Ideas to lower electricity usage in our tanks.

[Daemonfly]

Currently setting up frag system in the basement, and always considered insulating the tanks (rubbermaid stocks) to save on heating costs. Even though most of the heat is probably lost from the surface, I'm sure insulating the sides could make some difference. Was also considering air-lifts for main flow in frag tank, but the "new" propeller powerheads are quite efficient.

As for greenhouse, I read that you can use large black barrels/containers of water to help hold the heat. Sun heats it up during the day, and the heat built up helps keeps temps up during the night.

 

[Mikep503]

Best tool I have found is a Kill-a-watt meter. Look it up online if you dont know what it is. Very simple to use. Easily tells wich devices are drawing the most juice.

 

[jayk198030]

Chris, the current draw of a 220V line will generally be HALF the current of a 115V line, but that does not reduce your electric bill. You are buying WATTS of power, not amps of current.

P=IV

Power (in watts) = Current (in amps) x Voltage

Twice the voltage and half the amps still adds up to the same amount of watts. Unfortunately.

voltage is E. so it wouyld be P(power)= E(voltage) x I(amps)

ohms law P=EI

 

[Ben_Im]

1. Reduce your dawn/dusk time settings.
I.e. Have your actinics turn on half an hour before and after your photoperiod rather than an hour before and after. In just one month that saves 30 hours of running time. That really adds up!

2. Put your refugium light on reverse photo-period rather than 24/7.

3. Better insulation in the room the aquarium is in. I.e. leaving windows closed when its hot/cold outside to minimize temperature flucuations that kick on heaters or chillers.

4. Running more eficient powerheads. I.e. my old AC70 powerheads took up 20 watts and my Koralia 3's which put out comparable flow only take up 10 watts. (these numbers were not confirmed by a kill-a-watt, just going by manufacturer information.

5. Running your skimmer 12 hours a day, or even just a couple times a week. I have mine setup on a timer to turn on during the day when I'm feeding the fish. I.e. it turns on at 10 am, I usually feed once at noon and once around 4-5, then the skimmer turns off at 10pm.

The list goes on and on.

 

[tattooreef]

this thread is very interesting to me , as i am in the middle of redoing my system at home. i was using a ton of power, on my 11 foot display system, i decided to go half the length, wich in turn will allow a lot less equipment. i am cutting down from 5 halides on standard reflectors, to two with luminarcs to increase light, without more halides, i am adding a small amount of t-5 for color suplement, downsizing my skimmer from an E.T.S.S 1400 with a high pressure pump to a smaller msx , instead of the reeflo barracuda and OM 4way, using vortech mp40's bringing my sump back indoors, instead of a room inthe garage , wich should cut back on the size of heaters considerably, instead of a high pressure return, going with a small mag drive.
over all i should be cutting my energy consumption to a fourth of what it was, all the while having a very impressive setup, with demesions being 66l x 24w x 31h with a starphire front panel, and the rest of the tank and sump insulated with styrofoam

 

[Colione]

LEDs!

I save money on it's usage over my MHs, as well since my chiller comes on only twice a day instead of the typical 48 times.

 

[stymee69]

wow there are a lot of awsome ideas coming from this. I guess luckily for all of us technology is advancing quikly for our hobby and most of the manufactures of our favorite gadgets and gizmos pumps and lights are thinking towards the future with leds, dimable ballasts ,12 volt circulation pumps(vortech and others), more efficeint chillers and main pumps. all that being said it is still up to us as to how we implement these new ideas ...I love how we tend to scavenge great tech from other industries for example geothermal this will work but it will take someone to try it and perfect it for our uses ..
not to mention if we can cut our electric bills we can spend more money on corals and fish.

 

[malawiman]

i use a ton of energy. i have 2450w of mh lighting. there are a few things i do to try to reduce costs and energy use.

1. i open the blinds that allow natural sunlight into our display tank.

