Lose The Dryer, Save The Money

Guest post by Chelsea Green's Makenna Goodman:

Behold the classic domestic duos of the past: Ricki and Lucy. Ozzie and Harriet. Bennifer. Tom and Jerry. Bush and Cheney. And most important of all, not to mention the most seriously detrimental to human society—um, make that second most serious—the washer and the dryer. Readers may doubt the importance of separating the latter, but a divorce must be arranged. The dryer, as it were, is an energy-sucking, money-vaporizing, obsolete object that has served its last purpose. Feel free to recycle it, make better use of it, or fill it with water and use as a pleasant place for baby ducks to frolic in your yard. But seriously, if you want to save money this summer, you may have to part with your Maytag and those handy Bounce^TM sheets, and embrace other ways to dry your clothes.

According to Stephen and Rebekah Hren, authors of The Carbon-Free Home: 36 Remodeling Projects to Help Kick the Fossil-Fuel Habit, throwing out your dryer is a wicked way to save money this summer.

Electric clothes dryers are a colossal waste of energy. They often draw around 6,000 watts. Six thousand! This is more than a typical heat pump or electric water heater, usually thought of as the hogs of the household. Simply put, you should not use this appliance. Gas dryers are more efficient because they use no electric-resistant heat, but they can still draw around 720 watts. That's a lot, equivalent to about 60 compact fluorescents (not to mention the energy of the gas). You should plan on getting rid of electric heat dryers and hopefully gas-fired dryers as well if your climate allows.

Solar clothes drying shows this energy source at its finest. It's a great example of simplicity combined with effectiveness. Hang up something wet in the sun, come back in a few hours, and voilà, it's dry, clean, and fresh smelling. Like everything, having the proper tools to access this resource goes a very long way in making sure it's effective and easy to do. Some of this depends on your climate and your own personal habits. We realize some parts of the country have very little sun in the winter, but if you set aside a bit of room, even in a closet or a spare bedroom, clothes hung on racks will dry fairly quickly in a heated house.

Just for the record, I am not an eco-psycho. I am a recent convert to the drying rack, and I choose to keep it covered in wet clothes, by a breezy window facing the sun. Actually, to be honest, I was sort of forced to shun the electric dryer—my boyfriend won't let me turn the damn thing on. He's a better man than I, with weightier morals. So yesterday while he was out of town, I cheated. I gathered together a bundle of cut-offs, sweatpants, and dirty socks and thought, Oh yes. Now's my time. I'm gonna get my clothes real warm and dry. But as I began to open our dryer (which I'm about to get rid of), I caught sight of the indoor drying rack, waiting in the sun. I remembered the last batch of laundry, and how it smelled like clean grass. I thought of my electric bill. About my rapidly depleting checking account. The choice, in the end, is actually pretty obvious, and after a couple times using solar drying techniques (clotheslines included), my lazy reflex wore off. I now see it as meditating and investing in my solvent future. Out it goes!

Here are some tips on solar drying from the Hrens. Try these at home!

• Retractable clothesline: An excellent tool for the space-constrained. These come in a variety of lengths and are very simple to install indoors or out. Consider putting these inside near a passive solar wall. The sun will dry the clothes and raise the humidity of the room in wintertime, making it more comfortable inside.
• Indoor drying rack: Avoid the cheaper models, as they can fall apart rather quickly. These are generally collapsible and can stand alone or be wall-mounted. I recommend having at least two. Being able to place these in sun or near a woodstove will greatly speed up drying time in the winter.
• Outdoor drying rack: If you've got the room outdoors, a permanent outdoor rack is a very effective method for drying clothes, even when the temperatures barely get above freezing. It requires some time to mount properly, but it should function well for decades.
• Clothespins: These are a necessity and come in two varieties: split or spring. Determine your preference and make sure you have plenty. Hanging clothes from pins rather than folding them over the line greatly speeds drying time and greatly reduces the odds that any clothing will fall off and get dirty. Folding clothes generally means two sides of the clothing are not exposed to the air at all. This more than doubles drying times.

Makenna Goodman works and blogs for Chelsea Green Publishing, a leading community providing books and dialogue on the politics and practice of sustainable living.

Comments

[AC258]

Not using a drier will help us save a lot of money. Before when my family and I us to live in a big house with a big back yard, we would hand our newly washed clothes outside to dry, even though we had a dryer. If though it requires a bit of work and a lot of ironing after, it is well worth it when our energy bill would come. Now that we live in a apartment all we do is use the dryer, as a result we waste a lot of money paying the bill. Just because there is technology out there we don’t have to necessarily use it. For those who live in apartment and don’t have room to hang their clothes we are forced to use the dryer, but I think it would be great if those who have room to hang their clothes out to save energy and money. I have also herd that if clothes are dried in the sun they will get disinfected, in comparison if the clothes were dried in a dyer. Plus, clothes that are hung outside to dry smell much more better then in the dryer. So go Green and save a much as money as you possible can in this bad economic times.

[JnrNorman]

Lots of people in apartments have no place to dry clothes and they use clothes driers and dont feel guilty about it.

[obamaluv]

Call your congress people for a bill to outlaw driers.

[westreal]

Air dried clothes smells so much better than machine dried.

