Help with TV power usage?

It would help to know the make and model of the set you're looking at, or at least the screen size. The ref below shows plasmas of various sizes with their power rating, generally around 200 to 500 watts.

So whether the set you have in mind is good, average, or bad depends on what you're comparing it to. Compared to LCD or LED/LCD sets, it will draw quite a bit more power, with everything else being equal.

If you want to know how much it costs in electric power to run the TV, you can figure it out with a little math. First, determine the power rating in watts of the set you want. Lets say it's 250 watts. Such a set will use up one kilowatt-hour (kwh) of power in 4 hours of operation (250 x 4 = 1000 or 1 kwh).

Now estimate how many hours per month you'll operate the set. Let's say an average of 4 hours every day. That's 4 hrs x 30 days = 120 hours per month. Divide that by 4 hours for one kwh, and the TV will burn 30 kwh per month.

Now go to your latest electric power bill, find out how many kwh you were billed, divide that into the amount of your bill, and you have your electrical cost per kwh. If it's 400 kwh and your bill was $60.00, your cost per kwh is 15 cents. (60 / 400).

Multiply 0.15 by your 30 kwh for the month, and the TV costs you $4.50 to run for the month. With 120 hours, that works out to about 4 cents per hour.