So we reduced our electricity consumption by 11% from this period last year. Two adults and two kids in Sydney with average consumption of 3.2kWh per day in a two bedroom apartment. Apparently the average for a 1 person household is 10.5 kWh so I think we're doing pretty great. In all honesty I was thinking there might be something wrong with our metre but I did a few estimates and it seems correct.
Considering it doesn't take much effort I'm pretty chuffed. Obviously we're lucky because we live close to the sea so there are no major temperature extremes. We run no air conditioner and use cross ventilation during the summer. We do run an energy efficient dyson fan in our daughters room, they are only three so we prefer this to risking them falling off the fourth floor balcony, it only runs during summer on a low setting just to keep it from getting stuffy. Obviously we use drying racks for our clothes and have an energy efficient front loader. We don't use the dishwasher or a television. Our fridge is old so not that energy efficient but we run it lower than medium temperature and its a smaller size than average. We figure it would be a worse environmental cost to upgrade to a new one just now.
How did we reduce our bill from last year? Spoke to the washing machine repair guy and he said that unless our clothes are super filthy we can use the 30degree quick cycle to wash the majority of our clothes. We also changed over the remaining lights to led. In winter we put wool under blankets on the bed and I sewed up some flannel quilt covers for the kids. We have heavier curtains on their windows for extra insulation.
The best thing is the cross ventilation of our apartment. Compared to our cousin whose apartment is just around the corner our place is lovely and cool in the summer.
