!

[@MarkSpohr]

You can use the same strategy for pasta.

[@AndreasSpiess]

A lot of innovative ideas!

[@felix30471]

If you do this and don't have an induction stove, it might make sense to boil the water using an electric kettle. Heating up a hotplate takes energy, and I'd guess that a kettle has a lower heat capacity than a stove.

[@andersostlund]

Excellent. Your rational and pedagogical videos are real treats for an engineer and maker like me. This time you also hit a sweet spot for my wife (she's an accountant). Can't wait to show her this video. Thanks!

[@EmanuelTeixeiradaCunha-Plus]

Pq

[@AndreasSpiess]

Saving energy of course became also financially interesting. I think that this is needed if we want to reduce the consumption.

[@sergiurotari]

Dear Andreas, without many explanations, i just want to say - Thank you !!!

[@AndreasSpiess]

You are welcome!

[@csongorvarga]

The fan you mentioned in your video is available already. I installed this in my holiday home so I can ventilate the room without throwing out the warm air in the summer. It is called Aerauliqa Quantum HR-150. I think it is an Italian product and exactly as you described it. Installs in a 160mm cutout, has a ceramic "filter" inside and reverses the fan direction every minute. That is also an option not to reverse the fan (e.g. it is warmer outside and you want to push the warm air in all the time). And it is done by simple switches. For which I use an ESP with a 4 channel relay.

[@Mr.Leeroy]

heat recovery wall fan, nothing new. ceramic element inside also known as recuperator.

[@AndreasSpiess]

Thank you for sharing your example installation!

[@Heimbasteln]

In Germany these kinds of decentralised ventilation units are called "Pendellüfter". Their efficiency is limited but they are easy to install. I installed a centralised ventilation system in my house because I have spaces to run the pipes to the rooms (in the attic and along the sides where the roof is too low for any rooms).

[@1over137]

Strategy I used was to "split rail" rooms which have quadrant 4 devices. One socket has a 4 bar extension for "essential" devices that should NOT be switched off. Another socket with everything that does not need to be on when I leave the room. I put both on energy monitoring plugs, but the "non essential" switch has a switch at the door. One press, all the standby stuff that doesn't need to be kept powered is switched off. If I forget I can do it remotely. It works well for offices, labs and living room media centre. I saved myself about 100W 24/7 power doing this. On gas. I immplemented a multi-zone presence aware system which controls the heating based on presence and room usage. Leaving unsed rooms at 16*C except for 1 hour in the morning where all rooms "boost" up to comfort temps around 19-20*C. If I switch on the TV or media centre in a room, the target temp jumps up to "comfort" levels. When I switch them off and leave, the temp falls back to 16*C. In the dead of winter I save money by not using some rooms, like I live in the office/lab for a few months and don't use the livingroom. I just ventalate it every other day.

[@AndreasSpiess]

Good idea with the two "clusters" in your rooms! I do not constantly measure the usage of Q4 devices because their consumption do not vary a lot.

[@SmithyScotland]

Congratulations on hitting 400k subscribers. I now mainly use GoSund smart plugs - they're now natively sold by amazon (rather than a market place seller) at about £10 each. Easily flashable with tasmota. I use a 500w halogen light to then calibrate each plug. The 500w varies so I use a clamp meter on the cable first. Still not found a reliable way to track voltage. Have blown up 2 9v AC power supplies trying. I agree on not connecting the fridge to a smart plug. I use a CT clamp on the cable, connected to a wemos d1 mini.

[@AndreasSpiess]

Good idea to use a halogen light because of its PF of 1. The voltage can be measured by any RMS multimeter which supports more than the peak voltage of your net. My UT71D is rated up to 1000V. If you do not trust these meters, just do not touch them while connected to mains. Concerning IOT plugs: We have a very limited selection because we use a special plug in Switzerland.

[@santopino2546]

@@AndreasSpiess so many plug standard is a nightmare. ordered a set of adaptors from Schuko to Italian standard, this makes a bulky mess around these smart plugs. Converter Italian/Schuko then smart plug then Schuko/Italian.

[@alexlovett1991]

+1 for the gosund plugs. I’ve got a few of them with tasmota. I calibrate them using a 1500W toaster and do them all at the same time.

[@AnnaVannieuwenhuyse]

@@santopino2546 for such issues, I've found converting power strips myself to be useful. I integrate one of these switches into the box part of the switched strip, and replace the switch with a button (which I also need for space reasons)

[@santopino2546]

@@AnnaVannieuwenhuyse good solution, I was doing something like that with an Arduino and wireless module, but gave up, was taking me too much time, with these cheap Chinese modules it's a better solution.

[@EsotericArctos]

I moved to an electricity retailer that onsells at proper wholesale prices rather than a fixed rate. They provide the wholesale rates and forecast rates based on the actual national energy market, updated every 5 minutes in Australia. This has made me really conscious of electricty usage as during the day, when there is a lot of solar energy, the grid wholesale price is really cheap, but overnight the prices go up considerably as we still rely on fossil fuels for electricity when renewables are gone. This video makes a lot of sense, and given me a lot of ideas where I can automate things that I have been doing manually.

[@AndreasSpiess]

Thank you for your support! I think that variable pricing is a good idea to steer people towards using electricity when it is produced. I think it is easy to implement as the principle mechanics are known to everybody. We have two tariffs here. The night tariff still is cheaper (we have lots of band energy). I use this fact to see when our electricity system gets modern. Because then, the tariffs will change as it is in your situation.

[@PATRIK67KALLBACK]

The four quadrants are always so useful when you have to do analysis of things!

[@AndreasSpiess]

I agree!

[@tonysfun]

You are the best! Your thinking and solution is right on the money! I just purchased a new server and it is using less power than my old server, despite having 9 slots (my old one has only 5 HD slots). The old one will become a backup system for the new server, but will remain turned off most of the time. Here in Lincoln, Nebraska (USA) we have the least expensive electricity, but the cost just rize per Kilowatt and one has to save anyway we can. I think I should implement more power saving measures to cut my electric bill. When we moved into this house, I replaced all the lights with LED lightbulbs and that alone saved money, despite at the time (2013) the LED lightbulbs cost much more than today. Thank you Andreas for being an inspiration for the rest of us!

[@AndreasSpiess]

You are welcome! Also here with the PV electricity is not expensive. Still I try to avoid waste because I do not like it ;-)

[@SAerror1]

This stuff really works too, I shaved off almost 8000 kwh of my home power consumption from 2021 in 2022 by becoming more aware of my various electrical loads and more aggressively turning things off completely when I'm not using them.

[@johnymommen]

8000kWh is a lot. Can you share how much yr consumption was in 2021 ? What devices (power/device) did you switch of to reach this result ? Thanks for sharing.

[@SAerror1]

@@johnymommen a lot of it went to heat pumps air conditioning in the summer and heating in the winter, now i adjust the temperatures when no one is home and ventilating smarter helps, as well as disabling electrical floor heating and switching the heated towel rack off in the bathroom for parts of the day. And replacing the old DELL r720 file server in the garage with a simpler NAS. I've gone from 24300kwh in 2021 to about 16000 in 2022. It was indeed a lot of waste, but back then power was cheap!

[@coal.sparks]

This video is so much more useful than the "7 tips to reduce your energy bill!" type videos, as it offers a framework with which to evaluate what works for your personal set up. Thank you!

