We have an extra refrigerator in the basement, useful for its freezer and holding extra stuff for parties, leftovers after parties, and the like. It was more useful when we had a family of four, and my wife has wondered if we wouldn’t save some electricity if we got rid of it.
I pooh-poohed this for a few months, because it is rarely opened, the basement is always fairly cool, refrigerators got much more efficient after the seventies, yada yada, but my wife has good instincts about this stuff, so I finally went into engineer mode instead of know-it-all-tech-hip-male mode and did a little actual research. I was pretty sure any savings would not be worth the inconvenience, but we pay a lot at the margin for power in California, and Debbie at least deserved a serious response.
Oops. This page lists a LOT of old refrigerators’ energy consumption, an indicator also available for new units and in any case easily convertible to money. When the spreadsheet cleared, after a little searching for energy star fridges, we found a unit at Sears only 10% smaller in size (plenty big) whose average annual energy use was fully 800 kwh less than the one we had. With rebates from the power company for replacing appliances, it will cost about $300 including moving it in and taking the old one away, which means it will pay for itself in a little more than a year. It will what??!! Yes, in 13 months: a 90% CD, warm fuzzy green feelings, and one more lesson in humility and respect for data (I don’t need any more lessons in respect for my wife’s judgment, just practice in implementation) for yr. obdt. svt.
YMMV, ours too: maybe all that not opening the door and stuff means we will only save half what I calculated. But I don’t know of any 45% CDs, do you? If you have a refrigerator from the 90s, you might want to check out your options.
On the subject of data, there are inexpensive electricity meters on the market these days that will tell you how much electricity your appliance is actually using. I just picked up a Stanley model for under $19 at Costco. We’re going to find out about our basement refrigerator, among other things, and then donate the meter to our local tool library.
Beware the energy star ratings:
http://abcnews.go.com/WN/government-investigation-faults-energy-star-rating/story?id=10213726
If you have two refrigerators and one is not stocked entirely with beer, wine and mixers, you are doing it wrong.