State of the Art ... Refrigerator?
 

Our refrigerator is now 21 years old, and it has been pretty darn good. The one day that I measured it's power consumption, it was 1.6kWh / day. Which is pretty good considering that it is 27 cubic feet (20 cu ft refrigerator and 7 cu ft freezer up top). The heat radiator is on the bottom which is generally a good thing, but it does collect dust and cat hair, etc.

So, I can put LED light bulbs in there, and I can cross my fingers that the new noises it is making are not an issue BUT - it will need to be replaced, maybe soon or maybe in a couple of years.

I want to buy the best refrigerator I can to replace it. It doesn't have to be so big, and the freezer in particular could be just for ice cubes and ice cream. We now have a 12.5 cu ft deep chest freezer in the basement to do the lion's share of that work.

I'm hoping for less than 0.5kWh / day and a very sturdy design and materials that could last 50+ years. The heat radiator ideally would be remote and could be put down in the basement or even underground. Is there anything out there like this?

I haven't heard of anything like this. Sounds like a good diy project though. Create your own fridge. It wouldn't be horribly complex. Rip the guts out of an older machine. Reuse the inside and doors, but remove the skin. Remote mount your heat exhanger, add as much insulation as you want and face it with whatever you want (wood would be relatively easy). Can't wait to see your finished product! :)

Yes, it is called Sun Frost. They are made in the USA, they are designed with extreme performance for wing nuts like us, and people who live off grid.


And LOOK HERE...


They are essentially hand built, so don't expect them to be cheap.

How strong is your commitment?

Best,

-AC

The diy guys have found that hacking a deep-freeze to run at fridge temps is ultra-efficient as all get out. The secret is that the top opens, keeping the cold inside the box. Remoting the heat source is near useless, as there is very little heat generated at all. Typical usage is 100 to 200 watt hours per day.

For a conventional, front-opening fridge with a freezer compartment, look at Bosch and Whirlpool.
Bosch has a euro-market line called the SmartCool. It uses like 60% less energy than regular fridges of comparable size. All the USA-market fridges have at least some of the SmartCool technology built into them. The SmartCool fridges are smaller than American models, because europeans in general have smaller appliances across the board.
Whirlpool won a 30 Million dollar prize for bringing a super efficient refrigerator line to market around a decade ago. They still get the best energy ratings. Check it out:
Best Refrigerator Comparison | Save Energy and Money at Enervee

But here's the punch line: none of these super efficient fridges are anywhere near cheap. As always, you get what you pay for.

Yeah, the front opening SunFrost R10 uses 170 watts per day...

Part of their secret is ultra insulation, another is that the compressor & coil are on top, so the refrigerator is not bathed in its own waste heat.

I'm really surprised that nobody on this forum has actually built a converted chest freezer/refrigerator. It's pretty cheap, it is known to work really well.

There have been avalanches of posts about putting bottles of water in refrigerators and carefully monitoring results looking unsuccessfully for some sign of reduced energy... but no conversion.

-AC

I hacked a freezer into a fridge. All you have to do is buy a controller. My Belkin Conserve Insight Energy-Use Monitor says it will cost me $27.91(@0.16Kw) a year to run, 2.3 to 2.4 KW.. The freezer is a Frigidaire Model # LFCH13M2MWO. 13-cu-ft-chest-freezer

Control Products TC-9102D-HV Dual Stage High Voltage Digital Temperature Controller
The controller is set to 39* & is half deep in the freezer.
Water starts to freeze in the bottom of freezer.

I hope I got everything right.
I tried to post links to all the stuff involved, but short on posts.

I'm the only one in the house.

Thanks for all the info - I'll keep my eyes open and we'll see how long the unit we have keeps going.

Check out the Energy Star list of qualified refrigerators - Refrigerators : ENERGY STAR

If you download the spreadsheet version you can sort to find the fridge that meets your size and efficiency requirements. Most on the list won't be as efficient as the fridges mentioned above, but at least you can compare purchase and operating costs.