[@AndreasSpiess]

Glad you see what I wanted to achieve! Learn them fishing instead of giving them a fish ;-)

[@PhG1961]

Great video ! Btw, one of our best investments we did concerning energy savings, was the installation of heat pipes. We use it for hot tap water. The basic model has a 300l reservoir, if upscaled (3000 l) you can also use it to heat the house. This is by far the most profitable installation we ever did, it exceeds the photovoltaic installation quite a bit.

[@AndreasSpiess]

I assume your heat pipes are in the sun? Or are they in the earth?

[@PhG1961]

On top of the roof almost perfect orientated. Only during the coldest and most cloudy days of the year, the hotwater production is somewhat limited. Then the regular CV kicks in. However, the heatpipes have a double wall which is vacuum. So as soon as there is a little sun, even in mid winter, it produces heat. Great investment !

[@4000phil]

​@@PhG1961 Share a video. What local climate or area & altitude. Metrics such as how many liters of water/week have been raised by 30°C?

[@PhG1961]

@@4000phil A quick response, more details asap. Local climate: Belgium, East Flanders (near Antwerp), altitude here is 6m above sea level, the heat pipes are on top of our roof on (attic level), all together they are something like 10m high. The details of the temp. I'll have to consult the controller.

[@4000phil]

@@PhG1961 Definitely interested as I'm living about 50km from you :-)

[@muddy11111]

For those with pumped heating systems, the pumps usually have 3 speed settings. Installers have a habit of setting them as the maximum speed. If you can hear the water rushing through the pipes try dropping the pump speed. It make a big difference to power consumption, as the pump runs for long periods.

[@cannaroe1213]

I hate this aspect of the system, it really can be noise AF, particularly if there are any bubbles in the loop god help you

[@AndreasSpiess]

Thank you for the tip!

[@gustersongusterson4120]

I've been thinking a lot about this in my own home. Thanks for helping me organize my ideas and find out where savings can be found.

[@AndreasSpiess]

Enjoy the hunt for watts!

[@klassichd10]

Thank you for this contribution and the measurements with Metrahit. Really many parallels here. But one significant difference: I eliminated TV in 1986. And I did not get stupid by this, I think

[@AndreasSpiess]

I also do not use our TV a lot. However, I watch podcasts of the most interesting content of our national TV. I think, these days. "TVs" are more used to watch Netflix et al.

[@ufootje]

I concur about the coffee machine, no debate about that!!

[@AndreasSpiess]

:-)

[@peter.stimpel]

My strategy was to feed the daily use of Q4 devices from solar power, by using a guerilla PV. Seems, our regulators are still not ready for this. A shame. Nice video, and congrats on the 400k subs as well.

[@AndreasSpiess]

Here the paperwork for the PV was not exaggerated. And I just got 3500.- back as a contribution. Quite fast, I think.

[@neildotwilliams]

Great video as always. I use a smart socket and extension lead combination to power off most things overnight based on Home Assistant schedules, example being tv, amp, Xbox all on single extension. Can use Alexa routines also if someone doesn’t have HA. I probably spent more on smart plugs and extensions than I’ll save on equipment in standby though.

[@AndreasSpiess]

Time based switch off is a good thing and easy to implement!

[@yitspaerl7255]

Thanks a lot Andreas. After having seen this I created a power schedule on my 4 disk NAS, and will add timer controlled power switches to my POE switches and modems.

[@AndreasSpiess]

The action changes the world! Not the monitoring. Very good.

[@McTroyd]

"Across the pond," we've been seeing energy increases too. While nowhere near your 10x surge, our last power bill showed that a 25% reduction in usage year-over-year, still yielded a 50% higher bill. (Our electricity is mostly powered by natural gas.) I showed my wife the chart at the beginning of your video showing the surge in Swiss prices, reminding her that's where we could end up, while the Soviets are still shellacking their neighbors. She turned off the lights she wasn't using. Thanks for helping me illustrate my point. 😁

[@AndreasSpiess]

I remember the book "Good to Great" where chapter 4 is: Confront the brutal facts" ;-)

[@jmr]

When using a Sonoff device to measure power on fridges and freezers I disable the relay in the firmware to prevent accidentally turning them off. This is possible when you replace the original firmware with Tasmota.

[@AndreasSpiess]

Thank you for the tip!

[@rickharold7884]

Cool stuff. Also, do direct DC power without the power bricks and AC conversion. I know that’s more difficult for you because of your roof system. But with all our off grid systems, we do that because you lose a lot of power. power consumption / waste is critical. Thx

[@AndreasSpiess]

I thought about standardizing my lab on 12 volts and use a battery instead of a UPC. But I would still have many converters. So I decided to stick with 240V. The radio room mostly runs of 13.6 volts. But this is the nature of these devices.

[@typxxilps]

12:36 has been covered by Andreas Schmitz on his channel about a year ago. He emphasized more on the quality of the cleaned air without particles or Pollen that had impat on his family life in the spring . The energy return was there but also a bit of noise and those devices were not cheap.

[@HerrFreese]

We have the Helios EC 45 system in our new home and are satisfied with the air quality in the house at the lowest setting. Any higher setting is too loud for sleeping. But for parties the noise level at higher setting is ok. We are still testing/undecided if opening the windows is necessary once day. A big problem is the air in the bathroom which gets very moist once per day. We are undecided, if it is better to vent the air by a) opening the small window, b) using the also installed big fan without heat recovery or c) venting the moist air to the house and hope that the slow helios fans will remove the moisture over time and risk higher humidity in the house. My parents have a Bayern Luft installed in a 2,5m² bathroom and never had mold again.

[@AndreasSpiess]

Thank you for the link to Andreas and for sharing your experience

[@bastiannenke9613]

I changed my overly excessive UPS situation, currently I'm not able to have everything run for a hour when we have a power outage, but combined with a smaller network switch that saves me 120w/h. Future plan is to further optimise the UPS situation by letting the PC/Server control the UPS. I want it in bypass mode when the pc is off, that way the inverter doesn't waste energy, the input may also be switched off when the battery is fully loaded and no output is active. I am currently working on splitting my electronics into "Always on" (kitchen appliances, router, NAS), "on when I'm home" and multiple "only on when needed" groups and I'm currently checking out openhab (thank you for already covering this topic in the past) to automate those things as much as possible. Openhab seems great because I can include my APC PDU as well as my HDMI Matrix and the receiver. The Mikrotik bind also seems very promising. I expect to not only lower my electricity consumption while keeping the comfort, I even think I can further improve my standard. I plan to start with buying the first parts in q1 2023, until then I still have to do some research.

[@AndreasSpiess]

Because I have a 10kWh battery for the PV I only need a UPC coverage of a few seconds till it kicks in. So here it is only about energy saving.

[@bastiannenke9613]

@@AndreasSpiess cries in apartment without possibilities for solar, don't have a balcony and my window mount experiments failed.

[@santopino2546]

It's over 4 years that I've gone through a process of saving. My heating gas boiler broke stopped working and I haven't had it repaired. In winter, I only heat my bedroom in the evening with a 1.5 kW electrical heater and I use a 50W feet heater when necessary. I still haven't used them this winter (4 Dicembre 22) Last night I used for the first time my new €20 60W bed heater, though I put it on half power 30W, it was too hot, so I'm thinking of running it on programmable power switch changing the duty cycle. I put on warm clothing to go to the kitchen. my kitchen is now 13°C. My bedroom is around 16.5°C. I'm often away for weeks from home and my room gets heated by the sun, I use a cheap €80 roller blind opener that automatically opens and closes it every day.

