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Save Money by Reducing Your Vampire Power

Save Money by Reducing Your Vampire Power

This is a guest post by Ryan Gargiulo of Pause The Moment. Ryan is a travel blogger, wannabe photographer, wordpress ninja, aspiring minimalist, professional bargain hunter, adventure seeker, rabid fan of lifestyle design and self-proclaimed world traveler who has been fortunate enough to be able to travel to over 22 countries across 4 continents and he’s just getting warmed up…

Standby Mode

Keeping your devices on standby power can use an extra $50-$80 a month in electricity!

Did you know that you could save money this month by simply unplugging your household appliances and devices each night?

Vampire power, more commonly known as “standby power” refers to the amount of electric power that is being used by appliances and other electronic devices when they are either switched off, or in standby mode.

Some devices have a standby power that can run up to 10 to 15 watts, sometimes more. Now let’s face it, 10 to 15 watts of power isn’t much but when you’ve got a half-dozen devices that are just wasting away on standby every night you’ve now got yourself the equivalent of a 60-watt bulb!

Many household appliances such as VCR’s, televisions, stereos, computers, and kitchen appliances all draw a small amount of power even when they are switched OFF. Most people think that because they switch off their bedside lamps that there’s no possible way that there would be any power running to it. Well, you’re WRONG!

Understandably, running around unplugging things each and every night would be a daunting task so I’ve got an extremely simple and cost-effective solution for you below.

Head on out to your local big-box store and pick up a bunch of power strips! You can usually find these handy little things at your local Walmart for less than $10! The use of power strips in your home will not only save you a ton of time, but it will also cut the power to all of your electronics with one easy click of a button.

We’ve set up numerous power strips in our home since finding out the massive amounts of wasted energy that we were going through month after month. Every device that didn’t necessarily need to be running over night in our home was plugged into a power strip. Since putting this plan into action over two years ago we have cut anywhere between $50 and $80 per month off our electricity bill.

We have saved so much energy that we receive monthly Home Energy Reports from National Grid (our electricity company) letting us know that we’ve used up to 44%, 46%, and even 55% less energy than our EFFICIENT neighbors.

Don’t believe me? Well, I’m going to prove it to you by showing you one of the many Home Energy Reports that we’ve received over the course of the last couple of years. See the reports below.

Remember, we’re not talking about being 46% less than our neighbors as a whole, we’re talking 46% less than our EFFICIENT neighbors! That’s some serious energy-saving.

As you can see in the second report above, over the course of the last 12 months we’ve used 51% less energy than our neighbors as a whole. National Grid claims our savings for the year cashes in at around $983.00.

Are you currently battling high electric bills in your home? Do yourself a favor and make an attempt at installing a few power strips in your home. It could put an extra $500-900/year in your pocket. Why give your money away to the electric company when you could be using it for better things, like Traveling!

If you are currently using these energy-saving techniques in your home, feel free to leave a comment below with a rough estimate of how much you’ve saved on your electric bills over the last year or two. Also, feel free to share with us any other energy-saving methods you may have.

Flickr Photos: functoruser, Surat Lozowick

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