Energy use by household appliances
We monitored many of our household electrical appliances with Kill-a-Watt monitors over many hours, typically more than a week. The usage figures are considered typical for our habits, for some items we monitored usage over 10 or more weeks.... note, 10 weeks is 1,680 straight hours.
For comparisson, the hourly usage rate was determined (use / time), and then multiplied to determine the cost over a year (24 hours * 365.25 days). The DoE Appliance Data is another resource you should consider.
| Appliance | Number of appliances in the home | Total use (kw) | Number of hours use monitored for |
Use per hour (kwh) | Estimate cost per year |
| 100 Watt Equiv CFL (25W) | 4 | 2.05 | 255.00 | 0.008043 | $24.54 |
| 40 Watt Equiv CFL (11W) | 13 | 4.86 | 1,104.00 | 0.004402 | $43.64 |
| 60 Watt Equiv CFL (15W) | 15 | 2.42 | 525.00 | 0.004618 | $52.82 |
Battery charger 
| 1 | 0.46 | 206.00 | 0.002233 | $1.70 |
| Cabinet Light
| 2 | 0.39 | 369.00 | 0.001057 | $1.61 |
| Clothes Dryer
| 0 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 0.000000 | $0.00 |
| Desktop Computer
| 1 | 73.33 | 3,175.00 | 0.023096 | $17.61 |
| Electric Piano
| 1 | 0.07 | 1,310.00 | 0.000053 | $0.04 |
| Emergency Light
| 1 | 0.42 | 625.00 | 0.000672 | $0.51 |
| Emergency Torch
| 1 | 0.73 | 567.00 | 0.001287 | $0.98 |
| Fridge
| 1 | 20.29 | 335.00 | 0.060567 | $46.19 |
| Garage Door Opener
| 1 | 5.06 | 893.00 | 0.005666 | $4.32 |
| HP Laptop computer | 1 | 3.54 | 226.00 | 0.015664 | $11.95 |
| Hifi
| 1 | 18.97 | 1,310.00 | 0.014481 | $11.04 |
| IBM Laptop computer | 1 | 9.64 | 543.00 | 0.017753 | $13.54 |
| Iron
| 1 | 0.80 | 650.00 | 0.001231 | $0.94 |
| Kettle
| 1 | 6.10 | 877.00 | 0.006956 | $5.30 |
| Kill-A-Watt
| 8 | 0.35 | 1,222.00 | 0.000286 | $1.75 |
| Microwave
| 1 | 128.05 | 10,785.00 | 0.011873 | $9.05 |
| Modem | 1 | 21.17 | 5,162.00 | 0.004101 | $3.13 |
| Office (1 printer, scanner, flatscreen, USB Hub, phone, computer, shredder) | 1 | 71.49 | 3,045.00 | 0.023478 | $17.91 |
| Paper shredder
| 1 | 0.41 | 544.00 | 0.000754 | $0.57 |
| Phone - Base station
| 1 | 9.41 | 3,335.00 | 0.002822 | $2.15 |
| Phone - Slave station
| 4 | 1.18 | 527.00 | 0.002239 | $6.83 |
| Radio/CD player
| 1 | 2.99 | 1,310.00 | 0.002282 | $1.74 |
| Signal booster
| 1 | 0.86 | 334.00 | 0.002575 | $1.96 |
| Solar Pump/Controller
| 1 | 23.51 | 4,558.00 | 0.005158 | $3.93 |
| VDU Screen switch
| 1 | 1.08 | 544.00 | 0.001985 | $1.51 |
| Washing Machine
| 1 | 4.81 | 1,703.00 | 0.002824 | $2.15 |
| Wireless router | 1 | 27.52 | 2,810.00 | 0.009794 | $7.47 |
| Work office | 1 | 66.47 | 3,480.00 | 0.019101 | $14.57 |
| Estimated total cost per year (8.7cents per kwh) | $311.49 | ||||