On Oct 8, 1:46*am, (vinny)
wrote:
vinny had written this in response tohttp://www.thestuccocompany.com/maintenance/Refrigerator-efficiency-t...
*:

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mike wrote:
My new fridge says it costs $43/year to run. Call it T$
What test conditions lead to that number?
If I let it run and never open the door, it will cost me X$ to run.
So, the annual cost of opening the door is Y$ = T$ - X$.
What's the magnitude of Y$? *And what opening rate does it assume?
If it's a significant percentage of the total cost, it might make
sense to address the opening problem.
95% of my accesses are for stuff stored on the door.
The inside is mostly empty and rarely accessed.
Maybe curtain the inside of the box?
OR fill the empty space with empty boxes so less cold
air spills out when the door opens.
It's the same concept
as putting open-topped vessels in your toilet tank to reduce
the water/flush.
Sounds like it's probably way into diminishing returns, but
every little bit helps save the planet.
Any idea the ratio of Y$ to T$?
Thanks, mike

I agree that they should put some sort of information on how they came up
with $43 cost to run a fridge for the whole year. How many times it was
open and at what temp setting the fridge is in..etc..

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I can tell you that the new Kitchenaid side by side that I bought a
few months ago is spot on to the Energy Star numbers on the label.
It was supposed to use $95 a year to run and I measured it for several
days with a Kilowatt meter and that indeed is what it was using. And
that was with normal usage, opening closing doors, etc.

On the other hand, the DOE Energy Star website has a calculator that
supposed to show you how much your current fridge uses vs a new one.
You can put in your current fridge make/model and energy cost and it
generates numbers. That was way off. It indicated my 24 year old
fridge should be using over $300 a year. With the kilowatt meter, it
was actually around $190. I suspect this calculator may have built-
in assumptions about the old fridge, ie that it has badly leaking door
seals, dirtied up coils, etc.

My bottom line conclusion was that I'm saving about $100 a year with
the new fridge vs the old one. Which means the cost savings to run a
new one can be a factor in making a replacement decision. But
clearly in my case, even at the current energy costs, replacing it is
not justified based just on economics.

I think as others have pointed out, it doesn't make sense to try to
take additional measures like putting curtains inside, filling up the
fridge with thermal ballast, etc. in the hopes of saving anything.
When you get down to $95 a year to run a 25 cb ft side by side, I
don't see that you're going to do much other than inconvenience
yourself.