The amount of energy used in a home depends on:
- the number of people in the home and how they use different appliances
- whether the home uses electricity, gas or both
- the energy efficiency of the building and appliances.
Your energy bills contain information about how much energy you are using in your home. To understand which appliances in your home contribute to your bills, you can do a home energy audit and calculate your appliance running costs.
In the average Australian home, energy is used for:
- heating and cooling (40%)
- water heating (23%)
- other appliances, such as laundry appliances or entertainment appliances (14%)
- fridges and freezers (8%)
- lighting (7%)
- cooking (5%)
- standby power (3%).
Energy use in the Australian residential sector 1986–2020 is a report commissioned by the Australian Government. It provides details about household energy use in each state from 1986 to 2005 and forecasts energy use until 2020. It also has information about how much energy different appliances (like air conditioners) are using in Australian homes and how much energy they may use in the future.
