Your Electric Bill

[Neilk]

Originally Posted by hardflex

frikkin Texas brags about it's energy deregulation, and I've paid 2.5 times the KWH rate you guys are quoting here. .

Hey Hardflex,

Have you signed up with different electricity provider? I have been with Gexa and pay 10.9 cents/ Kw on a fixed rate contract. I could have gone with a cheaper variable rate, but I got screwed one summer on the variable rate and paid 18 cents.

Check out Powertochoose.org for your area's best rate plans. No need to pay full retail to TXU when all the electricity travels from the same place over the same lines.

[Deschodt]

Went thru this recently... A few things you can do or realize:

- A pool is *at least* $50 per month, same with a jacuzzi !
- A teenager is 10x worse than a pool ;-)
- Get a Killawatt device, they are cheap and informative... They go between an appliance and the power outlet, and measure actual drain on your wallet! In $, if you want ! A few surprises came out of this experiment for me... Forgive me, I forgot the exact numbers, but to give you an idea...

- The "phantom" drain from plugged in transformers for devices not powered on is not negligible ! It won't save you that much per month, but it was a surprise ! I now turn off the power strips !

- My UPS (one on TV, one on each computer, 3 total) are horribly power hungry ! who knew ? An electrician friend recommend I install GFI protected outlets everywhere, They are cheap but trip easily when the power spikes, and are better than a UPS if you don't care about losing power.

- My fridge is 10 year old, it sucks way more power than it should and it also was set too cold, check with one of those remote thermometers for fun!

- A/C is the numero uno drain in the house, and it's ON 360 days a year in Florida!!! Programmable thermostast help, insulation and venting too...

- Another big one is the water heaters, #2 behind the A/C for me... That's where teenagers would kill you ! Teenage girls even more ! Turning them down helped a fair bit, replacing them with smaller Rinnai tankless heaters would help even more AND give me more garage and closet space (got 2 of the big guys) !

- #3 drain on my list: electric dryer... Gas is much cheaper ! For me anyway...

- Reflective film on windows, if in a hot climate...

- One thing that made very little difference? the new fangled compact fluorescent bulbs... They are ****. They burn out 10x faster than regular lights despite warranty claims, I saved maybe $30 total per bill, yet they cost $300+ for the house, need to be replaced all the time and recycled, and I hate the slow "power up" cycle they have... Not ready for prime time, bring on LEDs !

That's what I remember... Have fun investigating !

[David]

Originally Posted by Neilk

Hey Hardflex,

Have you signed up with different electricity provider? I have been with Gexa and pay 10.9 cents/ Kw on a fixed rate contract. I could have gone with a cheaper variable rate, but I got screwed one summer on the variable rate and paid 18 cents.

Check out Powertochoose.org for your area's best rate plans. No need to pay full retail to TXU when all the electricity travels from the same place over the same lines.

I have Gexa. Unfortunately I signed up before the current drop in prices so I'm paying 12.9 cents. I'm so tired of the Reliant and TXU door to door salesman. They're out trying to convince people that 14+ cents is a great rate, meanwhile they're buying wholesale power at 2 to 4 cents.

This is great time to get a fixed rate if you don't already.

[glewis80SC]

2600 SQ FT
Family of 5
3 laptops, 1- 42" plasma
Central air, updated 1 year ago,attic furnace
High Effic...washer/gas dryer and fridge
Energy saving lights in whole house
$291.00 last month
My buddy hits $600.00 during the summer.

[lane912]

ok here it is..... watts X time X cost(per kwh) / 1000
this gives you the cost of any one item for a given amount of time used. a 60watt lamp on for 18 hours( average waking hours of a teenager) is 7 cents @ 6.5 cents per kwh.

[hardflex]

Thanks NeilK for that site. Looks like I can cut it by over a 3rd and it's 100% renewable energy. Gotta love that.

Mine hit 20+ cents KWH when my contract (first choice electric co) expired and oil was $130. I renewed with reliant 2 years at 15+ cents KWH. Looks like it's time to change contracts again

[daepp]

Per my current bill, last month (10/22 to 11/21), I used 1,593 kWh. This cost me $385.84. So I guess it cost me $0.242 per kWh.

[daepp]

A few more details:

All heating in our home (furnace, water) is by natural gas.

We do a ton of laundry considering their are five of us, two adults, and 17 (girl), 15 (girl) and 13 (boy). Lots of blow driers etc.

Washer and dryer are high efficiency.

I did find a broken plenum in the attic. Basically a large cube with 3 ducts attached. A whole side (one without a duct) had fallen/blown open. It was installed with the new HE system 2 years ago. The new system (along with a 14 seer compressor) uses two thermostats and various automated dampers to allow a multi zone system but only one blower and one compressor. The first summer it seemed to cut our bill in half (but I think it was also a milder summer than the previous one). The old system would never cycle off during the summer, so the new system seemed awesome.

This summer, looking back now, it seemed like the upstairs ran a whole lot - i just chalked it up to hear rising. Now I wonder if this mucked up my bill???

[K9Torro]

Uhhh, I would say you got a serious problem-o there dude,

I got a 2800 sq ft 4 bd/3 ba house with a 1150 sq ft attached 4 car garage and the heating bill runs me 80-95 a month in the winter and 90-100 in the summer which is damn long here in south ga, and before you ask, yes I heat / cool the garage whenever I am working in it.

