You don’t know it, but vampires are draining the life out of your bank account. We’re talking about energy vampires: appliances and devices that, even when they’re turned off, use power. Ultimately, this increases your electricity bill—energy vampires can account for 10 per cent of a utility bill, or up to a quarter of it, depending on how many of them you own. Life is expensive as it is; don’t let these money-suckers steal from you at the cottage. (Keep reading to find out how to stop them. Happily, you won’t need a wooden stake. Or garlic.)
13 ways to repurpose old cottage appliances
1) Small kitchen appliances such as coffee makers, toasters, and microwaves. As long as they’re plugged in, they’re using electricity.
2) Large kitchen appliances, especially those with internal clocks, for example, your stove. Even if, at the cottage, you rarely use the stove—because c’mon, grilling on the barbecue is way better—that appliance is using standby power 24 hours a day.
3) TVs and cable boxes. TVs—like any device that you turn on with a remote—are constantly drawing electricity. This is because remote-controlled devices must be poised to respond when you do turn them on. The cable box is especially sneakily energy-hogging, because, these days, it’s expected to regularly update internal guides and software. Which, of course, uses energy.
4) This shouldn’t come as a surprise: computers still use power in sleep mode. They’re sleeping, not dead. But they use even more power when running a screen saver.
5) If you’re not a gamer at the cottage (or, well, anywhere), that’s good news for your pocketbook: game consoles, especially newer versions, are massive energy vampires. Like computers, consoles continue to use power in sleep mode. Plus, they’re incredibly energy-sucking if you use them for streaming; they use 10 to 25 times more electricity compared to a TV.
What to do:
Unplug things. Not everything—it doesn’t make sense to unplug, say, the washing machine. But definitely unplug the stuff that you don’t use very often: battery chargers when empty, kitchen gadgets, TVs in guest bedrooms, the printer, seasonal appliances such as air conditioners and dehumidifiers, the VCR (don’t lie: you still have one of those at the lake). If you aren’t in the habit of unplugging devices and appliances when you’re away from the cottage, you should be. It keeps them safe from power surges (which can happen after an outage).
Cottage Q&A: Appliances vs. the cold
Use a power bar. Some come with a timer that you can set so it shuts off automatically. Even a regular power bar will help you save on your hydro bill; flipping a switch to turn off multiple devices is easier than unplugging them individually, so you’ll be more likely to actually do it.
Disable your screen saver—it uses twice as much as energy as a computer’s sleep mode. Better yet, turn off your computer. Regular shutdowns are helpful for the computer; it allows the machine to update. Also? It’s the cottage. Stop working! Go outside!
Don’t take your old appliances to the cottage to live out the rest of their lives. They gobble way more energy than newer, Energy Star-certified versions. Energy Star appliances often also have built-in power-saving features that you can adjust to suit your needs.
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