How much electricity does monitoring use?

How much power does surveillance consume?

The average annual electricity cost for a home surveillance system with 4 cameras is not more than 230 PLN. For small and medium-sized businesses, it is around 900 PLN net for 16 cameras.

These results were obtained by analyzing two sample surveillance system installations.

In this blog post, I will explain the method of calculating the electricity consumption of an IP monitoring system.

How much power do surveillance cameras consume?

The amount of power consumed by a camera depends on two key factors:

1. Night vision range
2. Analog or IP
3. Whether it has built-in motozoom

The last parameter only affects the maximum power consumption and is not relevant to electricity bills. Motozoom is only activated remotely and temporarily for adjusting the viewing angles. IP cameras, on the other hand, have a higher power demand due to more advanced electronics installed in the camera itself. However, the differences are not significant. The night vision illumination has the biggest impact on power consumption.

For example, if a camera with a 30-meter infrared range consumes a current of 420 mA (5W), the same camera with a 60-meter infrared range would consume a current of 600 mA (7.2W).

Of course, these values can also vary depending on the model and manufacturer.

How much power does an IP camera consume?

One IP camera with a 30-meter infrared night vision range consumes approximately 0.13 kWh per day.

An IP camera with a 60-meter infrared night vision range consumes approximately 0.17 kWh per day.

 

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How much power does a recorder consume?

An IP recorder for managing 4 cameras with a 2TB HDD consumes approximately 0.40 kWh per day.

An IP recorder for managing 16 cameras with an 8TB HDD consumes approximately 0.60 kWh per day.

The power consumption of an idle switch in standby mode is 0.1 kWh.

Here’s an example of calculating the costs for a home surveillance system consisting of 4 cameras:

By multiplying the power consumption of one IP camera for home use (0.13 kWh) by 4, the result is 0.52 kWh.

Adding the power consumption of the IP recorder (0.40 kWh) and the switch (0.1 kWh) to this.

The total daily electricity consumption is 0.93 kWh.

If we multiply this value by 365 days, the result is 339.45 kWh per year.

Assuming that the monthly electricity consumption in the household does not exceed 2000 kWh, with an average price of 0.66 PLN per kWh, multiplying this rate by the power consumption of the surveillance system results in a value of 224 PLN per year for the energy consumed by the surveillance system consisting of the recorder and four cameras.

Here’s an example of calculating the costs for surveillance in a small or medium-sized company consisting of 16 cameras:

Assuming that in such a facility, 16 IP cameras are installed in combination with a recorder and two POE switches.

Cameras with a 60m IR range consume 0.17 kWh each, so multiplying by 16 gives a total of 2.72 kWh per day.

Two POE switches consume 0.1 kWh each, resulting in a total of 0.2 kWh.

Summing up 2.72 + 0.6 + 0.2 gives 3.34 kWh per day, and multiplying this by 365 days per year gives 1219.1 kWh.

The price for small and medium-sized businesses is 0.75 PLN net per kWh.

1219.1 x 0.75 = 914.3 PLN net plus 5% VAT.

These examples show that cameras consume the most power, and this value is largely dependent on the power of the night vision illumination.

It can be considered as an additional cost for lighting since such cameras need to remain illuminated throughout the night.