Tips to reduce electricity bill and high Efficiency.

 

Tips on how to reduce your electricity bill:

To start with, you should know that for these tips to work for you; you need a prepaid meter installed.

Without a prepaid meter, your bill pretty much runs on estimates and leaves you with little room to contest its accuracy.

If you want to save power, start by getting a prepaid meter installed at home.

1. Remove all plugs and turn off switches:

Many don’t know this but turning off a device while leaving it plugged in does not cut off the power supply. The device still consumes residue energy called vampire or standby power. To avoid this, cut off power to a device by turning off the socket and the device’s power switch.

2. Replace all your bulbs at home with energy-efficient models:

Although non-energy-efficient bulbs are cheaper to purchase, they become more expensive in the long run to use. This is because they consume far more power than energy-saving bulbs.

For example, the average wattage of an ordinary bulb is around 60 to 200. However, energy-saving bulbs are as low as 7 to 11 watts. This means that one would consume more than ten times the other’s power; the choice is yours.

Also, it would help if you become more cautious with how long you leave your bulb on. Turn them off during the day, and when you want to sleep at night; especially your kitchen, toilet and bathroom lights. Only leave security lights on.

3. Limit your fan and Air conditioner’s runtime:

The ceiling fan is one of the home’s highest passive power consumers. You might not know it, but your fan practically runs all day and night, which significantly impacts your power bills.

One thing you can do is replace all your fans with energy-efficient models if you have the means. However, if you don’t have the energy-efficient model, simply regulate how long the fan runs.

The energy-consuming capacity of an air conditioner is well known. Keep it running for a day, and it would make a telling impact on your bills. A 1.5hp (1119watts) Ac running for 10 hours at a rate of N60 per kilowatt would cost you well over N30,000 alone. You can shuffle run time between your fan and air conditioner, depending on how many units you purchase per month. Limiting your fan to running only about 8 hours a day can save you hundreds of naira.

4. Revisit your refrigerator:

This is another appliance that consumes the most power at home. The average watt consumption of a refrigerator is 1200 watts per day (depending on the model), which means they consume one of, if not the highest power at home. You can reduce consumption by purchasing a smaller freezer, which is the more expensive approach or doing the following:

Move the refrigerator to an area with adequate air circulation, as it helps it become more power-efficient.

Your fridge should also be at least 2 inches away from the wall and not stand directly exposed to sunlight.

Another thing you should do is not stuff up your refrigerator. This reduces the overall efficiency of the unit because of the lesser space available for air circulation. It also means that the unit would draw more power to meet the demand. Ensure you defrost the fridge regularly too

Asides from the tips mentioned in this article, you should also sit down to study your home. If possible, create a list of all your appliances and their watt rating. Start trimming down consumption by replacing the device with a more energy-efficient model, or reducing its use.

5. Air conditioner.

This is an equipment that gulps your energy. Set your temperature to a temperature for the ac to breath. It discharges and maintain the minimum consumption by switching the compressor off and then on again. It is very important to note that the major cause of switch burnt result from switching the system off directly from the wall switch. The switch get warmed up during use. Avoid flipping the switch while warm. This will make the internal component to shift and once dried at that point it get stucked and will not power up again. The best way to power it off is from the remote control then, the wall switch. This applies to other heating switches..

6.            Cooker switch.

The cooker unit comes with a standard switch designed to handle the flicker. Always switch off from it own switch before flipping the wall socket.

 

7.            Summary.

Replace your old device after few years use to a new more modern. This is because the manufactures always develop a low power consuming but more efficient device.

 

Poem; Title; Savage World

Poem Title; Savage world Author; Umar Uba Date; 4th march 2024 Arid dust pushing down the shores. Looters savaging the reserve. The once loamy sand cracking in absence of moist. Feminism reaching the aged while malnutrition breeds starvation. Chauffeur in cities seeking respite. Oh dearie me. Sounds of mortars no longer in Hollywood. With deaf ears blasting the normal with carbides. Once a beautiful life. Playing in the courtyard with peers. Kites flying the skies are grounded by skyscrapers. The video game mortal combat coming to reality. Tearing shelters in towns and cities. A so called camps of baggers lingers. Oh Lord, come down with ease, peace and joy. Bring back the smiles. Bring back the humor in the souls. Bring back the fullness of the belly. bring back lust in the living. Wipe away the tears. Let the seed shoot and the cobs bear. In abundance we duel. The horror that was in scenes in studios now is bare. With cities once an empire now in rubbles. Silent cries in dry tears. Make peace, make peace, make peace. The transistors fill our living rooms with recurring violence. When will there be hope for the sapience breed. Until the rounds and the barrel chamber runs dry.

