Making homes energy efficient homes

[Shimmyhill]

Gas is cheaper to heat the house with than electricity though


My friend measured his big Plasma screen and found it drew 750W

My dad had one returned to his shop because the customer didn't realise how much it was going to add to their bill, and found it was doubling the amount they had to put on their PAYG meter.

They are shockingly thirsty compared to LCD screens. Yours must be tiny if it only draws ~150W

On topic, I think the single most effective thing you can do is to double the amount of insulation in the loft. If you don't use the loft much just roll out another thick layer of fibreglass insulation on top of what's already up there.

I assume he has that 100" Panasonic one or more likely he cant work the meter.

Plasma barely draws any more electricity than LCD - the big difference is that LCD/LED draws a constant amount the only variable is how high you have the backlight up - the brighter it is the more power it draws. Plasma is variable draw, if its rated with a 500w psu it will only draw 500w when the whole screen is white and the brightness is at 100% - when watching normal tv it will probably draw 1/4 of the rated W

I measured my old 42" Panasonic PHD6 and it averaged 140w I also measured the nasty 7 series Samsung LCD i had for a week and it drew just over 100w constantly.

All of this OMG MY BILLS DOUBLED WHEN I GOTZ A PLAZMA is rubbish, bare in mind a 65" Panasonic 3D set is rated at 581w and in an AVF test it used between 80w and 430w depending on what was on the screen you can see that your mates was not using 750w and that while LCDs use less there is not a huge gulf in energy use and the yearly difference in energy costs is negligible and well worth it of you want the best PQ etc.

Onto energy saving, i find that the more you do the less of an effect it has on a house that was not built to be energy efficient in the first place - we have now got an A rated boiler, loft insulation at 300mm (where ive finished it) cavity walls insulated and on some odd bits that are single skinned (Bungalow and porch walls are single skinned for half a meter into 2 rooms we found) put some celotex inuslation on and boarded plastered over, new double glazing, energy bulbs etc etc still its not going to rate very hig as its a 1950s bungalow!

And then there is all the tech in the house, lots on all the time - in the end you always pay for fun

 

[Jonny69]

Insulate your toilet.

Sounds stupid but you'd be surprised how much energy you waste heating up a cistern of cold water to room temperature and then flushing it down the toilet

 

[Glaucus]

Heather exchange pump, wind turbine, log burner, x10 nrtnetwork and as much insulation as you can, oh and energy efficient stuff, wonder how much that would cost and pay back time.

 

[Jonny69]

All of this OMG MY BILLS DOUBLED WHEN I GOTZ A PLAZMA is rubbish, bare in mind a 65" Panasonic 3D set is rated at 581w and in an AVF test it used between 80w and 430w depending on what was on the screen you can see that your mates was not using 750w and that while LCDs use less there is not a huge gulf in energy use and the yearly difference in energy costs is negligible and well worth it of you want the best PQ etc.

His one was a very old one, no idea of the size. I had the same discussion on Rods n Sods and lots of people complained their plasmas were thirsty and cooked in their living rooms.

The 65" Panasonic screens I used in an exhibit in the O2 c2008 were rated at 750W, with an image of a person dancing on them. It was like standing in front of a fire when they were on, they gave out that much heat. Most of the weight of the set appeared to be aluminium heatsinking inside the case which was cooled by about 5 fans, from memory.

 

[Shimmyhill]

His one was a very old one, no idea of the size. I had the same discussion on Rods n Sods and lots of people complained their plasmas were thirsty and cooked in their living rooms.

The 65" Panasonic screens I used in an exhibit in the O2 c2008 were rated at 750W, with an image of a person dancing on them. It was like standing in front of a fire when they were on, they gave out that much heat. Most of the weight of the set appeared to be aluminium heatsinking inside the case which was cooled by about 5 fans, from memory.

Even old ones didnt use 750w, they used fairly similar figures as were lower res etc - my PHD6 was knocking on for 7 years old and i have been into plasma since it came out pretty much.

Again the rating is on a pure white screen so they wouldnt be using 750w in normal use, having looked through old parts i cant see a 1kw rated psu for any panasonic model 65" or under since they made them inc commercial screens.

Even so if on 24 hours a day for a month a 750w screen is going ti use 50 odd quid in electricity and if its pumping out that much heat probably save more than that in gas usage

People just dont get how a plasma uses electricity, its like my AV amp - it can draw over 1kw but its not doing that while i watch Spurs being Frustrated by Man U but to people who say Plasma uses all this energy they would tell me to get a £150 onkyo as it uses 1/3 of the electricity and my 1kw drawing beast is causing global warming all on its own!

 

[wannabedamned]

Off topic slightly, but also on topic...kinda lol

http://www.energysavingtrust.org.uk/Generate-your-own-energy/Wood-fuelled-heating

Does that website run like crap for anyone else? I was trying to have a read up on the pros, con's and costs of converting -_-

 

[malef!c]

In a poured concrete house, cavity wall insulation is out of the window but I have:

- Added a thick covering of loft insulation
- Thick curtains across the conservatory / patio / front & back doors
- Ripped out my gas fire (with gas man to do gas bits) and built a nice open fire

Not much else I can do to keep the warmth in, but the concrete walls are a blessing in summer....always nice and cool inside!

 

[Jonny69]

snip

Ok. Since I don't have first hand experience on this and I'm going on what I've been told, I'm basically going to end my side of the argument.

Not much else I can do to keep the warmth in, but the concrete walls are a blessing in summer....always nice and cool inside!

You'll appreciate that as global warming creeps in

In the UK our building stock lasts around 100 years, so the building industry is facing an interesting quandry as to what constitutes sustainable building. Do you build to keep warm now, or do you build to keep heat out in the future...

I'm glad I'm not working on that one