FAQ! How To Save Electricity whilst growing! Or just lower your power bill!

How To Save Electricity whilst growing! Or just lower your power bill Dramatically! FAQ

Hey all! Iv recently been looking into how to save electricity around the home. As all of us know using HID’S increases our electricity bills substantially and it can be quite a shock when the inevitable bill arrives.

More pressingly a certain percentage of growers do not set up the grow light/lights efficiently and as a end result when harvest day arrives little bud is produced but the electricity bill is just as big.

High electric bills induces suspicion by police and can add the to the list of reasons to obtain a search warrant and therefore increases the risk of getting caught.

By investing in a few timers and energy saving light bulbs around the home electricity usage can be reduced dramatically. Even enough for a grower to have a 400w to 1000w HPS with out the electricity bill rising depending on the size of the home and appliances within.

Standby Wattage

Standby wattage is the amount of power used by an electrical appliance when left on standby. i.e. When you’ve turned the PC, TV, VCR, DVD player off but not off at the mains plug.

CO2 emissions from electrical equipment being left on standby are equivalent to 1.4 million long-haul flights A Year which is a shocking statistic alone.

Below Is a average guide to the amount of power used by different appliances whilst on standby. (take in to consideration that these numbers can be dramatically more than indicated.)

To figure out how much wasted wattage your home is using add up the amount of appliances and there correct wattage. The end number is energy your wasting and can easily save. The end number for my home was 455w more than a 400 watt hps.

Device Standby Wattage

Hi-fi/Stereo 10w
TV 10w
Video recorder 11w
DVD player 7w
Digital TV set top box 5w
Computer monitor 11w (more if lager screen and/or flat screen.)
Computer + peripherals 15w (more if games pc.)
Laptop computer 2w
Broadband modem 14w
Rooter 14w
Answering machine 3w
Battery charger 2-6w
Mobile phone charger 1-6w
Cooker and Hob 12w
Microwave 8w
Computer Speakers 12w
Toaster 4w
Games Console 18-24w
Printer 15w
scanner 15w
Sky Box 11w
Cordless Phone 8w
Washing Machine 2w
Kettle 3w
Fan Heater 4w

The best way to save all this power and by far the easiest is to go to your local hardware shop and buy 6-10 inexpensive timers, exactly the same as you would use to control the photoperiod of your lights. Place the timers around all the highest wattage using appliances about the home (plug the timers in multi plug extension leads to save even more power.). Program them all to turn off at night and when your at work or when ever you know people wont be using them.

You’ve Just substantially reduced the suspicion of one 400-600w HID. :)

Buying energy saving light bulbs

In most homes, lighting accounts for around 10-15 per cent of an electricity bill.
Energy saving recommended bulbs work in the same way as fluorescent lights. An electric current passes through gas in a tube, making the tube's coating glow brightly.

Traditional bulbs waste a lot of their energy by turning it into heat. Each energy saving bulb can reduce your electricity bill by up to £9 ($17) a year . They also last, on average up to 12 times longer than ordinary light bulbs.

So in my case I have 21 light bulbs in my home. If I was to buy energy saving light bulbs I would save annually £189 ($368) a year on my electrically bill!

You’ve Just substantially reduced the suspicion of 1 400-600-1000w HID again. :)


Energy saving light bulbs are coming down dramatically in price (£2.50 a bulb in B&Q.) and are SERIOUSLY worth getting.



Configuring your pc to save electricity

Computers use a phenomenal amount of power when on. For example my desktop games machine has a 600w power supply in the case. And lets be honest the majority of us are guilty for leaving the PC on when were not using it.

Using Windows it is possible to put the monitor and pc into a 'sleep' mode in which it uses little power. This option is invoked after a predetermined period of inactivity has elapsed and is really intended for notebook computers, where the need to conserve battery power is often very important. However, the settings can also be applied to desktop computers. When powered off via this mechanism, the monitor and PC will power up again when computer activity recommences.

To configure your monitor and pc for these settings Bring up the control panel enter in to power settings and turn on either hibernation or standby. Place the activation time to 2 or 3 min. this maybe short but think of the power you’ll be saving.




Hope this was useful to everyone as it does really work. It helps people stop getting caught for such a little price. :)

thanx tom! great thread and info.

i love these damn hippies :p

kp

Hey Tom! I did just that. I went and bought 6 packs of those cfl's.They come 6 to a pack. I changed every bulb in the house. They are 15 watt and bright as hell,too! Before I changed the bulbs,my bill was running around 195.00-200.00,each month.After the end of the first month they were in. I saw a huge drop in the bill.I saved around 50.00 bucks.That was with the HID's running.It's even gonna be lower, at the end of this month cause I added the electronic ballast,got rid of the hummer.I use to run all over the house turning out lights and such.It was crazy! I have to add! The little things makes all the difference.Never used the timers in the house,except on the christmas lights.Pretty informative post for the energy concious! That'd be me and alot of you folk's out there!

Ga Grown!