Electrical Simple Checks that Saves Life.2 Many people expose themselves and their families to potentially fatal electrical accidents in the home by making simple blunders, down to a lack of knowledge about the dangers of electricity. However, there are a number of simple visual checks that you can carry out yourself: Check that you have RCD ( residual current device) in your fuse box. Make sure that your sockets and plugs are not overloaded. Ensure plugs and sockets are not damaged. Check that visible cables and leads are in good condition. Check that your light fittings are not visibly damaged and that down lights are in good working condition. Check that you are not storing combustible materials around your fuse box,electricity meter or electrical intake. Don't use top of you microwave or room heaters for extra storage. Never trail cables under the carpet. Watch trailing Cable in rooms and officers to ensure chair or table stands are not on them. Never take mains powered electrical items into the bathroom. Always switch off your electrical items when they are not in use. Consider having additional sockets installed if you regularly rely on extension leads and adaptors. Check regularly the following dangers signs.. - s smell of hot plastic or burning near an appliances or socket. - sparks or smoke coming from a plug or appliances. - arching sound from your change over should be scraped and greased ( by a good electrician) - Damaged or frayed leads. - Coloured wire inside leads showing at the plug or anywhere else. - Fuses that blow or circuit breakers that operate for no obvious reason. -Plugs and their wires can be damaged with use. Look for cracks or damage on the casing. Look for sign of overheating such as discolored casing or cable. Check that the plug cable is firmly clamped into the plug and no colored plug wires. are showing. By following these simple tips you can avoid overloading sockets and risk of fire.

Electrical Safety Tips Series. 1 DIY. DIY errors cause half of all electric shocks in our homes and offices. Almost 50% admit that they feel they should try and tackle the household maintenance and repair jobs themselves or ask a mate before calling on a professional. It Is discovered that half of all severe electric shocks are caused by DIY attempts, withg the main errors including cutting through power leads, drilling into wiring and repairing electrical items while they're switched on. Professional electricians have seen or been involved with fixing electrical DIY mishaps that had resulted in fires,serious electric shock or significant or repair costs. Tips for DIY Locate cables In Your wall. A common error is accidentally drilling, nailing or screwing things into cables hidden inside your walls. Use and RCD ( Residual Current Device) An RCD can save your life by cutting off the power in the event of an electrical fault. Shut off the power Shut off the power in your fuse box and use battery powered tools. Check power tools and watch out for the lead. Get advice from professional electrician. The best way to avoid any electrical problems in an installation is to seek the advice of a professional electrician.

intelligefent buildin...how ready are you?

Umar Uba December 2012. Intelligent Building – How ready are you? The objective in intelligent building is to maximize energy efficiency and to enhance work performance by combining environmental system technologies. The intelligent building takes energy management system a step further. The purpose is not just to control energy consumption but also to operate the other systems in the building in the most efficient way. Imagine when a home tells you the garage door is not shut. When a house tells you the light in the baby’s room is left on. Or when the house shuts the windows and power up the air conditioners because it senses you inside and also senses the temperature indoor will make sweat. The list goes on and on. How ready are you to invest in such a structure? Conveniences are known to dominate the automobiles and aircraft industry only. These are temporary accommodation for human comfort. Imagine setting out on a journey of about three hours in a very comfortable vehicle. In reaching your destination leaving the keyless car entry to enter your apartment you have to fiddle with the key to unlock the entrance. Fiddling with a switch to lit the room and a fan regulator to provide air and then switched on the air conditioner. How long will it take you to settle in? All the comfort you had enjoyed enroute will be wasted before you pick up again. What does a building need to be intelligent? Several factors are required to enhance your building to make it intelligent these include: Power back up system. Not only having a stand-by generator but having a fully back-up of average requirement to last through the rainy day. This is achieved by the use of inverter and battery banks to store energy. Embedded solar installation. This is done to be part of the structure either of roof, windows and walls. The solar panels are mounted to fit into the structure. Structured Cabling. This is considered during the initial design embedded during the construction to contain features such as; Network system, Detectors and Fire alarm systems. The need to have a building intelligently cannot be over emphasized. The security system having couples of camera and monitors with switches to activate alarm in the case of break in. The sense to monitor fire/smoke in a volatile area. Economic saving in energy consumption as the system shut the use of it as you exit, thus saving utility bills.

