Don't let Vampire Loads suck your energy this Halloween

Background

For the past few months I have been keeping on my energy use at home. I regularly download my smart meter data to see when and how I am using the most electricity. But recently I have noticed that late at night, or when we are away for a few days, there is an unexpected kWh baseload of electricity running in the background. Things took an eerie turn when I realised, we had a larger-than-expected vampire load in our house! 

Despite turning most appliances off at the plug, we were still leaving plenty of appliances on standby in the background, such as the sound system, Wi-Fi, oven, washing machine, dishwasher, tumble dryer and even a second freezer that had a few forgotten ice-creams!

Late one night when it was dark, and everyone had gone to bed I turned off everything on my hit list. Well, nearly everything, as I couldn’t access the plugs for the washing machine, tumble dryer or dishwasher. You can do this during the day if you are scared of the dark.  

What are vampire loads? 

A vampire load refers to appliances or electronics in your home that continue to draw power even when they are left on standby mode (in a dark room you might see the little tell-tale standby lights). The appliance by itself might seem low energy, but it all adds up over the course of the year.

There are a few essential items that most households will have on continuously, such as the fridge freezer, the telephone and security devices like alarms or exterior lights. I do not suggest turning off essential items or medical equipment as your home should be comfortable and safe for you and your family. But we all need to consider our vampire loads! 

Why do vampire loads matter? 

The cheapest energy is the electricity you don’t use. The cost of vampire loads can vary depending on energy efficiency rating of the product.

Consider your household’s needs and what devices are left on continuously, versus what could be switched off directly on the wall plug to reduce unnecessary usage. You could save yourself a few euro!

What actions can I take to understand my vampire loads? 

You don’t need to spend money to investigate what is using electricity in the background.  

Here are a few simple tips that I did at home.    

Step 1. Check your data with the ESB Networks Online Account or directly with your supplier if they offer insights into your electricity use. Have a look at what you use over the year or month, then check the usage on the days when no one is home and get a rough estimate of what is running constantly.  

• (average kWh no one home day x days per year or month) = total base load kWh 
• (total base load kWh/total use per year or month) = % of total usage.  

Step 2. Make a list of appliances still on. Some appliances will be essential such as fridge/freezer, alarm, or phone. Other appliances such as the oven, dishwasher, washing machine, tumble dryer, microwave, chargers, radio, and speakers could be considered the vampire loads in your home that are draining unnecessary electricity.  

Step 3. You can buy smart plugs at a low cost (approx. €10 ) that can help you avoid unwanted vampire loads. But for appliances that are in difficult to reach locations or have a regular routine, you can set these up to automatically switch off at certain times. Some are even integrated into an app that can also track the electricity use of that appliance. These are great for Christmas Tree lights (apologies for the early mention!). Some also come with a small remote control so you can easily switch unwanted loads off.

If you are interested to know more about your energy use, Codema’s Home Energy Saving Kit is a great place to start and is available to borrow free of charge at selected public libraries nationwide. The kit contains five tools that you can use to measure how your home uses energy and where energy might be escaping. A plug-in energy monitor is included which measures your appliances’ energy use and can help you find large electricity users.

In the future, if you are upgrading or replacing your appliances, consider the energy efficiency rating on the energy label, as this can really impact your annual running costs.  

My savings

I turned off the second freezer in the house and I no longer leave the oven and microwave on standby. Both changes reduced our daily basic load by 10% which adds up significantly over the year. I’m delighted with this result, as it really took no effort.  

What have I learnt 

Everyone can try this out and it helped me make some long-term changes to my habits at home. I would suggest having a chat with your family or other members of your household to share ideas and decide what changes you can make together. Remember to keep them in the loop because my partner thought the house was haunted when the Wi-Fi mysteriously turned off overnight. Vampire load mystery solved, and we are back online!