By David Dodge
The Energy Detective is back! We loved our story on Ron Kube, the Energy Detective. He’s the guy from St. Albert, Alberta who slashed his electricity bill by more than half by simply changing light bulbs, unplugging a beer fridge and slaying his power vampires.
But while we’re in Ron’s home filming our story he fed us some amazing lentil soup that he cooked using a Thermos cooker. Unbenownst to us, this was yet another of Ron’s energy saving experiments. Ron cooked the same recipe in a slow cooker, a pressure cooker and a Thermos cooker.
Almost five times less energy
The results were amazing. The slow cooker was an energy disaster, using 1,224 watt hours of electricity. The pressure cooker was better using 538 watt hours of electricity, but the Thermos cooker was almost five times more efficient than the slow cooker using only 280 watt hours of electricity to slow cook the lentil soup for six hours!
Here at Green Energy Futures we love energy efficient solutions that not only save money, but are actually better than the alternative solutions. The Thermos cooker not only uses very little energy, once it starts cooking it’s portable. You can take it on a picnic, to the office, backyard or anywhere you want since once it starts cooking you do not need a plug in.
And if that’s not enough you can simmer your Thermos cooker on an induction hot plate which is twice as efficient as a conventional stove top. Induction stoves are amazing appliances that are much better than conventional or gas stoves and twice as efficient, but the lowest price stove we’ve seen in Canada is around $1,200. A super efficient hot plate is about $99.
Here’s the nub – the Thermos Shuttle Chef and numerous similar Thermos products are widely available in Asia, but not in North America. But you can order one from Amazon for about $200.
Our original Energy Detective story was one of our favourite stories, be sure to check it out to learn how you can save a lot of energy in your home by doing pretty simple things.