FWIW,
Tim

fridge-freezer KGE39AI40 from Bosch, available only in Europe. Energy use 167 kw/yr.
Bosch fridge freezer in NA. 554 kw/yr. admittedly a much larger fridge.

lets hope that the new regulations for 2014 mean actual reductions in electricity use.

Why do you need a freezer in your fridge? my parents and I both have fridges that are only fridges, no freezer and it's great! their chest freezer is in the basement, mine is in my laundry room, people come over and notice that my fridge is smaller then they are used to then they look inside and ask what the deal is because they see it has a ton of space inside, all at eye level and it looks huge inside, all because I don't have all this space wasted at eye level with freezer that I only use every few days.
Mine is a Danby and my parents have a Crosley, mine used 338kwh per year.

Danby, huh?

I'm doing OK with a 3.2 cubic foot refrig. that I got at a thrift store for $20. Mine has a freezer which is worthless. I'm thinking about upscaling to a 4.4 cubic foot refrig, with no freezer.

I'm looking at someting LIKE THIS...


I'm not so crazy about Walmart, but they had a good picture.

The power consumption looks surprisingly high, considering the small size. I think that by defeating the de-frost system, a lot more energy could be reduced.

I also don't usually drink anything that comes out of a can or bottle, so that feature is a burden to me.

This is definitely NOT a state of the art refrig, but it is thrifty.

...and I have a freezer down cellar.

-AC

Under-Counter Freezer Conversion?
 

I'm still considering the all-refrig shown above, but I have that nagging voice in the background telling me that I should convert a freezer to an ultra-high efficiency refrigerator.

So, mousing about through the web, I came across this little beauty:



Then, just a few mouse gestures away, I found this:



Need I say more???

-AC

I replaced a 20 year old fridge last year (before I went off the deep end conservation wise) with the most efficient fridge I could find in a retail shop.

It ended up being a Whirlpool 20 cubic feet, bottom freezer. No ice outlet on the door. In our home its annual consumption is 1 kwh/day. EPA rates it 400 kwh/year. I will say that like with homes, the size can be deceiving. This fridge has excellent space design, and is big enough for our family of 4. IIRC it cost about $900 once my shopping skills were exhausted.

Dr. Best's converted freezer is a great read, but I remain skeptical that his rationale is right. I have monitored my standard fridge/freezer for hours without opening it (late PM to early AM) and do not see the low power consumption I expect from not opening the door.

I suspect that no freezer and much better insulation are most of the explanation.

This Bosch is rated 386 wh/day, although I do not know the testing protocol.

Can you post a link to your Whirlpool, please? What is the freezer - a drawer or a door? If it is a drawer, does it have closed sides?

Neil,

The fridge model is ItemDescription = 21.9 cu. ft. Single-Door Bottom-Freezer Refrigerator
(GB2FHDX)

I'll take a picture of the freezer drawer open later.

So am I to understand that you have one of these running on US grid power?

(Sorry, I thought you were talking about the amazing KGE39AI40...)

-AC

Yes -- apologies if I was unclear.

I *wish* I had that one :)
If my arithmetic is right it is small by US standards at 12 cubic feet, but even so it is remarkably efficient, and not horribly expensive.
I posted it for Neil's review. Every website I found though was European, so I doubt it can easily be bought here in the US.

European appliances are always going to be smaller and more energy-efficient in general. The reason being is that 90% or better of european consumers prefer the minimalist style of design. A big, American, cube refrigerator would look completely out of place, especially in some shade of beige or off-white. It would disrupt the sleek, almost tool box or medical look of the room. A typical euro-fridge-icebox would go in the same place as a dishwasher in America. Freezer down low, if it has one. It would look like just another cabinet.
For the lavish, built-in cabinet units are common. You wouldn't even know it was a refrigerator until you opened the door. Most are tall and narrow, like a pantry cabinet. They are smaller because the Europeans take pride in using fresh ingredients for meals and cooking from scratch in no time flat. In the time it would take me to make mac and cheese from a box and nuke some green giant vegetables, any self respecting Frenchman or Italian would have already made dinner for 4 and ate half of it. By the time I had sat down to eat my "30 minute meal", eurochef would be sipping on some alcoholic beverage I couldn't spell by listening to its name.