[@AndreasSpiess]

It seems you do not have much savings left! 13 C definitively would be a too low temperature for me (at least without force)...

[@SAerror1]

The Shelly range are such nice devices apart from their tendency to turn off at random times for no apparent reason, I made sure to use fibaro z-wave modules on my fridge and freezer instead and configured them as always-on appliances in the firmware. That way those plugs refuse to ever turn themselves off and become passive monitoring devices only.

[@AndreasSpiess]

Since I only once measured the power, a manual meter is sufficient for me. The consumption does not vary a lot. And I anyway need the fridge...

[@RobinCernyMitSuffix]

Becaus I was afraid of that too, and also thought that a relay is wasted energy, I desoldered the Relay on my sonoff POW2, and just bridged it ;)

[@bartowl]

Great video. You might have wanted to mention moving fridges/freezers to low temperature environment to increase their efficiency. Alone moving a freezer to basement where temperature is lower than in kitchen can significantly reduce it power consumption. From what I see you already did that. Of course main fridge has to be in the kitchen, but also then - especially for built-in fridges ensure proper airflow, so that it does not heat up unnecessary, this also reduces consumption a lot! Besides that I did not manage to test how good radar sensors behave as presence (not movement) detectors in situations like sitting in living room watching a movie. No movement there. But - most of smart TVs can be pinged or even accessed via API. Turned on TV might be an indication of room being "in use" - this can be used to improve presence detection, i mean - one do not leave TV running when not being in the room...

[@AndreasSpiess]

Good tips. Thank you!

[@mikamyllyvirta2796]

Great content again Andreas, thanks. At the end of the video, you mention heat storing ventilation device. There have been other devices on the market for a while now. I bought two of SIKU Twinfresh Easy Digital's and they have been very effecient. You would need two of these devices running synchronized in different directions so the indoor air pressure doesn't change. About two years ago I've logged temperature data from the device with two temp-sensors. Outdoor temperature was about 3 C and room temperature about 20 C. The "coldest" air coming inside was about 17.5 C.

[@wellreally831]

agree, that these devices only make sense in a pair. What about the noise? I imagine it be very annoying due to the constantly changing frequency

[@mikamyllyvirta2796]

​@@wellreally831 The spec for v2 says: "Sound pressure level at 3m - unshielded (dBA): 12/18/20". The v1 (which I have) is also very, very quiet in first gear.

[@matneu27]

The idea with detecting the cellphone is great and could be realized just by a simple ping request instance in your home automation. To save power on my TV surrounding illumination I switch it depending on ping requests on the receiver and the state of sunset.

[@AndreasSpiess]

Indeed, a ping request on the LAN would do it. HA does it using the GPS if I remember right.

[@matneu27]

@@AndreasSpiess everything fine as long the data of presence kept in your own place. Anyway I run iobroker which has an ping instance where I can set serval ip addresses to watch.

[@romutis]

It would be very interesting to see a video from you about energy measurement / monitoring devices. Especially devices that don't need soldering - like energy monitors plugs that you can use in rental apartment. And monitors that can show not only real-time usage but cumulative usage too.

[@AndreasSpiess]

I plan such a video.

[@romutis]

@@AndreasSpiess This will be just great! Love your videos (and your accent :) . Greetings from Zürich!

[@electrobob]

1. For screens and TVs the brightness setting contributes a lot to the consumption. But most people set them bright during day and never adjust to lower at night. Turning down the brightness when it is dark has quite a few benefits, besides saving a great deal of energy. 2. In most places it makes sense in the long run to buy a laptop rather than a desktop when the cost of energy consumption is added, provided the performance you need exists in laptop form.

[@david_akerman]

I didn't realise how much difference that makes till I monitored our TV and noticed that power went down by about 20W when we dimmed the room lights - our TV is one that controls it's own brightness according to the room brightness!

[@AerialWaviator]

Some TV's have an advanced "power-off" mode that takes longer to start-up. The typical quick power-on mode is really a sleep mode, not completely powered off.

[@daijoubu4529]

AMD Ryzen, my laptop have long replaced my desktop, faster and much lower consumption

[@AndreasSpiess]

Good points!

[@AerialWaviator]

Great tips. There is an open hardware / software project called Open Energy Monitor. It's well documented, so might provide some useful ideas.

[@AndreasSpiess]

Thank you for the tip!

[@MAMDAVEM]

Marley already produce a low energy heat recovery ventilation fan (Menv180), I have had one installed for a couple of years. It is easy to integrate with Homeassistant and I have automations that switch it off if the outside temperature is too low or too high or if it is raining outside.

[@AndreasSpiess]

Cool!

[@johnymommen]

You hit the nail several times, Andreas. I was very much interested in your PV panel project (#427). This 8kW installation, together with the batteries, should give you no worries abouth the electrical bill anymore. The 6 month use of the 8kW PV installation must give you a good view on the outcome (production, consumption, consumed from the grid, injected to the grid) Can you share some data ?

[@AndreasSpiess]

This topic is also important with a PV (I sell the excess energy). Particularly Q4 is important because it drains the battery in the night. I will share the results, but only after winter.

[@johnymommen]

@@AndreasSpiess Any time is ok to share, Andreas. I never installed the battery. I did what the SMA guys recommend : consume the energy when the sun is shining. A spreadsheet of daily grid consumption & injection using 3 cases - no battery, a 5 kWh battery, a 10 kWh battery - combined with investment, grid cost/kWh and injection price/kWh gives me a payback of 13 years for the 5 kWh, and 23 years for the 10 kWh battery. Lucky us, we have lots of smart plugs, Home Assistant, Node Red and some programming knowledge to optimize electricity consumption against production.

[@AndreasSpiess]

@@johnymommen My battery is a hobby, not an investment ;-) But it makes things easier.

[@CyclingSteve]

I went the simple way. - Smart meter to monitor overall usage. - Main switches for groups of appliances that do not need to be on as you have used. - An air fryer saves heating the oven. - Swapped my 12 year old power hungry PC for a new Celeron N5105 desktop which uses less power than it's two monitors when idle and does a better job than it's predecessor. - Smart light bulbs that can be turned off from anywhere. - I only have electric for heating so I got thick curtains, and I lowered the thermostat on the water heating cylinder (it only runs at night on a low tariff) as it mixes the hot with cold water and I never used a full tank. - I also sleep with a window open so the bedroom is rarely heated.

[@AndreasSpiess]

Thank you for sharing your achievements!

[@bartjsmit]

There is an off-the-shelf alternative for your Molex relay for PC peripherals, which I have used for years - it is the EcoControl function of Eaton UPS, which switches off the ECO marked outlet when the load on the protected circuit drops. In my case, when the PC sleeps, the speakers and monitors get switched off.

[@AndreasSpiess]

Good function! I use my method for years already and only go my UPS recently. Unfortunately, I did not find this function in my Eaton Ellipse ECO 800 :-)

[@JohnnieHougaardNielsen]

One use case for actually putting fridge and freezer on a switchable energy monitoring device is that you can set up an alarm in the smarthome backend if energy consumption gets too low or high, something needs to be done, including for defects, blown fuses, open doors, or misuse of the switching device. Also you can turn off power at times where electricity is most expensive, maybe only having a well-insulated freezer powered while electricity prices are lowest (assuming it is not opened much). You can also set a "smart" relay device to be always-on, like I'm doing with Tasmota.

