Energy Matters Forums

[Tracker]

... I'd also thought about investigating whether the condensor coils can be spaced off the unit enough to allow extra insulation to be inserted....

A modern fridge/freezer will have three lots of pipes.
A pair to/from the evaporator... a pair to the mullion heater (around the door jam), and a pair to the condenser, which is invariably attached to either the back-plate, or more commonly, the side walls..

I used to keep an eye open for REAL old refrigerators, with the wire-condenser on the back, and cut them off, and convert new style fridges to OLD style..
This does not really help YOU in any way, as adding insulation is still a gross ugliness..
The only advantage is that the greatest amount of HEAT is disposed of via the open-air grill, and then you don't have the silly position of high heat on the (inside-of-the) side-wall, separated from the cold-box via an inch of insulation foam.
I have NO IDEA how much better it would be for efficiency, but logic suggests that it just has to be better..
..
.

[Smurf1976]

I suspect that the same thing actually applies to embedded energy, and is one of my concerns about the whole green movement being "sold" new products that increase overall consumption rather than decreasing it.

Most things can be made to last almost indefintely, and the cost of energy and resources taken to produce something almost always outweighs the energy it uses, unless it has a very long life.

Strongly agreed and I see this as a major flaw in the commercialisation of conservation. With a few exceptions, the best course of action is to simply not buy stuff.

It's like the often repeated call to close a certain well known power station in Victoria on the basis that it uses 10 - 15% more coal than its more modern counterparts and thus emits more CO2. Given the huge embodied energy in a power station, plus the economic commitment to running a replacement baseload plant for 60 years or so, I very much doubt that there is any real gain as compared to continuing to operate the existing one for the remaining 20 or so years of its useful life (by which time we may not actually need to replace it anyway depending on what happens with renewables).

[offgridQLD]

I guess for the economy to tick over we all need to be purchasing something.I agree there often isn't any point replacing working old for new to simply save money.

Running cost isn't the only reason people replace appliances. Some times people do just want to spoil them self and replace the old 20yo tv to take advantage of bigger screen size, better picture, esthetics.I like my mod cons and new tec but I try and buy quality and get some life out my appliances.

We replaced Our first refrigerator (small) for a larger one once we had a family and simply because we needed more room. Although we purchased a like new fridge from a friend who was moving overseas. New people are always entering the market some purchasing there first tv,refrigerator ect.

The cost of the more efficient appliance isn't always more. We purchased a 100cm Samsung LED tv I think its consumption was around 173kwh PA (that was based on a lot of viewing hrs per day) and uses 30 - 45w . It cost around $500 (after a lot of haggling)

When i was looking There was plenty of other tv's same technology (led) and screen size (100cm)that consumed a lot more KWh PA and were more expensive. For example there was one Loewe tv (led) 101cm that consumed 640kwh!!! PA(buggered if I know how they manage that from a LED tv. Unless it has a built in air conditioner unit . That's 3.5 times more energy than the Samsung , There was a CHANGHONG (sounds like a cheep china home brand import) that used around 400kwh same size and LED. Unless there's about 100 misprints in the gov energy rating webpage there are some chocking consumers out there. Jump on there and do some searching.

For people off the grid keeping the consumption of appliances that spend a lot of time on each day to a minimum can make a big difference to the size battery, inverter, PV's you need to invest in.

Some one with a good size plasma, big double door refrigerator with ice maker and a few power hungry desktop pcs running all the time might need a system that costs double what some one with energy efficient appliances dose. The saving in not having to Double the size of a off grid system would more than cover the cost of new appliances.

As for the OP. I think your concern is to save money. Its a hard one as anything you invest in to save you on consumption is going to have a very long pay back period.Or any thing free or cheep could potentially look like a ugly experiment.



Kurt

[jimbo]

I just measured my 9 year old Westinghouse 450 Fridge/Freezer over 24 hours on an average day and it used 1.7Kw/hrs. What surprised me the most is the 15W it uses on standby when there is no compressor or fan running. I would like to upgrade to a more efficient unit but can't justify the cost (this fridge cost me $100, 5 years ago).

A bit off topic but my 4-5y/o Panasonic 50 inch plasma says that it uses around 500W but so far it only seems to use around 230W. I would hate to buy a new TV and have it use only marginally less.


Update. I just changed a few picture settings on the plasma including turning the brightness down from 60 to 52 (max 100) and power is down to 190W, however this is very dependant on what you are watching and constantly changes

[offgridQLD]

A bit off topic but my 4-5y/o Panasonic 50 inch plasma says that it uses around 500W but so far it only seems to use around 210W. I would hate to buy a new TV and have it use only marginally less.

The rating on the sticker at the back is just the max watts. Perhaps a white screen (or full black ) with the with all the picture setting set to 100% volume up 100%. Even then in practice its most likely wont use the full 500w.

That said you can purchase 50" LED tv's that' have a real at the plug consumption of only 50w or so. If your on the grid and happy with your tv keep it until it's dead.

We just purchased a new fridge freezer for a off grid home and for the size we wanted 510ltr, 400kwh PA (1.1kw day) Electrolux was the lowest rating we could find after a lot of searching. I don't think its built (finished) as well as our 10 year old FP fridge at our other house but its been working well and the efficiency difference was a good 25% better than most other brands on offer. I haven't actually put a meter on its plug to see how much it uses in a day (real world) compared to its rating. But will give it a go and report back.

Kurt

[jimbo]

Im about to move into an off grid house in 6 weeks. The current owners have a separate fridge and freezer bolted together with a total 800L capacity so i'm hoping mine uses a fair bit less.

That said you can purchase 50" LED tv's that' have a real at the plug consumption of only 50w or so.

That is lower than i thought was possible and might be an option in the future. I will see how we go.