Power Ratings (typical) for Common Appliances

Typical Power Ratings for Appliances

We have provided a list of many of appliances and their typical power ratings (in Watts). You can use this information to help you estimate to total amount of Watt*Hours that your alternative energy system needs to supply on an average day. Power ratings of most appliances are usually listed on the appliance itself or its manual.

For a final calculation of your watt*hour usage, we recommend that you look at each appliance to be powered to find it rated power. We also offer meters (Brand Power Meter and the Kill A Watt Power Meter) which are specifically designed to measure how much power an appliance consumes. For detailed specifications on the Brand 1850W model, click here, or for the Kill A Watt Meter click here.

When determining how many Watt x Hours you're appliances will use keep in mind that many of the appliances that you might use will only be run for an average of a few minutes per day. For instance a 500W weed eater may be used for 1 hour every week. That translates to an average of 71Watt*Hours per day (500W / 7 Days).

Also, there are appliances like refrigerators which although appear to be "on" all day, actually are running between 12 to 15 hours a day (turning off and on as needed). Air conditioning units run on and off all day depending on the cooling needs of the home and the outdoor temperature.

Finally, be aware of "ghost loads". These are devices that people commonly forget to include in their calculations. These devices typically consume a small amount of energy (<1W) but are running 24 hours a day. Examples of typical ghost loads would be AC adapters, clocks, VCRs, TVs, microwaves and printers. Many of these devices require power to maintain their clocks running (e.g. VCR, TV and microwave). Although the amount of energy consumed on an hourly basis is small, the fact that they run all day can easily add as much as 100W*Hrs per day.

* These items should either be powered by non-electric sources (gas, passive solar, etc.) or should not be powered by a PV system because they are considered to be an inefficient appliance to power by solar or wind electric sources.