These days, we’re all watching our pennies. The British public has traded salon dye jobs for boxed colour. Comparison shopping for groceries is pretty common now. In general, everyone wants to live more frugally.
When it comes to energy bills, it seems like there is only so much anyone can do. There is a lot of advice on how to save energy out there, from sensible steps, like washing your clothes on a cold cycle, to more extreme strategies, like turning off your refrigerator whilst you are at work.
But how can you really tell how much energy you’re using and if your little steps are actually adding up to anything meaningful? As it turns out, there are plenty of gadgets out there that can monitor your electricity usage, so you can see what’s working, what’s not and how to improve your energy usage and shrink your energy bills.
Monitoring products
These devices will either help you track your energy use or will help you reduce how much you use.
Maplin Plug-in Mains Power and Energy Monitor
You just plug this device into an outlet and plug your appliance into it. This will tell you how much energy your appliances are using, and you can tell if your appliances are energy inefficient and need to be replaced or if you should just turn them off (not just left on standby) when you’re not using them.
Ecotek Energy Monitor
The Ecotek monitor works in a similar way to the Maplin monitor above, but it includes a few different features. It doesn’t show you all the energy measurements that the Maplin monitor does, but it does have a warning if your appliances are using too much energy.
OWL +USB
The OWL +USB monitor goes a step further than the Maplin and Ecotek monitors: in addition to measuring your appliances’ energy usage, it tracks the energy usage in your whole house. It also includes a USB port, so you can download the data to your PC (right now, it’s not compatible with Apple products). With it, you can track your energy usage over a much longer period of time, so you can make even better long-term decisions.
efergy Elite Classic
This monitor can monitor your entire house, and it can compare your energy usage month-to-month. It updates automatically every six seconds, so you can even see what happens when you turn on a light or boil the kettle.
Your energy supplier’s monitor
Many energy companies, including E.ON, Southern Electric and British Gas, offer energy monitors. They are usually free or cheap for customers, but even non-customers can use them. Simply contact your energy supplier, and ask for an energy monitor.
Black and Decker Thermal Leak Detector
When you’ve narrowed down which appliances are using the most energy, you can track where your house is losing energy with this leak detector. It identifies both hot and cold draughts, so you can patch your insulation and other places where your energy is literally leaking out of your home.
Belkin Energy Saving Smart AV Power Strip
This power strip is pretty amazing. It doesn’t monitor your energy use per se, but it does respond to your energy use. Plug in your television and its ancillary devices – the DVD player, the cable box, speakers, games console and whatever else – into this strip. When you turn off your television, the power strip turns off the other items you’ve plugged into it, so the zombie energy use caused by the standby setting is a thing of the past.
If you use these or similar products, you should be able to get your energy bills down. In fact, you may find these gadgets pay for themselves in no time.
Which of these clever gadgets would you use? What do you do to monitor your energy usage and shrink your bills?
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