• Take control of your power usage

• Learn what each appliance is costing you

• Cut your power bill by 25% your first month

The electricity monitor has been available in it’s various forms for saving energy at home for some time now. Even so, it’s taken a long time to gain wide public acceptance even in spite of it’s relatively low price, and ease of operation.

The main problem, is that when it comes to devices for saving money at home, the electricity monitor really wasn’t what folks in general have had in mind. You see, what most folks have really been hoping for all along, was new technologies that in and of themselves would cut power usage. Not measure it.

After all, if you stop to think about it for a moment, you have to ask yourself how on earth can any device that simply tells you how much power you’re using save you any money? Something so simple in concept and operation that you just clamp it around the main feed wire at your power box?

Do You Really Need to Know What it’s All Costing You???

The simple answer to both these questions, is that an electricity monitor doesn’t save you any money. As stated above, it only measures it. However; the “proven fact”, is that statistically people who buy them and use them, cut their power bills by about 25% on average within their first month.

Sound a bit hard to believe that saving energy at home can be as easy as simply measuring it as it’s being used? Well once you think about it, it all makes perfect sense, but first stop and ask yourself if you would feel comfortable owning and driving a car that didn’t have a fuel gauge, or a speedometer. Or; how about ordering at a restaurant that didn’t have prices posted on their menu?

So the concept of tracking the cost of things as you consume them isn’t unusual at all because you do it every day as you go about your life. In fact if you take a moment to think about it, given the amount of money that folks spend on electricity, what should be a surprise is that the electricity monitor has been so long in coming.

Are Your Home Appliances Really Shut Off ??

For instance, are you aware that your television set may be using up to 75% of the power that it consumes while it’s turned off!? You read that correctly. While your TV is sitting in the off mode, it is still in fact active and consuming electricity, and by the way there is a new device to put an end to that.

It’s a clever hand held remote that turns the “actual electricity” for your TV on and off at the power source when you use it, but that and other clever devices are material for another article. Right now I’m writing about the electricity monitor.

It comes as two separate components that work together for saving energy at home. One device simply clamps around the main power line at the power box and the other device sits in your home, and receives signals from the unit out at the box. That’s it!

How Much is Each Appliance Costing You Today ??

However; it’s what the electricity monitor does with the information that it receives that’s so useful. For starters it can measure the energy usage for your entire home or it can measure how much any given appliance uses on an individual basis. Does that sound interesting?

Then with that information, with the simple click of a button it can convert that actual “usage figure” into a real “monetary figure”. That is how much it’s costing you in several international denominations. (dollars, pounds, etc.) But wait because it gets even better than that.

That’s because with just one days measurement and cost figure, it can extrapolate it out to show you what your cost will be in a week, a month or a year. Want to know how much your old refrigerator is costing you this week, month, or year, and compare it to the cost of buying a new one for instance? No problem!

Then with the software that comes with your energy monitor you can connect it up to your computer, so you can check your power usage figures online from anywhere on the planet, and even join an online community. So what kind of community?

A Whole Online Community of Cost Cutting Fanatics

A community of energy saving fanatics that share tips and information. What kind of information? How about being able to access each others actual power usage figures while challenging one another in contests to find new methods for saving energy at home? Sound interesting?

Well it’s going on right now and once you get into it you’ll quickly discover how with a simple device that costs you as little as $50 US you can slash your electrical bill in half and at the same time become a heck of a lot more knowledgeable about power usage in general.

• What are the pros and cons?

Pretty much everything about the tankless water heater or what some people also refer to as the on demand water heater is a surprise, and complete breakaway from a conventional standing unit. They’re also the perfect “rainy day backup unit” for solar water heating systems.

Now the first big surprise for most people, is their size and weight because for some reason the standard assumption is that a much larger piece of heavier equipment is needed to heat large quantities of water so quickly. The tankless water heater is incredibly compact and light.

The On Demand Water Heater is Compact and Light

In fact the larger on demand water heater models that are designed to replace a standard 40 gallon conventional unit weigh in between 20 to 30 pounds on average. These larger units are also about the size of a small compact television set. Usually in the area of fifteen by fifteen inches, or so.

So the next surprise is how easy they are to install and hook up because they simply bolt to the wall through the back-plate and electric models basically just plug right into a wall socket. With a simple “cold water in” inlet and “hot water out” outlet, connecting up the lines is also a snap.

Incredibly Efficient use of Water Heating Power!!

Another big surprise is how efficiently they use power. For instance the gas powered tankless water heater doesn’t even need to be vented out of the home because there is just “no wasted heat” to be vented out. Now there is a top exhaust vent but you can hold your hand over it when the unit is running and will only feel “a bit warm”.

Another big surprise is how much scalding hot water they will put out, and do so continuously. Be aware though that a larger gas fired on demand water heater does gulp quite a bit of gas when running on maximum output, so you have to make sure that the gas lines in your home have the capacity to provide it in large amounts.

Two Downsides to the Tankless Water Heater


So then what are some of the downsides of the tankless water heater because there always seems to be pros and cons with every new innovation? The simple answer to that question is there are two, and the first one is cost.

Generally speaking, an on demand water heater of such a size and capacity that it can replace your current 40 gallon standing unit, is going to cost you about twice as much on average. Also be aware that they also tend to be more vulnerable to complications caused by mineral buildup from heavy water.

• Who invented energy saving bulbs?

