Do you care what your hard earned cash is used for? For many people, the answer is yes. This is why we all want to look for an appliance that can help us save energy. The thing about serving energy is that you are not just ensuring the health of your finances, but also ensuring the health of the earth.
The less energy you use, the fewer emissions into the atmosphere . Even though your contribution may look like a drop in the ocean, when every one of us chooses to use an energy efficient toaster oven, the difference made can be massive.
In this article, our idea is to look at how you can select an oven that delivers more but uses less energy. When your oven is efficient, you do not only use less energy, you are also cooking faster and serving time.
But before we even look at energy efficiency relating to toaster ovens, let’s look at what energy efficiency entails. This will help you across the board with all your other appliances in the home. Saving energy should be a holistic approach, integrated across different appliances in your home.
What is Energy Efficiency
Energy efficiency means using the same amount of energy in order to attain the same result. One thing that people always confuse is energy efficiency and energy conservation.
While energy efficiency in electricity means looking for appliances that can do the work without using more energy, conservation means going without an appliance so as to save energy.
When looked at in terms of toaster ovens, this means that you have to look specifically for those that will help you do the work of cooking, baking, toasting, and others without necessarily using too much energy.
How the Toaster Oven Saves Energy
An energy efficient toaster oven can save energy in a number of ways. Firstly, they have smaller interiors which take less time to warm up when compared to your regular oven. So, if you were baking or heating up something small, you do not have to heat up a whole regular oven and waste electricity. This one uses less electricity.
Energy efficient toaster ovens cook your food much faster. Why? Because air that cooks the food is confined to smaller space. The hot air does not have to travel long distances in order to get into contact with the food that is being cooked.
This will lead to a faster rate of cooking as there is less heat allowed to escape through the walls of the oven. This is the reason why it is easy to lower the heat by about 30 degrees when you are using a toaster oven and still get the same results you would if you were using a regular oven.
Tips for Choosing an Energy Efficient Toaster Oven
The main advantage of a toaster oven is that it should save you money, time and space. The oven saves you time as you can bake, toast, roast, and broil than you can do when you are using other means. It helps you to save money as you will use less energy and thus your bill will be lower.
If you have a small kitchen, you save space that could have otherwise been taken by a bigger oven. Check out the following features when you are buying your toaster oven and you are likely to come back with one that will save you lots of energy.
Convention Technology
Research shows that using a convection toaster oven can help you to save about 40% energy when they are put up against traditional toaster ovens. The time needed to get the heat around the whole oven is much less, which means that you start cooking much earlier than you do if you were using a bigger traditional oven.
Insulation
Insulation is one of the biggest disadvantages of toaster ovens. However, technology is constantly improving when it comes to this area. The bigger the toaster oven, the more likely that it is properly insulated. Good insulation ensures that the oven does not get too hot on the outside and therefore leave you exposed to the risk of burns.
Good insulation ensures that most of the heat generated is used to cook the food and not heat the room. A more energy efficient toaster oven would be one that has a door that seals well and possibly two layers of glass on the door.
Temperature Controls
Electronic controls that work properly help to control the amount of heat inside the oven. Ovens with digital controls actually keep using energy even when they are in standby mode.
Even though this energy may be very small, if millions of households are doing this at the same time, this could be a huge amount of energy. On the other hand, ovens that use manuals knobs do not use any electricity when they are in standby mode.
How You Can Figure Out Energy Consumption
If you are interested in knowing how much your toaster oven is consuming in terms of energy, you can always use a simple formula.
Take the time you use the toaster for and multiply this by the wattage and then divide this number by 1000. With this calculation, you will get an idea of the kilowatt hours used. The cost of your kilowatt hour will be determined by looking at your electricity bill.
Choosing an energy efficient toaster oven is only the first of your tasks. You will want to consider issues of safety when you are using this appliance. Never sacrifice your safety just to save energy. Always remember the outer shell of your toaster oven tends to get quite hot.
Do not allow things like dishtowels, papers, curtains and other stuff that can burn quickly to come into contact with the oven while you are using it. Ensure that the pans you use in the oven are suitable for such use.
Ensure that the food you are cooking is not dripping into the oven as this could easily start a fire. Never leave food on the toaster unattended.
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