Electric appliances are almost everywhere, they have actually come to be so typical in our lives that it’s almost unimaginable to think they barely existed 100 years earlier. We use electricity from the moment we awaken in the morning to the moment we go to sleep at night and in most cases even while we sleep.
It is electricity that gives us light, powers our alarms as well as our handheld devices. That unseen source of power that travels via wires into our houses allows us to boil the kettle or turn on the coffee machine before we leave the house in the morning, it maintains our living spaces at a comfortable temperature. We use it to wash our clothes and also our dishes, heat our meals and we can even travel using electrical vehicles.
For a lot of home appliances in the home, electric is the only readily available option, for others manually operated or gas-powered options exist, but despite the alternatives it’s very difficult to picture life without electrical energy.
When it pertains to electrical devices, not all appliances are created the same. Some models of electrical appliances require more repair. Whether you are thinking about a refrigerator or a cooker, a washing machine or a humidifier there will be hundreds of choices available with a variety of price points, colors, capacities and degrees of effectiveness.
What are Electric Home Appliances?
Put simply electrical energy is the transfer of negative electrons from one place to another. Electricity is almost everywhere. In towns, people are continuously surrounded by it, from the power in our buildings to the streetlights all around us. But, even in the most remote areas we still see it as lightning or static as well as the electrical transmissions that move around our bodies signalling our thoughts and our movements.
Ever since we have been able to capture electrical power humankind has been frequently discovering innovative ways to create it and use it.
Electrical appliances are any devices in your house where the main power source is electrical power. Other appliances, such as gas appliances often still need to be plugged in and also contain electrical components yet the key fuel isn’t electricity. As an example, a gas hob might have an electric spark or a gas dryer still needs electric to turn the drum.
Different Kinds of Electrical Home Appliances?
We use major electrical appliances in our houses for all types of day to day jobs consisting of heating as well as cooling our houses, refrigeration, cooking, laundry, and washing ourselves.
A lot of us will make use of any number of these common electrical appliances:
- Fridges
- Freezers
- Cookers
- Hobs
- Dishwashers
- Air conditioners
- Heaters
- Washers
- Dryers
Obviously there are a large number of other smaller appliances that save time such as kettles, toasters, blenders, grinders, curling tongs, vacuum cleaners, humidifiers and coffee machines.
Pros of Electric Home Appliances
Electrical energy and electric home appliances have noticeably changed our lives in the past 100 years. In 1925 only 50% of US houses had electrical energy yet these days we cannot think of day to day existence without it and find it tough to function during a blackout.
- Electricity is very easy to distribute. It may be a large investment to get a gas line but the fall in the price point of photo-voltaic panels in the last few years means you can have electricity even if you live off-grid.
- While gas is harder to replace, electrical power has many practical ecologically sound options and plenty of utilities give consumers the option of acquiring eco-friendly energy which serves to raise demand and encourage further production.
- Electric devices save vast swathes of time, whether it’s preparing your food, cleaning your clothes or heating water so you can have a bath, life’s easier with electrical energy.
- Electric home appliances are coming to be more and more effective and it is now simpler than ever to choose energy saving home appliances as they have labels as well as the ENERGY STAR rating.
Cons of Electrical Home Appliances
Naturally while electrical appliances have become essential to modern living, no one would wish to go back to having no refrigeration or go back to having to light the stove every time they wanted to cook, all this simplicity does come at a cost and enhancements in modern technology could mean that alternatives ended up being more cost effective.
- Most electricity is still created from fossil fuels and even green energy sources still have an environmental cost.
- A lot of potential energy is wasted when converting the power captured in oil and coal to electrical energy we can make use of in our houses.
- Electrical appliances are generally more complex and therefore tougher to mend than gas devices.
- Unless you have a backup battery or generator, even the highest spec electric appliances doesn’t work if you have a power outage.
Is an Electric Appliance Right for Your Home?
Climate change and continued use of non-renewable energy sources has come to be a hot topic in recent years resulting in lots of reasons to wish to cut your dependence on oil and coal by choosing less energy intensive appliances or finding ways to reduce energy including turning down the thermostat, taking shorter showers and drying your clothes outside.
While there are currently large gas reserves all over the United States this will not always be the case and although bio-gas is a possible replacement it does still release greenhouse gasses into the air.
Electrical energy isn’t disappearing in the near future. While innovations are constantly getting better as to where we get our electricity from electricity itself isn’t changing. You might be harnessing your electricity from nature yet, it won’t change the fact that you can plug in your home appliances in the same way.
If you are considering new devices try to choose the most energy efficient design you can afford as this will make you cash over the life of the appliance and consider smart home appliances that you can manage from your phone and enable you to precisely monitor power consumption. If the desire to conserve power extends to the ecological effects find out if your utility provider provides a green tariff, and if not switch to one that does.