Should we unplug the charger when not in use?

How much energy do your phone, laptop and tablet chargers really use? Do we need to unplug the charger when we are not using it? In this article, we try to answer this question by calculating the electricity consumption of several chargers so that you can easily make a decision in this field. ?

The amount of power consumption of the charger when it is not active

In the field of power consumption of devices that are not active but are connected to the power outlet, Terms like energy vampires are used. There are a lot of energy vampires in every house, and for example, we can point to televisions, whose electricity consumption is higher than expected even when it is turned off.

With this in mind, some users may believe that they should even unplug chargers to reduce their electricity bill. In the meantime, we have to see if doing such a thing will significantly reduce the electricity bill or not.

How we measured it (and how you can too)

We use a power consumption measuring device to measure the power consumption of different chargers. Most of these devices, in addition to measuring the electricity consumption of electrical appliances, can also calculate the cost of electricity consumption if they receive the amount of electricity. For people who are sensitive about this, these devices can be very fruitful. Their operation is very simple and they mostly provide very high accuracy in this field.

Naturally, household electricity consumption measuring devices are made for use by ordinary users and therefore to check electricity consumption lower than 1 Watts are in trouble. Of course, it is generally recommended to use these types of devices for power consumption higher than 10 watts. Some users who use desktop systems use these power consumption measuring devices to check the power consumption of the system.

If you want to measure the power consumption of devices with very low power consumption, you need to use much more sophisticated equipment at the laboratory level. Considering that chargers consume very little electricity when not in use, in this test to increase accuracy, we also connect a 75 watt lamp to it so that we always have 75 watt electricity consumption and the fluctuations can be calculated more easily and accurately. Naturally, doing such work is not going to provide you with very accurate results, but with this work, we can largely overcome the limitations of the accuracy of power consumption measuring devices.

So if you want to use power consumption measuring devices to check Use devices with low power consumption, it is better to connect a product with constant power consumption like a lamp next to it and then easily after receiving the consumption amount, subtract the desired fixed number from the final number.

How much power do different charger models consume when not in use?

After providing detailed explanations on how to perform this measurement, now we need to get to the point. At the very beginning, we must say that naturally, in this test, not all the chargers in the market are going to be examined, because we see thousands of different models of chargers in the market. But in any case, considering the variety of chargers tested, you can count on the results obtained from the tests to a large extent. h2>

If you have ever had an argument with a friend or family member Do phone and tablet chargers consume significant electricity when in use, now you can discuss this with accurate statistics. As we said, household electricity consumption measuring devices cannot perform well for consumption below 1 watt. In the case of phone and tablet chargers, it seems that their power consumption is so low that these types of devices cannot actually do much. We connected the electricity consumption, but practically no exact figure was obtained because their electricity consumption is very low. But when we connected 10 chargers and even more to this device, it was only in this state that we encountered a fixed figure. For this, normal chargers to fast chargers have been used. It was in this situation that the total of these chargers recorded a consumption figure of 2 watts, of course, to improve accuracy, a 75-watt lamp was also used next to them.

As we said, to check the consumption of devices that consume very little energy, we need to use inexpensive laboratory equipment, but according to this review, Smartphone chargers seem to consume between 0.05 and 0.1 watts when not in use, which is a very small figure. In order to better understand the insignificance of this figure, we must say that a simple LED lamp consumes between 5 and 7 watts of energy. Therefore, in order for the chargers to be close to the energy consumption of an LED lamp when not in use, you need to plug in about 100 of them.

Laptop chargers are also very energy-efficient

Laptop chargers usually have a relatively large size, and therefore some users believe that because of this large size, even if they are not in use, they consume a lot of electricity. But it seems that the advances made in the field of charger technology have led to the optimization of the consumption of these chargers.

In this case, the power consumption of all types of laptop chargers has been investigated. From giant gaming laptop chargers to smaller gaming laptop chargers and even Chromebooks. In this case, like phone chargers, in order to reach a significant figure, we had to connect a large number of these chargers to the power consumption measuring device. Even the giant charger for a gaming laptop does not consume a significant amount of electricity when not in use.

Meanwhile, some very old chargers from more than 15 years ago were used and about this Chargers, we must say that each of them consumes how many watts when not in use. So we can practically say that if your laptop charger is from the last 10 to 15 years, in this situation and in the worst case, it consumes only 1 watt.

It is better to unplug the electric tool charger Drag

Unlike phone and laptop chargers, which practically do not consume any electricity when they are not active, we cannot make such a statement in the field of chargers for electric tools. Of course, like laptop chargers, there is a significant difference between old and new chargers. For example, we can mention the charger used for the Ryobi 40V lawnmower, which, although it provides high energy for this tool, consumes very little and imperceptible electricity if it is not active.

But very old chargers of electric tools that were produced more than 15 years ago, in this situation consume between 5 and 10 watts of electricity, which is a high number for They are considered So if you're using old chargers for these types of gadgets, it's best not to keep them plugged in.

How much do chargers add to your electricity bill when they're not in use?

Now, after checking the power consumption of chargers in idle mode, for many users, the important issue is how much will be added to the electricity bill in such a situation. The electricity company uses the kilowatt-hour unit to calculate electricity consumption. To convert watts to kilowatt hours, you must first multiply the amount of watts by the number of hours consumed and then divide the obtained number by 1000. For example, suppose that 5 chargers are always connected to the electricity and when not in use, each of them consumes 0.05 W of energy. Their total energy consumption reaches 0.25 watts, and they consume 0.006 kilowatt-hours of electricity every day and 0.18 kilowatt-hours of electricity every month. Regarding the cost of electricity consumption in Iran, this issue is different according to tropical and subtropical regions, hours of use and different months. Also, the cost of the electricity bill in Iran increases gradually.

But even in European and American countries where electricity costs are very high, laptop and phone chargers practically add a completely imperceptible figure to the electricity bill. For example, in the United States, the same 5 chargers will increase the electricity bill by only 0.37 dollars on average.

Therefore, it makes sense to disconnect the charger from the outlet only if you are using very old chargers. . This is especially true for old chargers of old devices, and connecting some of these chargers to electricity may lead to the consumption of 20 watts of energy at all hours of the day and night, which is a high figure.

Instead of worrying about using chargers, do this

If you've continued reading this far, then there's no doubt that saving electricity is very important to you. In the meantime, the question that arises is that if unplugging the phone and laptop charger does not have much effect on the electricity bill, then what can we do instead? There is no harm. But in the meantime, it is better to do this for devices that consume significant electricity in the inactive state. For example, if you are using an old TV, it is likely to use a lot of electricity if it is plugged in all the time. So leaving an old TV plugged in is like leaving an incandescent light bulb on 24 hours a day It is usually left on.

If for any reason, you have to keep some high-use devices connected to the power outlet. If you have, it is better to use smart sockets. Using these sockets, you can schedule the power connection so that these devices do not have access to electricity during the hours when you do not use the desired devices. Finally, in the field of energy consumption, we must say that it is better to use LED lamps completely because these types of lamps provide you with very good light for less consumption.

Source: HowToGeek