Hook up all your tv/stereo/computer equipment to accessible powerstrips and unplug everything when you leave or go to sleep.

Hey, how much wattage is everyone wasting on standby? be intresting to show how much other homes are wasting. :)

Any one else doing anything like this?? be great to have some figures and input! :)

I'm going to be switching all my lightbulbs soon...I'll post after changing and getting the new bill. :jointsmile: Bree

What about a 42 inch plasma tv left on over 14 hours a day as background noise?

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Originally Posted by Chronic Chrissy

What about a 42 inch plasma tv left on over 14 hours a day as background noise?

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It runs 399 watts and the speakers are 16 watts.

Ga Grown!

Holy Fuck! I'm turning the radio on on my days at home and H can live with a few hours less TV. Plus K is starting to be glued to the tube and I don't like that at only 6 months. WOW!

We've already agreed that when we move into the new home, we're using nothing but cfls in every light fixture. I'm already a nut about turning everything off.

yea same here. but the thing is it really does make a huge difference. its just lazy if people don't do it. i mean its fantastic to have the most peace of mind when growing anyway. but even if your not growing your still going to save a shed load on your power bill.

Standby wattage Calculator - TVEC | Energy Tips | Standby Cost Calculator

The thing I don't like about the CFL's for indoor residential use is that it seems to take forever for them to get bright enough for regular use, as opposed to our former incandenscent friends, which are hot as heck, waste 95% of their energy as heat, but do light up instantly.

It's been a while since I've tried CFL's for the home for this very reason. Has the situation improved?

Tom great thread! Theres only one thing I'd like to say, and please don't take this as an attack I point this out to every one. We live in a capitalist world this means money over anything else. Your electric company does not care if your bill jumps a little high as long as you pay your bill there happy. Most people on this site are running under a 1000w at a time for there grow setup, With an 18/6 light cycle this makes my bill $53 dollars higher a month. I think we have a responsibilty to stop spreading the "my friends, friends, uncles, cousin got turned in by his electric company for growing" rumors. No judge in his right mind is going to give the cops a search warrant with the only evidence being an increased electric bill. And if he did A lawyer fresh out of law school should be able to get that warrant dismissed. The best thing you can do to protect yourself is to not tell a soul that you are growing, no matter how good your bud is hold back the urge. You have many good points and ideas in this post and its cool that you shared those with everyone.

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Originally Posted by socialistpete

Tom great thread! Theres only one thing I'd like to say, and please don't take this as an attack I point this out to every one. We live in a capitalist world this means money over anything else. Your electric company does not care if your bill jumps a little high as long as you pay your bill there happy. Most people on this site are running under a 1000w at a time for there grow setup, With an 18/6 light cycle this makes my bill $53 dollars higher a month. I think we have a responsibilty to stop spreading the "my friends, friends, uncles, cousin got turned in by his electric company for growing" rumors. No judge in his right mind is going to give the cops a search warrant with the only evidence being an increased electric bill. And if he did A lawyer fresh out of law school should be able to get that warrant dismissed. The best thing you can do to protect yourself is to not tell a soul that you are growing, no matter how good your bud is hold back the urge. You have many good points and ideas in this post and its cool that you shared those with everyone.

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I think these are some things all people should do.Even if ya ain't growin'! That's fine if you don't mind spending that 50 plus buck's! Little things that you and I do,to conserve. Will be a benefit to all folk's later.!

Ga Grown!

yes,
i've noticed it takes longer to turn on the larger the bulb is. The only light that dosn't instantly turn on for me is my biggest 45 watt one. it takes half a second (which is actually a long time for a light to come on)

Also, CFLs take longer or do Not come on when cold. Cold as in below 0 Celsius. So if you have a very cold house that might be the problem

LED lights are on the market now! they are even better but may be hard to find

Here is a website i haven’t really looked at but looks interesting
TheLEDLight.com is everything LED. Find loose LEDs, LED controls, LED fixtures, LED light bulbs, landscape LEDs, LED strips, LED flashlights, UV LED flashlights .

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Originally Posted by socialistpete

Tom great thread! Theres only one thing I'd like to say, and please don't take this as an attack I point this out to every one. We live in a capitalist world this means money over anything else. Your electric company does not care if your bill jumps a little high as long as you pay your bill there happy. Most people on this site are running under a 1000w at a time for there grow setup, With an 18/6 light cycle this makes my bill $53 dollars higher a month. I think we have a responsibilty to stop spreading the "my friends, friends, uncles, cousin got turned in by his electric company for growing" rumors. No judge in his right mind is going to give the cops a search warrant with the only evidence being an increased electric bill. And if he did A lawyer fresh out of law school should be able to get that warrant dismissed. The best thing you can do to protect yourself is to not tell a soul that you are growing, no matter how good your bud is hold back the urge. You have many good points and ideas in this post and its cool that you shared those with everyone.