Todd

[hardflex]

I'd say you got hosed twice

1. .24 cent's per KWH

2. The plenum in the attic. You were basically cooling the attic and the outdoors. It happened to me once too.

If the last usage bill was under 400 some must have been much higher. There's no telling how long you've been cooling and heating the attic.

edit: 1600 kilowatt hours is not that our of line with the 2 refrigerators and the pool. So you were probably lucky on the plenum. You need to get the rate down to under 10 if you can

[motion]

Originally Posted by DAEpperson

We just hit a "level pay" average for the next 12 months of $660. I am in shock to say the least. I seems like just yesterday it hit $550.

Details - A little more than 3000 sq ft 2 story house built in 1987, reasonably well insulated
- Two 27 Cu Ft refrigeratirs
- Large swimming pool
- 2 pcs
- Two adults, 3 teens
- 14 seer new hvac
- new high e windows throughout

What the heck? I know the kids leave the lights on, and the pool is a drain, but is this normal? What is everyone else paying? /rant off

My OC house is fairly similar to yours, with some differences:

Built in 1989, poor insulation
2 story
Single pane, original windows throughout
Medium size swimming pool & spa
Several PCs - I work out of the house & the wife stays home, so PCs are always running
Two adults, 1 teen
New furnace, original AC unit
1 large, 8 year old fridge
Malibu lighting fetish... they're everywhere - probably 50 of them
New high efficiency front load washer & dryer

I'm only 3 miles from the beach, so AC use is fairly limited, and the area stays fairly warm in the winter. I keep the heat set at 67 or so, and we try to wear sweaters as much as possible. I relocated my office to an upstairs bedroom to take advantage of rising heat, since that's where I am most of the day. No heat when we sleep at night.

I run the pool pump (new 1.5 HP high efficiency motor) 3 hours per day winter and summer. No way in hell I'm going to run it 6-7 hours a day like my pool maint company wants. We use the spa about twice a week. I figured it cost about $10 each time we use it.

My monthly electric is usually in the $230-$280 range, and gas is right around $70-$100. I've talked to my neighbors and we're all about the same.

If you're paying $660 for electric, you can probably blame most of it on the 3 kids using power unjudiciously. You should probably look at reducing your heater temp down a few degrees, running the pool pump for just 3 hours a day & unplugging as much stuff in the house as you can. Maybe install motion-detecting light switches on 10 second shut off timers.

Do you have a plasma TV or LCD? I've heard plasmas suck energy like crazy. You'd pay for a new LCD in short time if you converted. We don't watch any TV here.... just Netflix a couple times a week, so the TVs don't run very often.

[daepp]

I am thinking of ways to check the rest of the system for leaks.

Re: geting the rate below $0.10 per kWh, the bottom tier(#1 out of 5) starts at $0.12!

[daepp]

TV is LCD and (unfortunately) seldom on.

We seldom use the spa, and we heat the pool at most once a year, and that is primarily a gas issue.

I am starting to believe that it is a combination of rising rates, teens and a broken (new) A/C system!

[Joeaksa]

November bill just came up on the internet here.

875 kw for $104

Everything in the house is electric (no gas in this area) and I use solar for the pool and misc things in the back yard like path lighting.

Am down a good 15% on useage this year over 2008. Am a energy nazi and other than lights that are on timers, if I am not in the room its turned off.

Also use a "whole house" attic fan instead of the A/C whenever possible.

EDIT, forgot for the two big energy users in the house, electronics. One computer is on ALL of the time, its my server when I travel and network back into the system.

Also am afraid to put the "kill a watt" on the television downstairs. Its a 73" Mitsubishi that I am assuming sucks power. Am also guessing that the Tivo does a bit as its on all the time (has to be) and whenever its on thats two mega-hard drives going.

[Shoepop]

Wife and I, 3400 sq foot home with 8 tons AC, heat natural gas, R 40 ceiling R19 walls, pool circulate 6 hours day in summer 1.5 HP 220 motor. 1900 sq foot shop R30 ceiling R19 walls cooled by evap cooler heated wood stove. Wife in 25th year of menopause so in summer AC set 68 degree's 24/7, summer temps ave 95. 52" plasma + misc small one's, 2 fridge's, one freezer, 2 40 gallon NG water heaters 1 NG stove . Ave $336 mo.

[David]

Originally Posted by Deschodt

- One thing that made very little difference? the new fangled compact fluorescent bulbs... They are ****. They burn out 10x faster than regular lights despite warranty claims, I saved maybe $30 total per bill, yet they cost $300+ for the house, need to be replaced all the time and recycled, and I hate the slow "power up" cycle they have... Not ready for prime time, bring on LEDs !

No doubt!!! I put in some LED undercounter lights in about a year ago, but they just died. I didn't have a kill-a-watt at the time so I don't know how much power they comsumed, but they had 20 LED's. I replaced them with little 14" T5 flouresant bulbs which consume 14 watts each. I didn't like their light so I bought some GE LEDs which have 4 LEDs each, are just as bright as the flouresant (unfortunately), light up immediately, and only consume 5 watts!

I think LED is going to be the way to go.

[Rufblackbird]

Originally Posted by rick-l

Nostatic and Rufblackbird,

What are the different kilowatt hour rates for? What determines whether it is 3 6 or 7 cents?

pretty sure it depends on the time of day...e.g. higher rates between 5-10pm when most people are at home?

[daepp]

AFAIK, no one in So Cal has a smart meter or clock based meter.

[Rot 911]

Our house was built in 1926. 3000 sq ft. Original windows. Brick walls, so no insulation there. Insulation in the attic. Newer gas boiler for the steam heat. Electric for everything else. Two adults and one child. Average around $220 per month.