POWER SAVING IN OUR INSTITUTUTIONS

Umar uba
Kashim Lbrahim library
Ahmadu Bello University
Zaria..
Oct 2011


POWER SAVING IN OUR INSTITUTUTIONS

There have been several discussions on this issue but we shall not relent, rather we shall continue to struggle to save more power these great institutions.
Our institutions are major consumers of power in every PHCN District. This is because of our several students hostel rooms, vast office blocks, staff quarters, parks and streets. All these require a lot of lighting to keep peace in our schools.
The question is 'what sort of lighting medium are we using?'
The use of incandescent, Halogen and choked fluorescent lamps have been discovered to be a major consumer of our power. This became known after the introduction of energy saving lamps from the foreign markets.
I was impressed on my recent visit to an establishment that is a major consumer of power. i.e. The A.B.U. Teaching Hospital. Zaria. Although on medical ground the power saving measure is impressive. The hospital must have recorded a savings on its power tariff charged by the PHCN and will smile more if more measures are taken.
The idea of replacing the once upon common incandescent/halogen/choked lamps with energy saving lamps is welcome.
In an instance in the hospital a space with twenty five units of 40w =1000w choked fluorescent lamp is now being replaced with six units of 85w*6 =510w and a second sample is an office with 20w*4*4=320w that now conveniently lits with 85w*2=170w In most of the wards and spaces visited a 50% saving must have been recorded.
The time has come for us to adjust in our institutions same way as we have adjusted in our residences and business areas. so as to cut the rising PHCN tariff and diesel cost.
The transformation could be approached in stages.
stage 1: the student affairs could be charged to replace all the lamps in the students rooms to a lower wattage but brighter out-put lamps.
Stage 2: the street/parks that house these choked and halogen lamps should also be attended to similarly. Some departments in our various institutions are beginning to understand the use of these lamps and have had the bulbs in their individual offices replaced with the lower wattage lamps. More encouragement must be given.
The next stage is to issue an advice to residence in our quarters to imbibe this culture.
This and more will give the institutions an opportunity to save our funds for other resources.

The INEC’S DDC Machines – their limited use in the 2011election

The INEC’S DDC Machines – their limited use in the 2011election.
Being under the shadow of networks for a while now , I have come to terms with the progressively changing technology of computers and their networks.
The possibility of having a perfect election in the country for the 2011 was clearly the vision of INEC. This, of course was at their finger tips with these machines in use.
The decision of the government to acquire this technology and put it to use was to completely eliminate the fallacies of elections at all levels.
Computers and networks are required to handle these operations with the trained personnel having them on their laps. The operations solely rely on waves and power.
Firstly, the technology of the computer is beyond the limit of INEC’s operations to exhaust. These computers can even do more. It all depends on what we want them to do.
With what the government concur, to play with the dummies, the finger prints, image capture and data which are the key elements required during the registrations all powers were within the finger tips of the operators. These data once captured remain within the system for its own consumption only unless we use the waves and signals to extract them out either in print or stored in magnetic form.
Secondly, the network aspect of the technology is the medium that shares these resources among the dummies and other locations. It goes beyond the eyes, it is either in waves, light or metal (copper) it’s the wedding ring of computers.

Finger prints which have a probability of one in a million being the same is a major item field required for specicificity. In Nigeria, we have an average of 120- people having the same finger prints. Then comes the picture, this is prone to duplication with twins, kins. The probability of having a duplicate is high. Lastly, could the data/information such as name, age, telephone no etc all be wrong or untraceable?

The computers and other networks equipment are the hard wares that are physically visible to perform these jobs. To use this equipment, software is required to communicate between them. This side of the ddc machines is as important as the other. As the banks have succeeded in centralizing their operations with added limitations so also these machines could be made to follow suit. The software must have the ability to sort the data with accuracy how ever much it is to create very useful information in a millisecond. This ability of the software is far beyond what human calculation could handle.

The INEC registration machines must have come with this software and that was why the registration was a success. Unfortunately the software failed to attend to the issues of multiple registrations and duplicate data entry. This should be the character of each machine. It was as a result of this failure we had people registering in multiple places. These multiple registrations, for some were not deliberate but as result of a system failure during the initial registration. A case so many was when patrons registered and the personnel came back the next day and claimed the system has crashed therefore people must re register. Such cases came out with multiple registrations as the system failed to sort out the duplications.

What was expected from these machines was a similar enquiry and response we do get when registering the yahoomail or gmail address. In such instance the system must be connected to the inter-net. As we register it sifts through it if such a name or data had ever been entered. It then came out with an option. This was because the data provided by us was once entered by someone else. Therefore we have a different identity. The ddc machines could have done more owing to inclusion of finger-print and image.
Another failure of the INEC machines is the lack of wide Area networks for the wards and local government polls, metropolitan Area network for the states polls or the internet for the online one time national polls.

How best to use the ddc machines during elections:
(With everything being equal) having a good working machine with a well programmed software and an excellent network the hope of having a perfect election is at our finger-tips. If all the above conditions are satisfied, and the registration was conducted successfully with all data edited and sorted out all we will require is the fingertips recognition inter face and touch screen to make a perfect election.
Once you place your finger it simply recognizes you and displays a screen of ballot boxes. You then place the other finger tip and select the party of choice. As you release the first finger the screen disappears and wait for the next person. This operation takes barely two minutes.
The authenticity of this is that it can’t be manipulated and two people can’t vote at a time and one person cannot vote twice.
If all these are done, the next and subsequent elections in the country by a determined INEC to have a free, fair, credible and honest election will be hailed not only in Nigeria but world wide for a well handled election.


Umar Uba 2011