My wife likes to say that the French shop for fresh food almost daily.

What can I say, if I lived within walking distance of an open air market, I would too. As it is, I expect my 'fresh' fruits and vegetables to last close to a week in the fridge.

Thanks for the Whirlpool frig model number - the search I did came up with this:

Whirlpool Gold® 22 cu. ft. Resource Saver

Which says it uses ~60w so that is ~1.4kWh/day. That is decent, but when I measured my 27cu ft Kitchen Aid (21 years old!) it only uses ~1.6kWh/day. If the lights are not LED's then the bulbs can be changed, and this saves on the heat gain and the power use, too.

Edit: according to this site it uses ~1.1kWh/day, so that is certainly pretty good. Is this an accurate picture? It uses a 40W incandescent bulb, so a nice 6-8W LED would be a good change.

http://federsoutlet.com/wp-content/u...-30-101517.jpg

A lot of the reviews on Amazon talk about water condensing in the bottom of the freezer and a clogged drain, and it seems like this is a pretty serious issue. Also it may be noisier than some?

Man I wish they sold that Bosch SmartCool over here in the States - <400Wh/day would be amazing...

Neil,
That is indeed the model.
If you look under the 'manual' tab on the link you posted you will find the EnergyGuide pdf. That is where I quoted the 400 kwh/year from.

In our house the annual consumption is right about 360 kwh. Similar to cars and EPA MPG, I suggest using the EnergyGuide kwh ratings for comparison purposes.

Ours has been problem free. I do not know if that is because we are lucky to have a problem free model, or our use does not bring the problem out. Fwiw I live in a dry climate, and we do not open the freezer very often.

As for noise, my wife never hears it; I hear it every time it starts up because I am sensitized to energy use in the house, my hearing is quite good, and the ambient noise in our house is otherwise close to silent. I do not find the noise bad. I honestly doubt that any but a very small percentage of owners find this a problem. Perhaps ALL of them have complained on the internet ? ;)

I think that there is another reason. European energy prices are about 2X what they are in North America. The US subsidizes energy via our global military presence. Even as I write, the US is indirectly (for sure), and directly (almost certainly) meddling in the internal affairs of Venezeuela, Iraq, Iran, the Caspian basin (and yet to be publicized areas in Africa)... all oil producing regions.

Also, European homes are usually smaller than in N. America, so smaller appliances fit in with the smaller homes. I live in a small home, and regular sized refrigerators really seem out of place. Also for me, too often the refrigerator is the place where food goes to die. I'm finding that a small capacity keeps me current on the contents of the food in the refrigerator.

-AC

I've been writing down some of the refrigeration devices we have been discussing here, and also a few I've been looking into...


BTW, the third up from the bottom (Frostman), the one I am presently using, is the one found in a thrift shop for $20 . I put a kill-a-watt on it for a day and did the calcs for what it would be for a year ($11.78/year).

It has external coils on the back.

-AC

I cannot help but point out that your units should be Wh/day, not watts ;)

Useful Tool...
 

I came across this Refrigerator and Freezer Energy Rating Database.

I don't recall anyone posting a link to it before.

Best,

-AC

AC_Hacker's Hasty Freezer To Refrigerator Hack
 

You will be interested in my work of converting a small upright freezer to a refrigerator. Pictures & story HERE.

Best,

-AC

For those who want a quick fridge fix I was just at Home Depot.
Magic Chef 10 cu.ft. fridge/freezer 312 kwh
4.5 cu.ft. fridge/freezer 245 kwh.

I bought the 10 cu.ft. No more hauling propane!