[@NiHaoMike64]

One could hack a dedicated freezer with a modified smart plug connecting the relay in parallel with the thermostat. Then leave the thermostat set as a high limit but allow it to pull down more when cheap energy is available.

[@AndreasSpiess]

Fortunately, we have a modern freezer with an alarm. And its power consumption is quite small: 0.5W without heat pump...

[@BerndFelsche]

Location of refrigerators and freezers can have a big impact on energy consumption. Ensuring good ventilation (natural convection) means space around such devices. A refrigerator may be convenient right next to the cooker, but it will cost as radiant heat is absorbed by the side of the refrigerator. Built-in units often have to work too hard against the hot enclosure that they heat. Adding vents to cabinets to allow convection will reduce power consumption. One might go further to add forced air flow with an efficient, low power fan powered from a spare switch mode power supply. In warmer climates, venting the warm air outside will reduce air-conditioning loads and power requirements.

[@AndreasSpiess]

I agree with your statement. Here, the fridge is built-in, and we cannot do a lot. And the freezer already is in the coldest room of the house. So at least something...

[@thamesmud]

I put in whole house monitoring using Emporia Vue with ct's on all my circuits. It has allowed me to track down a lot of high demand items and reduce my consumption by about 20% without any impact to quality of life.

[@AndreasSpiess]

Cool! Thanks for sharing.

[@RossReedstrom]

@@AndreasSpiess You may want to take a look at the vue2, Andreas: it's esp32 based and can be reflashed w/ esphome fairly easily. Neat package with some good electronic design (proper isolation on the board of the higher voltage PS vs. low voltage logic, for example). Consists of a controller box and a set of CT clamps, designed to be installed inside your electrical panel to monitor both total power and each branch circuit, and looks professional enough that the electrician won't completely freak out. :)

[@movax20h]

I live in Zurich, Switzerland. In my apartment I do not have many things on all the time. It would be a fridge, my main PC (monitors go to sleep after few minutes), router and switch (about 40W!), WiFi access point (about 5W), smartphone charger (5W average). Most of my lights do have simple motion sensors, so they are on only when needed and for short. I still probably should install one in the kitchen, where right now, if I do not plan to use it for long, I do not even turn light on, but it is a bit silly. Stove cook electric heater, mostly to make dinner or boil some water (my kettle is broken), and I try to use just right amount of water when using it. I also do setup a small timer, so if I go away from the stove, I go back to it in few minutes, and not forgot about it for 20 minutes. Lab equipment, I only power on when I need them, so I am good here. I do not use TV. Only sometimes (one a week probably), I do use projector with extra powered monitor speakers, but these are also switched off when not used (otherwise they do use quite a bit of power indeed). And for next 3 months, I will just use my phone to watch stuff. I also do have few standing fans (~45W), but these are mostly used during summer. I do have some shellys and DIN rail mounted stuff on order, as I would like to redo most of my electric distribution panel, and have everything metered individually all the time. But, then they also consume power itself, and if I have 15 of them, I need to first measure how efficient they are themselves. When washing, I will skip drum drier, it is insanely power hungry. It is a nice convenience, but just hanging washings and waiting is just as good. If things go south with electricity, I will stop using a switch and router (pretty high end devices not designed for home), and connect Internet directly to my PC, and only have it on when using (i.e. not when I am at work or sleeping), and stop using my wifi access point, as my phone do have unlimited data plan anyway, so it is not needed. I do want to get an air filtering system, but that can probably wait.

[@AndreasSpiess]

So you seem to live already quite optimized !

[@glumpfi]

Often electrical instant water heaters are forgotten in the current engery saving discussions, although i had one in more than half of the homes i lived in. I recently measured 1,4 kW for just 7 minutes of showering, which is a great opportunity to save tons of energy by reducing the shower rate/duration and avoiding warm water if cold water also does the job (quickly washing hands for example)

[@jamesbutler5570]

I have a thermo solar equipped water heater. Even with very low sunlight that does the job. In summer it only needs 1/2 hour to get 65°C.

[@AndreasSpiess]

I agree: Heating water consumes a lot of energy!

[@richardlighthouse5328]

Using a door sensor is also a good way to manage lights. Two of them can indicate direction and you can also get a room count.

[@bogmaerke]

I thought this was unreliable. What type of sensor?

[@richardlighthouse5328]

@@bogmaerke There are variety of ways doing it. For example distance sensors, laser beams and etc.

[@AndreasSpiess]

In rooms with only one door such a sensor probably would work. Most of our most used rooms do not have doors or more than one :-(

[@bogmaerke]

@@AndreasSpiess how do you enter a room without a door? :o

[@richardlighthouse5328]

@@AndreasSpiess I see. By door I meant door frame. I apologize for such a casual mix-up of words.

[@NoHandleToSpeakOf]

Rolling blackouts here in 🇺🇦 make you face a different problems: how do I use as much energy as I can while it is available? How do I keep my fridge cold? What can I run on DC battery? What Internet connectiins work during blackout?

[@estqwerty]

Bring most of the food outside, fridge is cooling to 6 degrees , the terrace outside may be colder in the winter. And take a hand crack dynamo for the phone.

[@AndreasSpiess]

I bought my USV for exactly that reason (they said we will have it too next winter). Because I have a PV with batteries, I shuld be able to store energy. But grid to battery takes around 3 seconds. Then everything would reboot without a USV. In your situation, battery solutions probably are the best solution.

[@JosepsGSX]

I used to have "smart" power strips to save energy on TVs and computers, with a master plug where the main device was connected, that automatically shutted down the otthers below a defined thresshold, all very analog and the detection "logic" was imprecise and wasteful, being always on. I eventually created my own power strips, with one or two "always on" plugs, and all the other controlled via a 5v usb-controlled relay (those boards are cheap in Aliexpress with safe opto isolation). So far I have been always able to find in almost all devices a usb port that is turn off when the device is in standby, so I just choosed the one with the smallest standby consumption to act as a controller. It works like a charm and requires 0w when off. My next step is to do this with solid state relays as you are doing, as the mechanical ones tend to eventually start sticking connected after a few years.

[@AndreasSpiess]

This seems to be very similar to my relay on the PC. But your solution is easier because, as you write, many devices have an accessible USB connector

[@mysticsilent]

I’ve disconnected the kitchen boiler because this quality of life improvement was 15 years ago normal. These days i can wait 20 seconds for hot water to arrive from upstairs. I’ve also changed my home assistant over to an intel nuc running natively instead of proxmox. The zfs storage pool was taking a lot of cpu usage over time and therefor running very ineffecient at 35watt. Now back to 17watt idle.

[@vylbird8014]

ZFS has a greater problem with power consumption that I have yet to find a satisfactory solution to: The drives never spin down. Fine in flash, but spinny-drives use a lot of power if they are constantly running.

[@mysticsilent]

@@vylbird8014 it had been running on a nvme ssd but for some reason it took a lot of system overhead. Love proxmox but this works native more effecient :)

[@D9ID9I]

Usually there is circulation pump that turns like 2 times a hour for 3 min to bring hot water to all areas of the home. You don't need 2 boilers ever.

[@IcyT]

Totally agree about the coffee machine! And good to see, that even the rich swiss people with lower energy prices are also thinking about reducing energy consumption 😉 Thanks for the video!

