There are some bills you just cannot avoid. Grocery bills, transportation expenses, rent or mortgage, and utilities like electricity. You may feel limited on how you can lessen these expenses, but you’ll be surprised to learn there are many ways to decrease the amount of energy you consume in your home. Especially in your kitchen. Our tips and list of do’s and don’ts will have you saving energy and money in your kitchen in no time!
Kitchens: Big Energy Savings
Contents
I have been looking for different ways to save energy and I was pleasantly surprised when I made a few changes to my kitchen habits that caused my overall utility bills to drop! As you can see from the graphic, there are a lot of simple and easy tips to cause savings to rise and usage to drop. Using all, or some of them will make a world of difference
Save Energy and Money in Your Kitchen
Appliances
One specific area you can drastically change your energy consumption is in appliances. The type of appliances you have in your home is one way to make sure you are efficiently using any energy consumed in the kitchen. Not only are there energy efficient appliances, but energy-efficient brands. Often times, these kitchen items will provide great high quality with e-saving options.
A second way to get the most out of your appliances is to swap out old appliances for newer ones. If you have a fridge, oven, or any kitchen appliance using a significant amount of energy that is older, it probably does not have the most recent energy-saving technology. An old appliance is an unnecessary energy drain. Upgrade your appliance and the money you will be saving can make it well worth the investment.
Energy Efficient Cooking
One of my personal favorite ways to save energy while cooking implements it into your everyday cooking. It is so simple and often can make jobs a lot easier. For example, if you are cooking pasta, do not just go for the biggest pot you have. Consider how much pasta you will be cooking and choose a pot that appropriately accommodates that amount.
Not only will you be saving energy by not needing to fill the whole pot, but you will also have easier clean up when it comes to loading the dishwasher.
Also only use the amount of water needed for all cooking needs. Like boiling pasta and potatoes, or making coffee or tea. I use to often find myself dumping water not used, but it is so easy to measure out for an accurate measurement. Do this when cooking and you can save on the energy used to heat up the water, and decrease your water usage.
Energy Saving Do’s and Don’ts
DO
- Buy energy efficient light bulbs. You often cannot tell the difference and it is a very simple way to save energy.
- Defrost your freezer regularly. A fridge with built up frost can require more energy to keep it items cold.
- Defrost your food before cooking on the stove, oven, or microwave. When it is frozen it will require more heat and energy to be generated to cook.
- One way to cook your food faster in a pot is simply putting a lid on it. It will heat your food faster, use less heat, and increase the heat without actually turning your stove up.
- To ensure nothing is heating your fridge and counteracting its cooling system, keep your fridge a few inches away from all walls. This allows sufficient space for heat to escape without reheating your fridge.
DON’T
- Leave unnecessary appliances “on,” like your coffee maker or blender.
- Start a half loaded dishwasher. Every time you begin a dishwashing cycle, make sure it is completely loaded.
- Put hot food in your fridge. Allow some time for it to cool down before you heat up part of your fridge and use its cooling system to work harder.
- Leave your fridge or oven open for too long. Any time your kitchen appliances are giving off energy for anything other than heating your food or keeping food cool, this is wasting energy.
It is time to get creative in the many ways on how to save energy. While it may not feel possible, there are ways to decrease your energy usage in your kitchen. Some provide you better options when looking for new kitchen appliances. Others are simple habit fixes you will quickly forget about.
