Having a long hot shower in winter is becoming something of a luxury during the cost of living crisis as electricity prices soar.
Airtasker electrician Ethan Bagnati says a household of four having two 10 minute showers a day would cost about $2012 a year.
It’s safe to assume a household of four having one 20 minute shower a day each would add $2012 to power bills annually too.
So all we have to do to save some money is to take shorter showers, even cutting them down by a minute or two will help lower your utility costs.
“What we’re trying to advise people is spending half that time in the shower, even more than half if possible, and that obviously will reduce their savings by half, which would bring it to roughly $1006 per year in savings,” Bagnati tells 9honey Money.
Those who take one 10 minute shower a day could also save hundreds by cutting down their shower time to five minutes.
There are waterproof digital clocks with timers that you can pop in the shower or you can set a timer on your phone and leave it somewhere in the bathroom where it won’t get wet.
The latter option could make you even more likely to have a shorter shower as you have to get out to go and turn the timer off.
A big money saver that doesn’t involve sacrificing shower time is changing halogen down lighting to a more energy efficient option.
“In the average home, if you were to convert your down lights to let’s say LED down lights you can save up to $757 or more on your power bill each and every year.
“You’ll miss out on the first year of savings [because of the cost of] getting them installed. However, if you’re planning to live in your home for 10, 15, 20 years, obviously, you’re going to be saving in the realm of like $10 to $15,000 [in total over time].”
Replacing halogen down lights is something you’ll need to hire an electrician to do, but in the meantime there are a few other things you can do right now to save some power.
Those things include not leaving appliances like your microwave and TV on standby and using an air conditioner to heat the room rather than a small portable heater.