Lockhart Power believes in using resources wisely and sustainably. Even though we create and supply the electricity that powers your home and business, we encourage you to conserve electricity and keep your power bill as low as possible. Here are a few quick comparisons to help you use less electricity.

Which uses more electricity?

Washing clothes in hot water vs. cold water: This one is pretty obvious. Heating water is a major contributor to your power usage. If you have an electric water heater, it will certainly use more electricity to heat your water. With high-efficiency washing machines and cold-water detergents, it’s often just as effective to wash clothes in cold water.

Washing dishes by hand or dishwasher: Many people think they’ll conserve power by hand-washing dishes in the sink. Well, good news! Using your dishwasher is better in many ways. As far as power consumption, dishwashers use less electricity. It takes far less power to make the appliance run and heat the little bit of water that it uses than it does to heat all the water you would use in the sink. Another bonus: Your dishwasher uses much less water than washing dishes in the sink. So, load up that dishwasher, push the button and congratulate yourself on connserving power and water.

Cooking with the oven or the air fryer: When it comes to cooking, there are obvious advantages to both appliances. For example, you can certainly put more food in the oven (good luck trying to do a Thanksgiving turkey in the air fryer). When it comes to power consumption, though, the oven is going to use a lot more than an air fryer or toaster oven. That’s why the power cord for your oven requires a special outlet. If you have the option to use an air fryer or toaster oven instead of a conventional oven, go for it!

Leaving the house at your comfort temperature all day vs not running HVAC and adjusting when you get home: You’ve probably heard that when you go to work, you should leave the thermostat on your comfortable temperature because it uses more power to cool your warm house when you get home than to maintain the temperature throughout the day. The misconceptioin is that your AC will have to work harder to cool down a warm house at the end of the day. It is true that it takes longer to cool down a warm house, so if you turn your AC off and come home and try to cool the house off, it might not get comfortable before you go to bed. We suggest that when you go to work, simply turn the thermostat two degree higher than you normally keep it, then it will get to your comfort level sooner. The best thing you can do to conserve HVAC power costs is to install a programmable thermostat.