[@AndreasSpiess]

My father said: Look at the rich people if you want to learn how to save ;-)

[@GabrielKleinCH]

I have added a few power monitors from hombli/tuya (~20chf) and one of the biggest consumer is the desktop of my son :). What would be interesting too is to consume at the right time - as an example my water heater (PAC = average max of 500W) should run during the day if I have enough power from my solar panels, otherwise during the night - but I have not optimized it because it's just 50kWh/months (so not worth the optimization). I don't understand why all these "power monitor switches" have the possibility to switch them on and off - as you said it's not always a good thing. I love your simple way of categorizing consumers in a house!

[@AndreasSpiess]

Shifting large consumers in time could be a topic for another video. Because my PV has a battery this is not very important for me.

[@edvardfranke]

Richtig gutes Ding!!!! Jetzt bin ich angefixt und muss sagen ich hab ein enormen Stromverbrauch

[@AndreasSpiess]

Es machte Spass die einzelnen Geräte durchzugehen. Mein Nachbar z.B. hatte immer gedacht, der Computer seines Sohns brauche so viel Energie. Nun weiss er, dass es sein Whirlpool war. Der heizt jetzt nur noch wenn er ihn braucht ;-)

[@gubbernl]

Well, I have a Delonghi espresso machine. And I've put it in power saving mode. Easy and works for us: the system rinses and shutsdown after 3 hours and the system + top plate for cups, will not be heated. So, if I want a cup of coffee after 2 hours or so, it just takes 30 seconds extra to warm up again. But it saves a lot of energy. Totally acceptable for us😀

[@AndreasSpiess]

Mine does not have preheaters and therefore only consumes less than 1W when it is not brewing. So switching it off after 3h consumes a lot of energy because it has a cleaning session and heats water...

[@gubbernl]

@@AndreasSpiess true, but if I don't, it clogs, and the machine needs extra maintenance i suppose. But maybe your system just works better😀

[@unionse7en]

here in the USA , one of the cheapest ways to get a PIR switch are cheap PIR security lights with screw in bulbs, use them inside as is or screw a 2 prong receptacle into the socket. then plug an extension cord into them. etc..

[@daijoubu4529]

Aren't they only rated for, say 150W max? (ex big incandescent bulb)

[@AndreasSpiess]

Good idea if you do not use connected switches.

[@wjn777]

Thanks for sharing, very interesting. One possible approach could also be to use deep sleep more on esp32 based sensors, for example, but this is small in comparison with using a kettle less or lowering the heating temperature

[@AndreasSpiess]

I agree.

[@gregvanpaassen]

I have modified my PC to have several standard 5.5mm/2.1mm DC power barrel jacks for both 12V and 5V, using spare cables from the power supply. My desk lamp and USB hubs are powered from the PC's power supply, so they are only on when the PC is on. I wish there were standard back panel plates one could buy for this, including with USB-A and USB-C sockets.

[@AndreasSpiess]

That is a good idea! Maybe in the future, we will get more PD enabled devices which can be fed by the PC power supply.

[@muddy11111]

The Shelly plus 1 pm switch has the option to turn it's self on again after a selected time of say 1 minute, so defrosting the fridge should not be a problem. There is however an issue connecting them to inductive loads. My normal domestic fridge (90w run) managed to kill the power meter function with over voltage. Switch function still works fine.

[@AndreasSpiess]

UUH! Good to know about the inductive load! Can save some money! Thanks.

[@grzehooo88]

Interesting things about this heat exchanger, but some solutions already exist in EU. Graphics are showing only one way flow and as I understand it should be about two way flow, and minimum 2 integrated units of which one is storing energy by performing outflow and second one giving it back by inflow of air. Great vid.

[@AndreasSpiess]

I agree, 2 synchronized units are much better

[@qchatgreg]

i have a solar PV system, (& also storeage battery) … and i try for maximising self utilisation of my solar genertion.. extending your time vs power grid, for “ load optimisation” i believe there is a third dimension of categorisation, particularly for heavy loads discretionary vs non-discretionary …. there are some loads that “must” run each “day” … and some that can be avoided … but only for finite periods or cumulative use. example: 1) i have a number of water features , these have various pumps (that are quite high loads) … = discretionary … if these are switched off for a few days - no big deal 2) pool chlorinator/filtration = discretionary … but there is a finited period they need to run over a mukti day period, which is also “weather”dependant , so “semi diacretionary” 3) dish washer = discretionary “manual” …. my wife looks out the window, says “sun is shining” .. so i can run washing machine, dishwasher etc … the automated logic for controlling some of these has some interesting and challenging nuances … that i’m still grappling with , eg monitoring the grid export energy (& actual vs theoretical PV generation vs time of day) to make decisions to shut off selected loads (then keep track of when and for what duration they have run over a given period) .. i enjoy your thought stimulating and great quality videos - keep up the great work.

[@AndreasSpiess]

I agree. PV usage optimization is a topic, too. Here I have a battery which removes most of the optimization work (We mainly can reduce the battery loss which is not a lot). Plus we get a decent amount when we sell electricity. So optimization does not have a lot of potential other than shifting washers from a grey to a sunny day

[@John_Smith__]

Great video and Obviously the Coffee machine is Out of the Question for any consideration regarding Lower usage no matter what the excuse may be 😀 energy crisys or not 😀

[@daijoubu4529]

Technically one could convert to cold brew and save energy? Haha

[@AndreasSpiess]

Yes, drinking beer instead of coffee saves energy. At least in your home. Probably not across the whole process ;-)

[@sunalwaysshinesonTVs]

Speaking of wasting money (just came from your solar optimizer video), that vent system is what we North Americans call an HRV/ERV system and costs $$$$ + installation. Granted it manages all exhausting vents (cloth dryer, cooktop fan, bathroom, etc) and is way easier to install when designed into a new, but that design looks WAAAAAY simpler and something I could add myself but only if someone would bring those to N.America.

[@AndreasSpiess]

Installing Smart Home devices in existing homes is one of the biggest obstacles to this technology...

[@sharg0]

I recently converted an old PC to a lab power supply for my workbench. And since I realised I wouldn't need the full output from it I decided to power some extra things from it. So far I've replaced the old amplifier with a car stereo and an LED lamp. The lamp had it's switch after the original power supply, the lamp also got a slightly lower voltage which both should prolong its life and reduce power usage. Light output is barely visible lower. Original LEDs indicates whether the supply is completely off or in standby when I leave the room. I do intend to draw a secondary power line from the main fuse panel (which luckily sits on the other side of the wall) via a wall mounted switch to new outlets dedicated for lab usage. That way I can get rid of the mess of extension cables as well as get a main switch. That said, personally I don't save much in reality since my house is heated with electricity. I intend to move my power hungry main PC from the office into the game and music room and replace it with a laptop for office duties. BUT that means I need to put in a heater for spring / autumn! (I use the floor heating only in winter.)

[@AndreasSpiess]

Indeed, in winter, the loss of electricity is less (particularly if you heat with electricity).

[@daijoubu4529]

Heat pumps

[@jamesmichener7526]

I, like most geeks, have lots of switches, routers, access points, modems, small servers... that are on all the time. Rather than having a zillion wall warts, that are inefficient, I have a single high efficiency power supply (with PFC) and distribute DC to all the devices on my networking wall and use POE for remote devices. Then low threshold diodes and a battery provide a centralized UPS capability.

[@AndreasSpiess]

That is a good idea if your devices are close. My radio room also runs on 13.6 volts. The lab has many different voltage levels. This is why I went with a 240V UPS

[@michaeleitel7186]

For always on devices measured by Shelly use your solder iron. Just short the relais contacts. But I found that measurements are only made when sensor is on. So additionally connect input switch to keep it on. Bad point is that relais heat up the Shelly, have not jet tried to solder them out.