[madfigs]

Our new house doesn't have hookups (our washer is hooked up in the carport with a garden hose) but it did come with a nice big drying line in the backyard. I was pretty surprised at how quickly things will dry when there's a bit of a breeze -I can do up to 4 consecutive loads in one day. The downside for us is the pet hair that sticks to the clothes that is usually caught by the lint trap in the dryer. But then again, our black clothes are still black instead of grey, and our whites seem to be even whiter, so I'd say it's a good tradeoff.

[bobdob]

I always forget to take my clothes out of the dryer anyway, so four or five hours drying on a rack on my front porch or four or five hours sitting in the dryer is really not much of a difference. Except that they smell better when I dry them on a rack.

[mzrecycle]

In areas that are restrictive about clothes lines, may I suggest the Wall Mount Dryer by Whitney Design. Found it online. It's an umbrella type layout and folds up against the wall of the house when not in use. Has a black nylon cover so that I don't have to clean the lines before hanging wash, and don't even have to remove the clothes pins!
I also have a retractible reel line that is mounted on the side of the house, runs to the wall of the garage. It's 49 ft. long, but where I've attached the hook, it's enough to hang a set of queen sized sheets and pillow cases. Again, because it retracts, I don't have to clean the lines before hanging. I really like it that nothing much shows unless I have clothes on the line. Both of these are attached to the house at the deck. Very convenient.
I do still use my dryer for most loads, but only for 5 min. (use a timer so I don't forget). It gets out all the wrinkles from the spin cycle.
Not only do my sheets smell so wonderful, but I find that solar drying keeps them crisper and smooth for a full week. While sheets from the dryer feel rumpled after 3 days.

[SCG]

I try to, especially with large heavy wet items, such as jeans and blankets. If you do use your dryer and it's equipped with a moisture sensor, it's best to learn how to use and adjust it's level so that the dryer stops when clothes are dry, instead of running several minutes with a already dry load.

[fiestyslug]

Would love to see Michelle Obama put in a clotheline on the White House lawn, next to the organic garden. Maybe some of these restrictive city and zoning ordinances would then change. How ridiculous that ppl cannot hang their laundry out if they wish.

[TruthmongerII]

When I lived in Ireland we had an extractor dryer because the climate was damp & clothes didn't dry unless on radiators. These dryers use far less NRG because centrifical force removed moisture as well as heat. The Dutch use drying racks mounted high up to get the heat & this works too. In France I used a portable folding rack & because the apartment was heated, everything dried within 24 hours. Everybody expected to see everyone else's clothing drying out so it wasn't embarrassing. The Spanish use their little pateos but in Barcelona they were cracking down because tourists didn't like looking at our underwear swaying in the breeze.

[fame]

I very rarely if ever use a dryer, I love my drying racks!

[squander123]

I'm one of those Europeans who doesn't own a dryer, and never has. It's not, certainly for those of us in the comfortable middle-class or above, because of the costs of our electricity: I don't even bother looking at my electricity bills, and I'm not that rich!

I won't have a dryer (and my partner tried to foist one on me last time we bought a new washing-machine, but I resisted him on it) because, as others have posted, they destroy your clothes, especially any made of delicate fabrics.

We live in a city centre apartment, so drying clothes outside isn't an option. But they dry on a rack in the spare bedroom, next to a radiator in winter and an open window in summer. I wonder if the differences in home heating systems between Europe and the US are one reason why Americans use dryers? Whenever I've stayed in American houses, I've always been baffled by the heating system, because it's SO different from what I'm used to. We have hot water radiators on the walls in each room, whereas several US homes I've been in have some kind of hot air system (still don't really understand how it works!). Radiators are excellent as a source of near-direct heat next to an indoor drying rack in winter: overnight dries even the thickest fabrics. Just a thought...

[Ginger Ale]

I try not to use a dryer too, especially bc I grew up in Europe where dryers do not even exist or are only for privilege people. However, I always get criticized for hanging my clothes in my yard here in FL. I always get told that it is not "pretty" and it is trashy. This negative perception bothers me for multiple reasons. First, it is not efficient to use dryers, then I agree they damage clothes, and they never smell as good as living them outside. So GO GREEN until your neighbor call for your collection of underwear flying on their yard:)

[jones]

You didn't mention how much dryers eat up clothes, mangling them out of shape. Laying them out on a rack is a much better alternative.

[Lynne2363]

I had always used the sun to dry my clothes after reading that the sun actually disinfects clothes and they smell so good too. When I moved to Reston, Virginia in 1982 I put up my clothes line and was told by the neighbors that clothes lines weren't allowed. After purchasing my own home in 1984 I was able to hang a small line under the porch so that it was out of sight of the new neighbors. This area never gets sunlight even though it's "outside". Most suburban communities in the US now forbid drying clothes on clothes lines outside--this is for developing countries only. I have traveled to many developing countries in both Asia and South America and goodness knows that there are plenty of days when it rains and it takes several days for the clothes to dry. Do we need to learn to just slow down and smell the roses?

[PresidentRobertBooth]

Hang your clothes outside.

If you live in an apartment building, get together with your fellow residents and get a courtyard together where you can hang clothes communally.


Lovely and fresh.