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you are wrong. Power consumption Can be used. But you are right that this really shouldn't concern growers as few people on here run enough lights (10+ 1000W might get attention)

feel free to check out my thread in which i wrote on this topic
http://boards.cannabis.com/grow-loun...-cops-how.html

power consumption is rarely the only piece of evidence to search a grow op. But it will get police monitoring your place to gather enough evidence.

As well, power consumption is enough to get a warrant to use an infrared light detector on your premises which can detect the heat from your op.

And as someone said, everyone should do this regardless in light of climate change etc

yea i do agree with you socialistpete 100% :). it shouldn’t bother people but its still worth investing in generally and also it applies to some more than others like you said. However if your on a tight budget or your growing in slightly suspicious surroundings like a outbuilding or shed it helps the peace of mind which keeps any sense of paranoia or confusion to a minimum.

Electricity consumption may not be reason to obtain search warrant but it adds to the list of other obtainable information’s that can conform a warrant :)

If anything saving electricity is a better safe then sorry analogy. If you can help prevent it, you might as well.

so basically besides those swtiches you were talkinga bout the only way to get rid of this standby wattage is to unplug it?

yea. but due to Convenience and people forgetting people wont do that in the most efficient way..

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Originally Posted by Tomthehippie

If anything saving electricity is a better safe then sorry analogy. If you can help prevent it, you might as well.

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And its great for the enviroment!

cant you just turn stuff off at the socket? do you really have to unplug? dont fancy shoving the washing machine arount to do that, and what about the oven? thoes are wired into the mains.

Yeah great, now my printers broken after being turned off and on once with a timer...:wtf:

Retired electrician here. I've done many lighting (efficiency) upgrades in factories over the years as technology moved up. I've been using CFLs in the home for a few years now. I did our church's lighting upgrade to 200W CFLs this past year. They do work really well. My home electrical use went down quite a bit, until I started indoor growing. This present crop I am using the flourescent lighting exclusively. My impression is that the HPS lights worked very well but the plants that were under flourescent only did just as well. We'll see.

Shovelhandle

Just using cfls (13w in most sockets here) has offset the cost of my grows completely(lights that is), now I just wish it would warm up so I didn't need a space heater in the room.

:D Im still surprised not more people do things like this to lower the electricity usage! it just makes a huge difference for such littler extra work or money.

So having to wait 2 seconds for a light to reach its maximum brightness is too long? Slow down people.

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Originally Posted by faithlessxxx

Yeah great, now my printers broken after being turned off and on once with a timer...:wtf:

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Are you kidding me, why would you put that on a timer???? Did you put your PC on the timer too?

yea man! my pc uses as much power as a 600w hps when on when off it still uses alot of watts. :)

It depends on what your pc is running.. Some run at over 1000 watts.But your right! One can be equal to or even greater than a 600 watter.

Ga Grown!

Common Household Appliance Energy Use

Tom's a OG.

Sweet link blazrido! og ate?

i changed over all the light in the house to cfl about 6 months ago all but one and and if just died...strange part not change a blub for 6 months lol
long life the cfl ! ! !

I wouldnt run incadescents anymore if they were FREE!!

lol. why?

Tom have you seen "An Innconvient Truth"? If you haven't I highly reccomend it. Everyone should see this.

looks intresting, just googled it. il download the vid i think! thanks pete! :)

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Originally Posted by socialistpete

Your electric company does not care if your bill jumps a little high as long as you pay your bill there happy.

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Bang on.

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Most people on this site are running under a 1000w at a time for there grow setup,

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Been running 2x 1000HPS 12/12, 1x 400W HPS 24/0, and about 100W of flo's 24/0 for the last 8 years. Bill paid in full on the due date, every time. Never a complaint.

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I think we have a responsibilty to stop spreading the "my friends, friends, uncles, cousin got turned in by his electric company for growing" rumors. No judge in his right mind is going to give the cops a search warrant with the only evidence being an increased electric bill. And if he did A lawyer fresh out of law school should be able to get that warrant dismissed.

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Quite right. No judge would issue a warrant on power consumption alone. It'd be a consideration, but there'd have to be other, more specific cause. Scent in combination with power consumption might get LEO over the wire with some bastard judges, but the more sensible ones (i.e most of them) will want some evidence of drug trading activity as well.

A pedestrian op with CFLs for clones, a 150-250W MH or HPS for mums and a 600 for flowering would be only a modest increase in power consumption in the ordinary modern home.

The place where a lot of stoooooopid criminal type growers fall down is when they bridge out the power meter. If the meter doesn't spin, the pwr co sends out a techie to replace it. If the new meter doesn't spin, he puts an amprobe around the hot lead and notes if there's current. If he has current flow but no meter spin, he calls his supervisor, who in turn calls the cops.

Turning the AC temp up a degree saves a decent amount of power. Also turning down an electric water heater to around 130f is a good idea too (not below or bacteria will grow).

Peeps should be doing this regardless, not just to keep the PoPo from getting suspicious. No reason to be throwing money away.

P.S. The whole climate change thing is just another way for da man to control what you do and how you do it. Don't believe the hype :p.