Home & workshop Energy

Energy consumption calculator

Power while running
W
Hours running per day
A fridge compressor runs about a third of the time
Days per year
Price per kWh
Consumption 438 kWh
150 W × 8 h × 365 days
Per day 1.2 kWh
Cost over the period 122.64
Cost per month 10.23
Cost per year 122.72
Running watts × duty hours × days
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320 × 100

Annual consumption is running watts times hours per day times days per year, divided by a thousand. A 150 W compressor running eight hours a day all year uses 438 kWh — which is a realistic figure for a fridge-freezer despite its 150 W plate rating.

How to estimate annual consumption

1 Enter the power drawn while the device is actually running.
2 Estimate the hours per day it genuinely runs, not the hours it is switched on.
3 Set the days per year — seasonal loads run far fewer.
4 Compare against the manufacturer annual figure if there is one.

Duty cycle is what separates this page from a simple wattage multiplication. Fridges, freezers, pumps, heating and air conditioning all cycle, and the fraction of time they run swamps every other variable. A freezer in a cold garage runs a fraction as often as the same freezer in a warm kitchen. Appliance energy labels quote an annual kWh figure measured under a standard duty cycle, which is why the label number and your bill can diverge sharply — the label is a comparison between products, not a prediction about your house.

Questions

The fraction of time a device actually runs. A fridge compressor typically runs 30–40% of the time, so its annual use is far below its rating times 24 hours.

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300 × 250
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