When you visit your butcher to pick up some chicken for the weekend barbecue, your
poultry purchase will be priced in a system of pounds and ounces. When you power-up your
hair dryer in the morning, your purchase of electric energy will be priced in
"kilowatt-hours." Technically, one kilowatt-hour is equal to the electrical consumption of
1,000 watts over a period of 1 hour.
Probably the easiest way to define a
kilowatt-hour is to use an example to which we can all relate. You wake up late
for work. You're into the shower and out the front door in record time — but wait,
you forgot to turn off your bathroom light. Now, lets say that your bathroom fixture
takes a single 100-watt light bulb. That bulb consumes 100 watts of electricity
per hour. If you left that bulb burning for 10 continuous hours (100 watts consumed
per hour times 10 hours equals 1,000 watt-hours), that single light bulb would
have consumed a single "kilowatt-hour" of electricity.
