Efergy electricity monitor review

Comments

• I've found this product so good but amazingly shocking! I got mine through this site;
  http://www.primrose-london.co.uk/efergy-whole-house-energy-monitor-p-1986.html
  I honestly didn't realise quite how much I was using and I'm hoping it will make a big difference to my household bills as I have rather extravagant children.
  It gave me quite precise readings and although I'm unsure exactly as to how it all works it seemed really accurate, guess I'll see if it has made a difference because the size of my bill normally destroys a small sized forest!
  I'm also quite pleased I got mine for £39.95 but there was a £4.95 delivery charge. Posted by Olivia G, England
• You don't know how it works but it seemed "really accurate". What a stupid comment.
  
  The accuracy of these are not that brilliant. They definately will not beable to tell you the 3-6w difference that your TV is on stand by or not, it might change, it might not, it might change randomly even if you didn't switch the TV off.
  
  The accuracy of these is not perfect. If you want better accuracy you will need the plug in ones which actually connect to the power lines, usually via a pass through socket. Admittingly these only allow 1 socket at a time.
  
  As for the unit, the reveiw fails to mention its down sides. It doesn't know how to calculate the price if your energy company has a lower price both after the first 1000kWH (or other value) and if you use Economy 7 etc where its cheaper at certain times.
  The kg/co2 is also a falacy, because you have no easy way of knowing which sources your electric is actually being pulled from. You could use the country average for all its energy usage, but if you use double and most of yours comes from a wind farm etc, you are going to be showing double co2 when actually you could be using nothing at all (if you are "lucky")
  
  
  Want to save power? Don't turn items off standby, have less showers a week and/or have them much quicker. Recenly I saw a shower rated at 10.8kWH, this at half power 5kWH run for 10 minutes will let you run a 5WH standby for 160hours (a week). Having your shower slightly colder can save you more also. Posted by Simon, England
• Only 5KWH for a standby? Have you ever measured it? My living room TV and freeview box was 70KWH!! My tiny lcd in my bedroom was 18KWH.
  Posted by Richard, UK
• This meter is a current meter only so will give erroneous readings
  Power = Volts x Amps x Cos (angle)
  Where angle is angle between voltage and current.
  As it does not have a voltage input, is not an energy meter.
  The power it shows is not genuine and does not take into account power factor.
  Example if you measure power of a 40Watt fluorescent light with an normal inductive ballast it will show up to 160 watts. Reason is these lights have a low power factor (Cos angle) so current is very high but actual power is much smaller. Posted by Peter Kay, Australia
• This thing saved me 350Aus$ per year!!!
  After switching off all my sockets and appliances in the house there was still a leak of 220W. That is 4kWh/day! I then started to turn off circuit brakers at the Meter Pannel and found that the revere cycle air con and my induction stove are using 220Watt in standby mode. That is 20% of my power used. That is 350$ wasted!! I installed a off switch for both.
  Instead of complaining about the Government not doing anything about global warming start doing something yourself. The meter cost 99A$ I thought it is silly and expensive. Now I am laughing to the bank and done a green thing! Posted by Peter Smith, Australia