U.S. households spend at least $129 on average for cooking, storing and heating food every year, according to the country's Energy Information Administration (EIA) data on Monday. As the Thanksgiving weekend approaches, which spans from Wednesday Nov. 21 through Sunday Nov. 25, households across the U.S. are getting ready to fire up their stoves and ovens.
According to the EIA, 74.9 million households, or 63 percent, use electricity in a stove, cooktop or oven for cooking, based on the EIA's latest data on Residential Energy Consumption Survey (RECS) released in 2015.
While 33 percent of households in the country use natural gas, around 5 percent use propane, the EIA said.
For cooking, an average U.S. household spends $31 every year, while the average expenditure for cooking with natural gas was slightly higher at $34 per year. Storing leftovers after Thanksgiving dinner on the fourth Thursday of November every year is also common in the U.S.
While 99 percent of households in the country have a refrigerator, 30 percent of homes have two or more, the EIA said. The most used refrigerator in an American household costs $81 per year, according to the EIA, while the second refrigerator in a home costs $61 a year.
A separate freezer in a U.S. household, which is most commonly seen in the Midwest region of the country, costs $69 per year. When it comes to heating up the Thanksgiving food during the holiday weekend, most households use microwaves. According to the EIA, 96 percent of American homes have a microwave oven that costs $17 per year.
When using electricity - the cheapest fuel for heating, using a single refrigerator for storing food, and using a microwave, the U.S. household's total cost comes up to $129 on average every year.
(Anadolu Agency)
