Q&A: Can I save on my heating bills by using an electric blanket?

I'd love to cut my wintertime heating bills by using an electric blanket. Will this help me save?

Manufacturers of electric blankets are benefiting from the frigid weather and a frozen economy. Instead of turning up the heat, consumers are turning on their electric blankets, which must please blanket makers. Sunbeam Bedding even puts a dollar figure to the pitch, claiming you can save up to $131 on heating bills by using a heated blanket. The company hopes to add to the 25 million homes that, it claims, currently use heated blankets and mattress pads. (The photo is from our 1954 report on electric blankets. We placed blankets in a temperature- and humidity-controlled test room and measured for heat. The changes in temperature in the blanket were recorded by the machine at right in the photo.)

We ran the numbers, and found that the savings might be even greater. The typical full-size electric blanket consumes 100 watts, according to the U.S. Department of Energy. Keeping the blanket on continuously for 8 hours a night, 25 weeks a year would use about $15 worth of electricity, based on the national average of 10.8 cents per kilowatt hour. Even factoring in the $50 or so someone you might spend on a blanket and even if the blanket were to use more than 100 watts, your net savings the first year would still be around $150 to $175, even greater thereafter. Savings are based on the $233 the average household would save by lowering the thermostat by 8°F for 24 hours a day, 25 weeks a year.

The holes in Sunbeam's calculations are that they don't account for the purchase and use of more than one electric blanket or the hours when you're home but not in bed beneath the covers. Presumably you wouldn't lower the thermostat by 8°F then, which will limit the savings. But even with that caveat, keeping warm while you sleep by using an electric blanket instead of heating your entire home makes some financial sense.—Daniel DiClerico

Essential information: Learn other ways to cut your heating bills this winter.