[@movax20h]

I think newer Shellys use bistable relays, so they consume way less power when always on.

[@AndreasSpiess]

Good idea. As said in the video, I have no Q2 devices. And for Q4 devices I do not constantly measure because it does not create any value. So going with a manual meter is easiest for me

[@tinygriffy]

Living without shower and fridge for 5 years now.. works a treat. I eat all my goodies first day of the week and since I do not shower there is no one around I'd to heat the room for, I am fine with 12°C in my "apartment" I have bad ass winter clothes 4 blankets and a hot kitty :D Living life golden ! Thank me later ...

[@AndreasSpiess]

You live "reduce to the max" !

[@AB-yt4hd]

I built my 140m2 home with energy saving in mind. It has big insulation, air tight, no window in the north, the windows are protected from the summer sun by roof overhangs... I have a small PV array and a 5kW inverter with 4.8kWh batteries that is used as a whole house UPS. The 9kW electric instant water heater and the induction cooking hob are not connected to the inverter of course. We have a thermodynamic double flux ventilation as our main heating system and a 1.5kW electric backup heater. When it is 3 degrees Celsius outside without sun the thermodynamic can easily heat our whole home to 19 degrees Celsius without the 1.5kW backup heater using only 400W of electricity. For the kettle, we are heating the water and if we boiled too much water, we put it in a thermal insulated bottle for later use.

[@D9ID9I]

Small windows are really helpful but it is not fun to live this way.

[@AB-yt4hd]

@@D9ID9I I don't have small windows. I have big triple glaze windows in the south and standard size windows in the east and west.

[@D9ID9I]

@@AB-yt4hd U can't make good insulation on windows. Even best ones are crap.

[@AndreasSpiess]

That is of course the best solution!

[@alistairross7308]

I do like your structure approach. One topic perhaps not relevant for you, but definetaly for many and for certain also into the variable cost of power in future due to renewables. Offsetting of loads to night time or dynamic tariffs for washing machine, dishwasher Maybe the device have timers, maybe HA has some extra tricks up its sleeve ?

[@AndreasSpiess]

I agree with your analysis. Timers probably are an idea. Maybe also include weather forecasts. Because I have a PV with battery, I do not care too much about that.

[@ald0man]

I too have pv/batteries the solar forecast in summer would be cleverly useful. Being able to conservatively intelligently adjust battery charge in summer would be useful. Now with very high electricity rates optimising battery during wet/cloudy summer days maybe valuable.

[@zhanzo]

A thought for some category 2, and probably category 4 devices: Why are we still using AC? Transformers were the only feasible way to crank voltage up in old days, but we can now easily do that with DC as well. So maybe converting AC to high voltage DC in the house in a single location, as efficiently as possible, and distrubuting it through the house will save a lot of lost power in AC-DC conversion (AC-DC adapters I have seen that come with various devices are horrible at efficiency to cut costs). Of course you'll need also high efficiency DC-DC converters. Since a significant number of modern fridges, washing machines also use DC high powered innards (they usually market it as digital motor here), that can also save a lot of money. (note: not so high voltage DC, otherwise you risk plasma fires)

[@AndreasSpiess]

I agree. Many small power supplies usually have low efficiency. This is why I always do my measurements at the mains side.

[@avejst]

Great walk-through of the process I would love to see if the different power meters Thanks for sharing your experiences with all of us :-)

[@AndreasSpiess]

The power meter video will come in the near future.

[@ntgm20]

I'll discuss the coffee maker since you won't! This is of course with a drip coffee maker, when it is done brewing turn it off. Don't leave the heating function on. If you like to keep it hot use a thermos to put the coffee that doesn't go into your cup right away. It will reduce power to keep the coffee warm/hot and will aid in keeping the coffee from being heated too much or burning it.

[@AndreasSpiess]

Fortunately, my coffee machine only consumes 0.5W when not brewing coffee. But you are right if you own an old one.

[@typxxilps]

10:00 receivers for balloons always on ? Usually those are started duing day time , not night , or do you mean weather balloons ? Not sure but it might save energy to shut those down during night or inactivity. The most important step has been missing. You need to get an inventory first, a list of each and every device in any room, measure the consumption during a day or typical week or by reading what the light bulb says. If you check room by room for any connected device incl. those built in one for the jalousie you get an idea about how many sockets and devices you have connected to the grid. The small hidden ones behind the shelves are usually outdated power supplies producinng more heat than using electricity for their core task like lighting the shelf and so on. And if you wanna know what you have to pay for then the rule of thumb is the tiny lighting indicators every where from switches to LED , those glowing indicators. The next might be a themal cam to find the hidden heaters, usually switched power supplies. Without such list you might be overseeing something you have not had on your mind. We had purchased 4 of these plugs as power consumption meters to check each day or week for devices to get a glimpse of what you are using the energy for. One big momemnt was the big/ger brother of the coffee machine, the water kettle It uses a lot of energy and there is a lot to save by simply 2 points without loosing quality: just heat up the right amount of water , not 300 ml or 0,3 too much cause it is a waste. Better to heat a smaller amount first and add the missing 300 ml afterwards cause the kettle is still warm and it happens quite fast, also you might mix it up. The second point is simply to NOT WAIT FOR THE AUTOMATIC turning it off due to boiling cause who really needs boiling water ? If you use that 3 times a day and shut it down 20 to 40 seconds earlier assuming the kettle is full than you save by changing your habbits without loosing. We use the kettle quite often and had recogniced a high consumption, therefore a higher saving of 30 kWh a year. But even that can be tough cause changing a habbit is always a challenge and adventure until it has clicked for you, and sooner or later all family members.

[@AndreasSpiess]

I agree with your statements. Fortunately, I did not find many hidden consumers. And heating whatever is one of the big consumers.

[@juergenheisel7360]

I use a switch on the front door as a presence detector. When the last person leaves the house and locks the door, a contact is opened with the lock bolt and then processed by the building technology.

[@AndreasSpiess]

Good idea. Very efficient!

[@itstbe76]

I use a Shelly 1PM for power measuring of a fridge. To make sure, that in case of a failure of the Shelly the fridge still works, I have bypassed the relay contact inside of the Shelly. Just make sure the bypass is after the shunt for current measuring. 😉

[@AndreasSpiess]

Good idea!

[@sophiesmith5922]

For heating savings, wrap your hot water tank in insulation. I did this and saved $15 USD per month back when gas was cheap... now its like $30 or more for a very cheap fix rather than investing in on demand unit.

[@AndreasSpiess]

Thank you for the tip!

[@Giblet535]

Spend a December night on a chair on a mountain top. Was WiFi the thing you missed? Or was it heat? Hypothermia reduces quality of life exponentially. Heating and cooling are energy hogs. Look into having a well drilled. Nearly every surface structure has an aquifer beneath it. A phase change heat pump can be used to move the aquifer's thermal energy to (or from) your home with an efficiency 400-500% greater than conventional heating/cooling systems. It's 55F down there, night or day, year round. A closed-loop of liquid requires very little energy to circulate, even less when the fluid's heat is extracted. Plus, geothermal equals 500 thunbergs on the virtue scale.

[@AndreasSpiess]

I agree 100 with geothermal energy. As I always say: It available at more or less the same distance from every point on earth. And this distance is much shorter than our "Gotthard" train tunnel which is 57km long. So I am confident that this will be a big part of the solution.