• Then who stole the idea and technology?

• What’s the latest invention?

• Will they Steal it too?

If you think that energy saving bulbs are a relatively new invention, you are just plain wrong. In fact would you believe that the first prototypes of what has become today’s compact fluorescent lights were developed, and produced back in the late 1890s?

Well it’s true and in fact the first working commercial models were marketed by General Electric way back in 1938. However; there were few nagging problems that kept them from achieving anything near the level of public acceptance that they have today.

Energy Saving Bulbs Back then


Those were that they were big, and they were expensive. You see, they had yet to develop the manufacturing techniques that allowed them to be mass produced in large quantities an also just as important, they were too large. About a eight inches long, and around as big around as an orange.

They were made though, and they were also bought, and used. But; only for specialty purposes like in photography studios, and compact areas where the heat from a normal incandescent bulb was a problem. In due time few things were to change though that led to a new public interest in energy saving bulbs.

No More Cheap Oil for You Yankee!!!

One was the 1973 oil crises, and the other was the development of the “curly tube” that you can find on so many of these types of lights today. You see, the energy crisis of 1973 inspired inventors to get busy, and also got the public to take a look at new ways to cut power usage.

So it was three years later in 1976 that a product designer with GE came up with the spiraled bulb that finally shrunk the lights down to the size of a normal bulb. However; by then the oil spigots in the Middle Eastern deserts had began to be slowly opened back up which led to the determination by GE marketing executives that energy saving bulbs were a dead-end street.

Now Who Let the Chinese Guy in!!??

Even so, through it all there was one group of people who were determined not to let a good idea go to waste, and that was the Chinese. You see, it was about that same time that their industrial espionage cadres were first getting busy running around the U.S. and the UK stealing every hunk of information they could get their hands on.

You mean you thought that the Chinese invented something?? Now granted they did invent the bottle rocket, and the fire cracker, but that was a few thousand years ago and it was not long after that that they came to the conclusion that it’s just cheaper and easier just to steal patented ideas than to come up with them themselves.

Man that Guys a Good Worker!!

So somehow the slippery devils got into GE and ran off with the idea, and technology to produce relatively inexpensive compact energy saving bulbs and after the Chinese got them, the competition was over. Hey! what workers can compete with slave laborers that have AK-47s pointed at them?

So now they were cheaper than ever before, but the Chinese had yet one more industrial secret to swipe to make them even cheaper, and that was the concept of replacing only the bulb element. But they had just one problem, and that was first someone had to come up with it before they could steal it.

Just One More Idea to Swipe

You see when compact fluorescents wear out, it’s only the bulb that goes bad. the lower part, or main electrical component that the tube is attached to doesn’t wear out, and in fact can last for decades. So what was the solution? The solution was energy saving bulbs with detachable fluorescent tubes.

Now who the Chinese stole this new idea from is lost to history, but you can bet your chop-sticks that they stole it from someone. However; there’s a new type of energy saving bulb being marketed now, and the folks who make it have taken a blood oath on John Wayne’s grave that the Chinese won’t steal it.

Keep Your Eye on the Chinese Guy This Time!!

It’s a brand new type of screw in light bulb that uses LED technology, but as of 2010 they cost somewhere in the area of $50 a unit. Just that same, they’re quite amazing because they use a fraction of the power of even the best compact fluorescents, plus one other thing.

That one other thing is that the light that they put out is as close to natural as you can get from any other screw in bulb up to now. Now they only emit the equivalent light of a standard 60 watt bulb, but it’s expected that in the future they will become more powerful as they also become more affordable.

• Is your attic bleeding you financially?

• Find out how to stop the hemorrhaging!

If you own a home today then chances are real high that there is more than one area that you can address to lighten your energy consumption load. For instance if it was built prior to the mid 1960s, chances are real good that no insulation was installed in the attic at the time it was completed.

Why? The reason for this is because homes in virtually all areas of the U.S. in particular weren’t even required to be insulated as part of the building code, and that was both in the walls and the attic. It’s one area of a home where a lot of energy can be lost.

Tip #1

Cellulose insulation is easy to blow in and in fact odds are that your local hardware store that carries insulation has a blower that they’ll let you use for free, with a deposit of course. It’s quite simple. One person runs the blower, and dumps the bales in, while the other person handled the business end of the hose up in the attic.

Tip #2

The second of your energy saving tips also involves your attic vents. You need to make sure that it is vented properly and that any screens on vents under the outer eves aren’t clogged up with cobwebs. You see, if your attic can’t breath it becomes a huge thermal storage tank.

Tie a broom to a long stick and do your best to swoosh clean all the eve vents along the outer perimeter of your home. Now if they’re clogged up from the inside then consider using a garden hose sprayer to give them a quick blast of water to clean them out.

Tip #3

If you don’t already have one then buy, and install an attic fan to keep it vented out. Even better yet, check into a solar powered attic fan that automatically comes on as soon as the sun hits the solar panel, and there are some very affordable units out there.

What you may not know is that if you’re using air conditioning to cool your home in the summer, and heat it in the winter, up to a full 30% of the energy you’re paying for is being wasted by having a poorly insulated, and unvented attic.

So if the cost of adding insulation and installing an attic fan seems expensive then you should know that you’re paying for them anyway on you power bill in the form of needless electricity you’re just throwing away. Maybe its time to check your bills and do the math.