You are about to go on a business trip for a month, standing at the door with your suitcase, silently reminding yourself: windows closed, gas main valve closed, water main valve closed. Alright, let’s go out.
Wait! Are you sure you’re not going to unplug the plugs of these appliances?
These are the electricity assassins we’re talking about today—although you haven’t used them, they’re quietly stabbing you in the back on the electricity meter.
These appliances are true electricity assassins.
Don’t think that just because you haven’t used them, they don’t consume electricity! These assassin-level appliances are experts at quietly consuming a lot of electricity in the background. If you’re going out for a long time, it’s best to unplug their plugs.
Set-top box
Who still remembers the dusty set-top box? Even though you might not watch TV programs once a year, you still pay electricity bills for it every month.
According to various statistics, the standby and operating power of a set-top box ranges from 11 watts to 16 watts.
If not used or turned off for a month, the set-top box consumes 11 kWh of electricity.
By the way, how many young people know how to use a TV to watch TV programs?
Router
Routers, without heating up or moving, usually consume a low amount of energy, around 5 watts.
However, the problem is, as long as the router is plugged in, regardless of whether it is working or whether there are devices connected to it, its power consumption remains unchanged, still around 5 watts.
If not used or turned off for a month, the router consumes 3.6 kWh of electricity.
Regardless of whether you have devices connected or how many devices are connected, the router’s power consumption remains basically the same.
Electric water heater
Electric water heaters are big consumers of electricity. Even if you don’t use hot water and keep it on standby, they will still consume electricity to maintain the water temperature.
If not used or turned off for a month, the electricity consumption of a water heater like the one below will exceed 30 kWh.
Notebook computer
Let’s assume you’re going out for leisure and don’t need to bring your laptop to work, so you just close the laptop and leave.
In fact, just closing the laptop isn’t shutting it down; it’s not even in standby mode. It’s in a special state called sleep, where the running data and programs are stored in memory, making it boot up very quickly when started again. But the downside is that it consumes more power than standby or shutdown.
The power consumption of a notebook computer is extremely low after a complete shutdown, around 1 watt to 2 watts in standby mode, and slightly higher in sleep mode, reaching around 2.5 watts.
If not used or turned off for a month, a notebook computer consumes at least 2 kWh of electricity.
These appliances don’t consume much power in standby mode.
Some appliances may seem large and consume a lot of power when running, but they actually consume little electricity in standby mode.
Air conditioner
Using the air conditioner in winter and summer consumes a lot of electricity, but in standby mode, it’s not too bad.
For a room of 15 to 25 square meters, typically equipped with a 1.5-horsepower wall-mounted air conditioner, the standby power is between 1 watt and 2 watts.
If not used or turned off for a month, the electricity consumption of an air conditioner does not exceed 1 kWh.
Washing machine
The washing machine makes a lot of noise when running, which seems like it consumes a lot of electricity. But for smart washing machines, in standby mode, they only need a little electricity to maintain the operation of the startup circuit, with power consumption ranging from 0.5 watts to 1 watt.
If not used or turned off for a month, a smart washing machine consumes less than 1 kWh of electricity (non-smart washing machines with mechanical switches consume almost no electricity in standby mode).
In addition, televisions, induction cookers, microwaves, air purifiers, smart toilets, and so on, if not used or turned off, consume about 1 kWh of electricity per month.
This appliance consumes a lot of electricity, but you can’t turn it off!
Of course, it’s the refrigerator!
Even a very energy-efficient refrigerator, if not opened for a month, still consumes more than 15 kWh of electricity. But would you dare to turn it off? Do the fruits, vegetables, eggs, and frozen meat in your refrigerator agree?
One of our friends, during the Spring Festival, turned off the power in the rented house, and when he came back, the smell in the refrigerator was as strong as concentrated bean juice, and it is said that it has not completely dissipated until now.
Even without using appliances, why do they still consume electricity?
After saying so much, some readers may get angry: I’ve been away for a month, these appliances haven’t been used at all, why do they still cost me electricity?
Oh, appliances still need electricity even when they’re not in use, for a reason.
Some appliances need to use remote controls, like TVs and air conditioners. In this case, the machine cannot be completely shut down but needs to consume some electricity to maintain the operation of the circuit that receives the remote control signal, just like a sentry waiting for the command to start.
Some appliances do not directly use 220 volts of AC power but need to transform the mains voltage through voltage reduction, rectification, and other methods before entering the internal circuit—such as mobile phone chargers, which have a rectification and filtering circuit at the front end. In the case of not working, such circuits also consume a small amount of electricity.
Finally, even if the appliances are left on standby, they still have standby indicator lights, which also consume a tiny bit of electricity.
Someone said that the electricity consumed by standby indicator lights across the country could be used in the Northeast for a year. This statement is obviously exaggerated, but it still consumes some electricity.
Is it necessary to turn off appliances when going out for a long time?
Appliances consume electricity even when on standby, which is convenient for our lives to a certain extent, but going out for a long time is another matter.
After calculating everything, even if no one is living at home for a month, it may still consume tens of kWh or even dozens of kWh of electricity. Depending on the pricing rules of electricity, the electricity bill is probably around ten yuan to twenty yuan.
Maybe some people think, it’s just 20 yuan, let the electricity meter keep turning, I don’t care!
But do you know what 1 kWh of electricity can do?
It can boil 8 kilograms of water, enough for a comfortable bath for one person;
It can fully charge a mobile phone 100 times;
It can light up a 9-watt energy-saving lamp for more than 100 hours.
If the concept of saving electricity seems too abstract or insignificant, let’s talk about the damage caused by long-term standby appliances to the appliances themselves.
As mentioned earlier, some components of appliances are subject to high voltage in standby mode or are
in operation, and long-term standby may accelerate the aging of these components, reducing the service life of the equipment—then you’ll have to spend money to buy new ones, right?
Standby appliances, especially those with high power consumption even in standby mode, such as set-top boxes, are prone to heat generation, which poses a fire risk. Coupled with no one at home to detect and extinguish in time…
So, from the perspective of energy saving, saving money, and safety, I recommend that when you go out for a long time, you should completely turn off non-essential appliances at home. The specific operation is as follows:
It’s impossible to completely turn off appliances with a remote control. It’s best to press the power switch for a long time when not in use for a long time to completely turn them off.
For appliances without a power switch, you can unplug them or turn off the switch of the power strip.
You can also install smart sockets at home to check the power consumption of appliances when no one is at home. If there are non-essential appliances with high power consumption, you can turn them off in time (many smart sockets need Wi-Fi control, so the router cannot be turned off).
A simpler method is to pull the circuit breaker. Many households are equipped with circuit breakers labeled with different room circuits. You can choose to turn off the lighting circuit, bathroom circuit, etc., or, after emptying the refrigerator, directly turn off the main circuit of the whole house.