[@haajee1]

Heat recovery ventilation is installed this summer in my appartment from 1980. So it´s possible to install on older buildings.

[@AndreasSpiess]

Thank you for the information!

[@benbaselet2026]

I have been thinking about making small UPS-like devices for the always on stuff, on the side if I can make them charge the battery during cheap hours and be off the grid during expensive hours I could reduce the bill a bit. Buying devices for it probably would not make financial sense, but I have so many bits and pieces around I probably can build a bunch of stuff that does not cost anything but time and solder. The UPS would probably bypass a lot of 230 volt power supplies, most things run on 12 VDC or something similar so I could just bypass the power supplies of my network swithc, NAS box etc. and give them direct DC from a battery system. That should reduce overhead conversion loss as well, especially for older devices.

[@AndreasSpiess]

I started with the same idea. In my setup, I have 240, 48,12V, and lots of 5V devices. So I decided to standardize on 240V mains.

[@BerndFelsche]

As for getting fresh air without undesirable heat movement, also look at "enthalpy wheels" which transfer (theoretically) all of the sensible heat between air flows.

[@AndreasSpiess]

Thank you. It seems that they use a similar principle. however, their construction is different.

[@hansmaulwurf8027]

An einigen Steckdosen nutze ich Fritz DECT 200. Die können die Leistung messen und können schalten. Viele Geräte haben einen Standby wert eingestellt unter dem die Dosen einfach abschalten. Einschalten geht dann lokal oder vom Telefon. Mein PC Setup würde ohne komplettes trennen mehr als 20W verbrauchen.

[@AndreasSpiess]

Interessantes Konzept mit dem Standby und abschalten.

[@1over137]

I see we more or less took the same strategy. I use Zigbee Wifi switches and a smart energy monitoring and remotely switchable device. On presence detection. I use the TVs/Media centre. So if they switch on one of those, it's obvious (to my system) someone is using that room. Of course for lighting in the "transit rooms" like hallways and bathrooms I use motion sensing where it is appropriate. I do waste a bit of power because the motion sensors are not "cat safe" so Angel turns them on quite a lot at night.

[@AndreasSpiess]

Here, the lab light also is on before I enter it in the morning because Dishka is waiting on the table ;-)

[@H0mework]

Try cold brew coffee. It tastes better, and lasts longer, doesn’t get a bad taste after sitting around. Even if you don’t like it you can mix it with the hot coffee for faster coffee. ☕️

[@AndreasSpiess]

I am not sure I will try this :-(

[@phoebebright]

Re Section 4, I put a timer on my router as I did not need it on overnight and then found the timer was quite warm, so now I'm wondering if I am using more energy to run my timer than I am saving by turning the router off! I'll be ordering an accurate energy monitor and see if I can work it out! Thanks for this sensible process.

[@AndreasSpiess]

Temperature of devices is a good indicator for problems! I measured the power consumption of one of our mechanical timers. It was around 1W.

[@Luke-san]

11:30 I have a meter/switch between the freezer and fridge here and I have been worried about it as well. But at 11:39 you say that you are lucky it has a build in temperature meter. Mine switches off when no power so no alarm I would guess? I have also been searching for plugs to just monitor without a on and off switch but can't find them easily. Been monitoring stuff here the last couple of weeks. Those electric toothbrushes. I have one here that is always on charge. The plug draws a constant 24 hours 1 to 1.5 Watt which is (not) completely wasted. Old DAB radio radio with a normal on/off switch, adapter sucks 1.5 Watt and with the radio on it goes to about 5 to 6 Watt. Transformer, 7805 and a class AB module kills efficiency. The energy is not gone, it's transformed in heat which is welcome now, ... but it is expensive heat.

[@AndreasSpiess]

For the always on devices, I have no need for continuous measuring because they do not change over time (and I decided they create quality of life). So I now use a manual meter. Our Sony DAB radios consume 1.5W in stand-by, too. Any timer will also consume at least 0.5W. So it only would make sense in a cluster.

[@ronaldhofman1726]

i fased out my server this weekend en purchased a QNAP NAS and fases out ubnt 16 ports switch and a 24 port switch , had a complex network setup with LAG to windows server and so on , removed the tasmota monitor devices because of there cos phi behaviour and i reduced the total power a lot , somewhere in the range of 300 watts and with the current energy prices thsi will make a lot of difference.

[@AndreasSpiess]

Good decision!

[@yekutielbenheshel354]

Thanks Andreas!

[@AndreasSpiess]

You are welcome!

[@beauslim]

As for heat, get some warm house shoes, wear a sweater, and turn the temp down a couple degrees and you'll save quite a bit. As an added benefit, my cat is really cuddly now.

[@AndreasSpiess]

Good idea. In our case it saves wood.

[@mcconkeyb]

Nice introduction to systems engineering, without even mentioning systems engineering. 🙂

[@AndreasSpiess]

As an engineer it is hard to escape ;-)

[@vk3fbab]

I've reduced my base load usage to approx 100Wh. I have zwave switches in front of my TV, and AC and a master light switch that takes about 6 other zwave modules out of service. TV takes about 30Wh of standby and about 20Wh for the AC. My biggest consumer is my massive fridge at about 1.2kWh a day. My 100Wh is two SBC, one router, one POE switch and a Wifi AP, Schneider electric power monitoring and a couple of sonoffs and zwave modules plus the fridge. Power monitoring is so accurate I can see when the fridge goes into defrost mode, that hearing element shows up at 300W with power factor of 1. I could go lower if I maybe went pi 4 instead of x86. Luckily electricity prices have not risen as much on Australia as they have in Europe.

[@AndreasSpiess]

Your fridge seems to be huge! Also here, electricity prices will increase from 21 to 27 cents. Still percentages, not factors as in other areas. Still it is a good time to look into this matter, I think.

[@gabest4]

My biggest consumer after the boiler is the always on home server area, a low power pc (20W), switch+wifi (4-10W) and a UPS with a surprisingly high 7W. I put them on a common 12v power supply with dc cable splitters, saves a few watts.

[@david_akerman]

I found that my APC UPS was using 15W when idle and not charging. Replaced with a CyberPower which uses 2.5W.

[@AndreasSpiess]

After others mentioning the same thing, I disconnected my UPS and will check next night if I see a difference. I bought an online device because I thought it will not consume a lot of power when not used.

[@ch94086]

I used a meter and various power strips to cut my consumption to pretty low. I figured my 4W (transformer) cordless phone cost me $80 in electricity, so I junked it and replaced it with a

[@NiHaoMike64]

Anyone else thinks the DVR is mining crypto for the cable company? I don't bother with cable, there's enough (legal) free content out there to consume all available free time.

[@AndreasSpiess]

I checked my coffee machine. It consumes next to nothing in stand by. But it is relatively new and a "barebone" model without bells and whistles :-)

[@mihaialdea]

If you’re a fan of QRP and digital modes you might want to look into QDX Mini

[@AndreasSpiess]

Already on the bench (including a QCX mini);-)

[@sophiesmith5922]

So many complicated methods! I prefer the KISS philosophy. Things that must stay on, one group, such as dehumidifier, refrigerator and freezer. That is isolated from things that dont need to such as tv, dvd player, streaming pc. They are clustered to a simple switched power strip. Flip the switch and they are off the mains. Family will spend far less time on entertainment if they are too lazy to switch it on! Go out and get some fresh air! Other items draw vry little power, and the savings of unplugging or switching would be miniscule. Just put all monitors and screens on the switched cluster if you must leave connected devices on, like server, security cameras, etc. If you are not actively using the monitor, it is a relatively large power suck even when switched off. Power strip switches are very easy.

