A life without some appliances: Manahil’s adventures in the appliance-free-land
For context: I am currently based in Karachi, Pakistan and am still waiting for my visa so that I can travel to Milan.
How do I reduce my daily consumption to 4kWh? The first step was actually figuring out how much electricity everything around me at my home consumes.
I usually keep all the product manuals and warranty cards of appliances in one place (thanks to my OCD!), so I took out the envelope and sorted all the appliance manuals. Some manuals were very straightforward in describing the energy usage while some were very confusing, one manual did not have the energy consumption and voltage etc. mentioned at all.
For those appliances without manuals, I checked their boxes. Because of changing my apartment every couple of years, now I end up saving the appliance boxes so that they are easier to pack (and sell!).
For some appliances, I had lost the manuals and boxes because I had bought them many years ago. Hence, I decided to look at the products themselves for some markings of the power usage. I knew that on larger devices there is a sticker somewhere which describes all this information, but was surprised to find a small engraving on the inside of my straightener. It was too difficult to read because of how tiny the writing was on a black surface and the angle of where it was written, but I took a picture and read it in detail.
Turns out my daily consumption is between 7–9 kWh with the largest share going to the air-conditioner (about a whopping 4–7 kWh per day). All the rest of the appliances barely take up any energy compared to the air conditioner. This also reflects in my electricity bills here in Karachi in the summers vs. the winters. This exercise is actually useful for me considering electricity costs in Pakistan have recently increased quite a lot, I am hoping I will save some money in the monthly electricity bill this time.
After finding the energy use and also contemplating what I can realistically give up in Karachi’s sweltering humid September weather, this is what I have decided:
Appliances I am going to completely stop using:
- Hair straightener
- Hair dryer
- Air fryer
- Deep Freezer
- Smoothie Maker
- Speaker
- Table Lamp
Appliances I am going to reduce the usage of:
- Air conditioner
- Phone
- Tablet
- Laptop
- Fridge
- Microwave
- Iron
- Lights
- Fan
The air conditioner has the largest share of my per day power consumption but it is also the hardest one to stop or reduce using, especially in this weather.
I have some strategies in mind, like making maximum use of sunlight, increasing the thermostat in the fridge etc. I am also excited to figure out more strategies on the go. Let’s see how my two weeks go.