2. i plumbed my large sumps to the basement along with the highest wattage light and most of the equipment. this has enabled us to have no need for a chiller since the basement stays fairly constant in temp.

3. using my central ac/heat/fan to control temps in the house. i removed the humidifyer from the intake side of the ducting before the blower fan. removing this unit left a 2'x2' hole in the duct, this hole makes a large intake and it pulls in heat and moister and spreads it thruout the house cooling the basement and inturn the tank.

4.since i pump water upstairs to the displays i use the drains and gravity to provide lots of flow and oxygen exchange to my sps tank downstairs.

5. i also placed my 55g rodi container on a high ledge in the basement, that way i am able to use gravity for my top off/ salt mix fill.

6. i also use fans on the water surface and to cool all my se mh bulbs ballasts and sockets so they can run as efficently as possible.

7. in the summer when temps spike i will try to top off with cool rodi water around 2-4pm "the hottest time of the day" to lower the tank temp and lessen the strain on the ac unit for the house.

im always looking for more ways to be efficent and i caught the idea to insulate tanks, this would be awsome for my system in the winter i plan to insulate all 3 of my rubbermaid stock tanks to keep in heat for winter. btw i only use a total of 400w of heaters for my 570g system thanks to the heat from the lights.

i will be following this thread very closely.

 

[ohchiz84]

How can we as reefkeepers lower the amount of electricity we use? I feel that many of us do what we can to only buy aquacultured aquaria and even propagate ourselves, but in keeping these specimines we use millions of kW per year. There has tone ways to lower our collective impact on the planet.

I know there are existing solutions, such as solar power or sun tubes, but for renters or building tenants this may not even be an option.

I would like this thread to explore ideas to light, heat and cool our tanks, and circulate and filter the water, while using less power. Who wants to share their ideas?

yeah i kinda find it hilarious when people go on rants about trying to be green, this really isnt a green hobby. you put out 1lb of carbon for every 1000-1500 watts/hour you use if your power comes from coal, and a lot of people have 750w or more worth of lighting.

 

[somdinwong]

i am changing from 720w of light to 360. switching from mh and vho to all t5's. that being said i love my mh's but am trying a new thing. also going to dosing pumps away from my ca reactor. a whole lotta less power. i figure i will cut my electric in half

 

[evoracer]

yeah i kinda find it hilarious when people go on rants about trying to be green, this really isnt a green hobby. you put out 1lb of carbon for every 1000-1500 watts/hour you use if your power comes from coal, and a lot of people have 750w or more worth of lighting.

Yeah, and trying to lower that is stupid, huh? I kind of find it hilarious when people have nothing better to do with their time than rant about other people. Nice third post BTW.

 

[Big E]

I've been running my lights for 5 hours a day for two years with good results.......no more than that is needed.

Eliminate supplemental lighting. There are a ton of options in bulbs for spectrum. Supplementlal lighting is not needed.

If you use T5's you probably aren't going to have to worry about heat, so try to avoid the heater coming on as often by covering the sump & having a canopy to limit evaporation.

 

[scolley]

yeah i kinda find it hilarious when people go on rants about trying to be green, this really isnt a green hobby.

No one said this was a green hobby. And there are no rants in this thread. It's just people looking for ways to improve the status quo.

You're on what, your 3rd post here at RC? If you can't be positive and help, please find another thread.

 

[ohchiz84]

Yeah, and trying to lower that is stupid, huh? I kind of find it hilarious when people have nothing better to do with their time than rant about other people. Nice third post BTW.

sorry mr president, but i guess i have to start somewhere. not a bad idea to try to lower it, but ive seen a couple of these threads and i always see people with 80-200g tanks in their signature harping about helping the enviornment, even a 20g tank tank probably sucks more juice than a modern fridge, but nano tanks are the only way to go if youre halfway serious about saving power

 

[johnd651]

+1 on insulating the tanks.

i rent, and the landlord does not pay heat, and its electric heat. $110 a month just for heat now!!! anyway, enough of that.

i used the thick blue insulation that goes under vinyl siding, and put it behind my FW tank, and underneath the tank. You can not see it since its in the stand, and on the side facing the wall, but it has about cut the Kwh that the heaters have been pulling almost in half.