[@AndreasSpiess]

Very good that you were able to save electricity with even a simpler method!

[@CezarySiw]

Passive heat recovery systems are widely available on the market for many years. Search for "Prana" or "Stiebel - Eltron VLR 70 " or in general "Passive heat recovery" or "decentralised ventilation"

[@AndreasSpiess]

Thank you!

[@notsonominal]

I opted for Mitsubishi VL-50 and VL-100 ventilators that do not alternate airflow as I found I was too weary of the sound in the FlexIT model i tried. The VL-50 is virtually silent and I will attempt to put a VFD on the VL-100.

[@AndreasSpiess]

Good point to pay attention to the sound level of the device!

[@vientezamoragarcia]

For the friends of the guy with the Swiss accent. In case it helps someone, I have a wifi plug that feeds the computer, printer, monitors, etc... Similar to what Andreas has said in the video. The advantage is that you can send the power-on order remotely and log in using a remote desktop program. So that turning on the plug causes the PC to boot, change in the BIOS, in power options, that when power is restored the PC always turns on. Of course, WiFi plug is accesible to switch by hand. ¡Saludos a todos!

[@AndreasSpiess]

Good idea!

[@penttiitkonen9765]

Hi Andreas ! Thank you again for your new video. I looked through all the titles of your previous videos and I couldn't find a video that handles the HC-05 Bluetooth unit ! Would it be possible that at some point you would take that HC-05 module into consideration on your video ? And specifically in such a way that the HC-05 connected to the microcontroller would directly connect to the computer via SPP protocol, to bluetooth usb-dongle that is connected to Linux or Windows x86_64 Desktop or Laptop programmed with Python 3.X ?

[@AndreasSpiess]

So far I have no projects with the HC-05. But I think there are some videos on other channels.

[@imqqmi]

'Coffee machine is off limits', you say that, but my senseo machine consumes significant energy when idle (off/standby) ie it is 14 watts. Doesn't sound much but consumes 1/3 of a kWh per day, so 365/3 is 121 kWh per year. At 0.53 euro currently, that's still more than 60 euros per year for nothing, just so you can press a button for it to turn on. After a similar process, though with a cheap watt meter, I've found 50W of q4 devices (and high power low duration disguised q4 devices ie plasma tv, coffemachine with high idle usage). I've eliminated 30W of that by using a powerstrip with switch. One of them is an outdoor sun shade with remote control. Consumes 3.5W. it's only used on hot days during summer so pulling the plug for 3/4 of the year saves me a few euros. It quickly adds up. If you ever look into investments to save power, look into ir heating. I use 250W in the living room diected at the sofa and could set the central heating to 13⁰C but it feels like 20⁰C. Costs me a few hundred euros more electricity, but saves me a few thousand euros of gas! I've already cut my gas bill in half last year by setting the central heater to 17⁰C max and wearing a few more layers of fleece (body and legs), and I expect it to half again with 13⁰C and ir heating this year (my bills run from august to august). I also partitioned the living room into two rooms. One living room and a back room with kitchen. That alone save 1000 euro in energy in a year. I've constructed a temporary wall with rockwool, canvas, a few planks and plywood. All in all cost 300 euros for 4 panels of 1.2x2.4m. I move them during the summer. Added benefit is greatly improved accoustics, acting as room treatment! I've also experimented with outdoor reflectors to warm up the outside walls more and project some heat through the windows. That lowered the heat loss a few degrees during the fall.

[@AndreasSpiess]

Very good examples! Fortunately, my coffee machine consumes only 0.5W when in standby...

[@ExplodingWaffle101]

I love your SSR trick on your PC setup- it reminds me of all the suspend mode bollocks laptops (try to) do to their peripherals these days- but much simpler :) Actually, I wonder if you could make some sort of USB power bar to do this without wiring into the PSU. Kinda sounds like a decent product idea… 🤔

[@AnnaVannieuwenhuyse]

It would be possible to make a USB triggered version only if your computer does not have USB power on standby. Some do, some don't. If you have USB standby and use a desktop, look into a small USB to USB header adapter, and connect that to the power supply instead of your motherboard. :)

[@VilmaHallikas]

There's many ways to do this if you have Home Assistant. You could monitor your PC power usage and control smart sockets for your peripherals. Or you can install HASS Agent on your PC instead of power monitoring socket.

[@AnnaVannieuwenhuyse]

@@VilmaHallikas there's upsides and downsides to both ways. Your approach let's it be conditional. Mine wouldn't necessarily allow that. 🙂

[@fungas4804]

I have the 12V line inside the PC going to a socket on the back which has a strip of LED's plugged in. Power on the computer and the sceens are backlit!

[@Huskyzeit]

I use the power consumtion of the monitor: as soon as the monitor goes to sleep it is time to turn off all power consuming devices

[@TheJay6621]

Congratulations to "Guy with the Swiss accent" 400k subs 👍🏻

[@AndreasSpiess]

:-)

[@dmatospt]

Small UPS’s, even from reliable brands are extremely inefficient. Would love to see you tackle this!

[@dectoasd3644]

Second this request. My ~50W server is >70W with a small APC UPS inline. I think the best idea for home lab would be to build a dediated DC supply with battery backup. Most PC's are nativiely 12V with a few extra voltages. Just the HDD that need high current to spin up. These little Lenovo use 19-20V, which is a different issue.

[@dmatospt]

@@dectoasd3644 My APC 600VA UPS consumes as much as my Dell Optiplex (10W).

[@david_akerman]

I swapped my APC UPS (15W idle) with a CyberPower (2.5W).

[@dectoasd3644]

@@david_akerman Will take a look, thanks, though seems the least expensive models don't do USB shutdown so not really suitable for Unraid. £60 a year to keep my current UPS warm isn't ideal and it will be £72 from April so payback period could be realistic on a replacement and I can repurpose the old unit for something less critical, with the addition of a DC breaker so I can actually shut the thing off fully.

[@dmatospt]

@@david_akerman 2.5W seems nice. Which model?

[@1over137]

The bottom line for me was ... using grafana to give me the "average daily power" for each day over the month I implemented all of this. I simple stepped through each day from before I began the campaign to after. My averaged over a full 24 hour power went from 400W down to 240W. A saving on electric costs at the time or about £45 a month.

[@1over137]

And with the excessively high electric and gas prices, I also became aware I had a bottle of propane for the cooker hob which was purchased before the price hike. So I alternated tea and coffee and used the gas hob to boil water for the tea. Note.... coffee machines are far, far, far more efficient than an electric kettle as they only boil the exact amount of water they need and very efficiently in a pressure boiler. The gas hob is probably the least efficient way to boil water.... but that's only if you consider the water itself. If you consider the "waste heat" from the water's point of view is actually just additional heating for the home... it's not wasted at all. Different story in summer mind.

[@AndreasSpiess]

So you were quite successful with Q4... And I agree: My coffee machine is quite efficient, too.

[@mvadu]

I don't have an enclosure for the TV cluster, but they are on a tasmota controlled switch which gets turned off at night by a simple nodered flow.

[@AndreasSpiess]

Also a good idea!

[@IlCapodOro]

I can see a Flipper Zero at 7:46 :) Are we going to get one or more videos about it from you in the future as well? Great ideas for saving energy btw!

[@AndreasSpiess]

I did not yet decide on the Flipper