Introduction

This is a list that I'm keeping on how to conserve energy and therefore money, adding to it from time to time and posting it online in the hope that it will be helpful to people. Many of these ideas are common sense, others are passed-down knowledge, and a few are the result of my own creative problem solving.

Electricity

Lighting

• Get timers for your various electric lights so that they go out when you aren't using them. Or even get the kind that includes a motion sensor.
• Everyone now uses LED lights, which are cheaper and more efficient than compact fluorescent and incandescent. A 2-watt LED bulb produces the same light as a 30 watt incandescent. At a minimum, replace your single most-used light bulb with LED. Over the long run, they save money.
• That said, incandescents provide more natural light and are better for the eyes, so if you have any, set them aside and don't throw them out. Just use them sparingly.
• Rather than using electric lights, open the curtains or raise the window shades and use natural light whenever possible.
• An more exotic alternative to electric lights is, if you own your home, consider installing remote-source lighting which is fiber-optic based lighting that collects light in a reflective dish up on the roof and sends it down a cable to the interior of your house. Unlike a conventional skylight through a window, since you don't have to worry about heat leakage.

Power hogs

• Borrow or buy yourself a Kill-a-Watt meter ($35) and use it to find the most electricity-hogging devices in your home. Then either replace those devices or don't use them as much.
• Rather than running a dishwasher, wash dishes by hand.
• Rather than running an electric dryer, you can:
  1. Use any residual heat in the house to hang wet clothes that need drying.
  2. On a warm day, hang clothing outside.
  • On a clothes-line.
  • On a drying rack.
• In some countries, like Germany and China, dryers aren't even used by most of the population.

Residual power use

• Don't leave a TV on all the time. If you aren't watching it, switch it off. It's mostly a sewer of propaganda anyway.
• Unplug unused electronic devices. Many devices draw power even when they are turned off, which sounds odd but it's often true. For instance, any device that can be turned on with a remote control need to be powered up enough so that it can be watching for the signal from the remote. You can use a watt meter to determine the idle standby (power off) wattage of appliances.
• Put your mobile phone in airplane mode whenever it is practical to do so, to conserve its battery charge.
• Turn off your wireless router and cable modem at night when you aren't using them. This saves electricity and it also prevents hackers from launching attacks on them.
• An worst-case example is a Tesla car, which uses considerable amounts of electricity continuously even when it is shut off.

Computers

• If you have a desktop computer, sell it and get a laptop. Desktops use hundreds of watts, whereas laptops use just a fraction of that, e.g. 50 watts. If you don't believe me, buy yourself a Kill-o-Watt meter and measure the power draw.
• If you must use a desktop computer, e.g. for gaming, at least set the power management and/or screen saver to power off the monitor and the comptuer itself after some minutes of disuse.
• It is always better to pay a little more for a laptop computer that has a longer battery life.
• It is often better to pay a little less for a laptop computer that is not as fast and power-hungry, in order to save power e.g. a computer with a Ryzen 5 5500U processor with built-in graphics rather than the Ryzen 9 5900HX with discrete graphics. Or for that matter, a tablet computer rather than a laptop.
• If you notice that some rarely-used program is keeping your computer running at a high rate of activity, uninstall it. It may be malware, or spyware, or just bloat, but it's likely using electricity unnecessarily.
• If you're not going to use your computer for more than an hour, switch it off entirely. This will save electricity but also reduce spying activity.

Entertainment

• During boring Winter months, take time to read a book rather than using high-wattage devices like watching TV, playing video games, or web surfing. Or get some exercise.

Mooching

• If you're going to spend money on coffee, you might as well go to a coffee shop and receive the following benefits, all of which you paid for and you therefore deserve:
  1. Electricity to recharge your laptop and your phone.
  2. Warmth in winter, which is cheaper than heating your home.
  3. Water to keep you hydrated.
  Remember, the workers are likely underpaid and struggling themselves and will likely sympathize with your mooching, unless they are brainwashed by management.

- The end -