 

[malawiman]

I've been running my lights for 5 hours a day for two years with good results.......no more than that is needed.

Eliminate supplemental lighting. There are a ton of options in bulbs for spectrum. Supplementlal lighting is not needed.

If you use T5's you probably aren't going to have to worry about heat, so try to avoid the heater coming on as often by covering the sump & having a canopy to limit evaporation.

taking out actinic and even moon lights are a good idea. i use hamilton 14000k bulbs on 250w, 400w, and 1000w apps. the corals have vibrant color and exceptional growth. :dance:
also the conopy or cover is a great idea i would aviod any thing between the lights and the water. ie. glass covers, the ones that usually come stock with tanks. any type of cover would only be blocking light and be a waste of energy. Im thinking of making an cone shaped enclosure from the edge of my stock tanks to the lights and line the inside with reflectors. :idea:hey rubbermaid product development lol.

but i run my lights 12hrs. 1,200w 6am-6pm and 1,250w 6pm-6am there is some over lap time also.

 

[The Seaward]

Rainy Day Powersaver

Rainy Day Powersaver

I don't think I've seen anyone mention leaving the lights off for a day here and there. We have all had blackouts and hopefully most of our tank inhabitants and us have survived. There are overcast and rainy days on the reef as well. Every now and then when we are out for the day, working hard to afford these aquariums, we should turn some or all of the lights off for a day.

Checking my calendar log for 2009 I note two 4 hour blackouts during the photoperiod and 16 days lacking light since I thought about doing this during the April showers. I saved 21840 watts and I only use 130watt compact florescent for 10 hours daily. For those of you with the 400watt halides that would be over 64000 watts a year you could go without! Not to mention the power you could save turning off the chiller in conjunction with those powerful lamps.

I know you're not saving a ton of money with the low kWH rates in some areas, but the important thing is that you are not wasting power on an unnatural photoperiod that you aren't even around to see. And my Acropora is still alive and fragging by the way.

 

[kvosstra]

As many have mentioned here already, the use of a heater is actually a large draw element to our tanks that many people simply dont notice, since its not bright and shiny like our lights and pumps. All the suggestions of using submersible or water cooled pumps in winter, and air cooled/external in the summer are right on! But, to truly maximize the efficiency, we probably need a "smart" program to allow the temperature to creep up just a bit at the end of the evening, so as to "save" some heat for the night. That same controller could also open and/or close vents for the sump to keep in heat or vent heat, etc. In the end, the controller would have to "learn" how to maximize the heat in the tank.
This does probably mean that the tank will have a larger daily temperature swing, but really, I don't see that as a huge issue. If you have ever been in the ocean, you know that there are occasional warm and cold patches of water, and these move in and out of the reefs all the time.

 

[LPino]

There are some really great ideas in this thread. I try to save energy$$$$$$ by using gravity as much as I can. For example my Refugium is fed via the main pump and is drained straight into the sump. So no additional pumps required.

Also, it shouldn't really matter how many posts one has. Just because one has few posts does not mean they are worth less.

 

[phobos2deimos]

My 240 is in the garage. My bill was very cheap in the summer, but the winter is killing me. Bill went up by $150, I'm pretty sure most of that is from the heaters.

I run my T5s about 2" from the water surface.
Lighting is from 8:00PM - 3:00AM.
Got rid of the sump.
Insulated the sides and back of the display.

Plan to:
Close off the canopy completely.
Put glass covers over the entire tank to cut evaporation and heat loss.

I use 4xK4s in my tank for flow. I plan on adding one K8 on each side of the tank and putting them on 10 min on/5 min off alternating cycles to create a quick tidal effect.