Refrigerator update

When we moved into House 5, it had the original Maytag 18.5 ft3 refrigerator that was installed in 2000. It had one feature I had never lived with before, an icemaker. It took me some time to realize that the weird sounds I occasionally heard coming from the fridge was it cranking out the cubes. We don't use much ice, and being middle-aged actually learned in our youth how to fill ice cube trays (similar to being able to count, and tell time by the big hand and the little hand, and other lost arts) so eventually I turned that feature off. Researchers at NIST recently reported that they tested four new refrigerators and the icemakers added 12 to 20 percent to the rated energy consumption (http://www.nist.gov/el/building_environment/ice-041211.cfm). The not-so-cool discovery was that 75% of this energy comes from heating the molds to release the ice. Duh. Oh, and the ratings you see on the big yellow sticker don't include the energy used by the icemaker, apparently because someone decided it would be too hard to measure. Double duh.

Anyway, being a complusive measurer, I plugged the Maytag into a kWh meter and measured its usage during March. This is a time of year where the house is perhaps slightly cooler than average. The annualized energy usage was 655 kWh. I knew I could do better, and maybe find a quieter refrigerator also.

I checked the Energy Star ratings (http://www.energystar.gov/index.cfm?fuseaction=refrig.search_refrigerators) and learned that the most efficient refrigerators were 16.5 ft3 models made by GE*, and that they didn't make them anymore. This despite the fact that these units were well reviewed by owners. Moving up to an 18.1 ft3 unit added 11 kWh/year, so after a few days of trying to find the last 16.5 ft3 model left I capitulated to being an American and found that the 18.1 ft3 one I wanted was also discontinued in favor of a newer version that used more energy. Duh (are you sensing a trend here?) I found the one I wanted, on sale as it happened, being discontinued and all, and bought it. It cost $517 shipped to Martha's Vineyard (Land of No Free Shipping Zip Codes). It does not have an icemaker. It is rated at 335 kWh/year.

I've been measuring its energy consumption and after about six weeks it looks like we're headed for an annual energy usage of 260 kWh unless it goes way up in the summer. I gave the Maytag away (I learned to my chagrin that all three of my work colleagues who immediately responded to my offer were intending to use this as a second, in-the-basement fridge). The GE seems quieter than the Maytag, which we appreciate.

One test I use to evaluate whether something is a reasonable energy investment is to look at kWh saved and compare with the cost of solar electric capacity to generate the equivalent amount of energy. This is reasonable IMO as long as the investments being compared have similar service life. I thought that a fridge mightn't last as long as a solar electric system, so this wasn't an optimal comparison. Anyway, here on MV we see that one watt of PV will make about 1.2 kWh/year, and has a marginal cost before subsidies of perhaps $6-7. If the GE fridge saves 400 kWh/year, that's the output of about 330 W of PV costing $2,000 or more. Fridge looks good.

* The most efficient refrigerators are actually still Sunfrost, but the margin is getting smaller, and the PVs cost less per kWh saved, and plus they are a pain to actually use because they are cube shaped so you need orangutan arms to reach half the stuff.

Comments

[Kate Stephenson]

I am constantly annoyed at how much noise my fridge makes... and this is motivating me to plug in the Kill-o-watt meter and figure out how much juice it is actually using. I've been frustrated with the calculators that supposedly tell you whether it's "worth it" to replace your fridge- I like your calculations better- easy to do and understand.
The question is, now that this model is no longer available, what's the next best thing?

[Marc Rosenbaum]

Noisy refrigerators are a common complaint. It's hard to determine how noisy a fridge is ahead of time without going and hearing one in the shop (where there is more background noise than your quiet home).
I was surprised that the 11 year old Maytag was as energy-intensive as it was - I thought that efficiency had been cranked up by then. What I suggest is to get the Energy Star listing I linked in the article, sort it for the features you want (I got a top freezer because bottom freezers use more energy) and then see if they are available.
One thing you'll learn by looking at the listings is that there are far fewer companies making these products than there are brand names. When you see four in a row with identical specs, you'll know that they're made by one manufacturer and labeled by the other three.

[John Morgan]

Marc,

I bought the same model GE refrigerator last winter, and was also disturbed to hear it is being replaced by a less efficient model. I will be interested to hear if you can reach the annual energy usage of 260 kWh. I was initially very bullish about the low energy consumption, with the house at 60 degrees for the winter, but the warmer weather pattern is already clear. At the rate it fluctuates with the ambient temp. I can see it shooting well over 1 kWh per day during the summer months. I'm keeping daily records of ambient temp. and refrigerator consumption.

[Marc Rosenbaum]

I'm sure it will go up during the summer. The room it's in has probably averaged 69-70F since we installed the GE fridge. Over a year, I expect the average temperature will be higher because we intend to install a wood stove to use in the coldest months.

[Daniel Bergey]

I was excited by the NIST report, with it's surprising answer. Friends ask me about ice makers, and we'd all guessed that it would be about a wash, if convenience didn't change ice consumption. So much better to have real data.

[Patti Roads]

Hey Marc - great post! Just writing to say I love what you're doing here. This type of stuff really interests me - keep on writing!

Thanks, House #16 ;)