Expensive Electricity Bill

[Dorothy Bradbury]

I thought they dump heat into door seals to stop the doors freezing up?

[paulc]

Thanks for all the replies, ive condensed my reply to early replies into one posting

I think the rates are correct, they are as follows :-

Night 2.690p per kWh Day 17.290p per kWh (i think this applies to just the first 182 kWh units per 1/4 Day 8.960p per kWh.

Can you tell me how i could check this ?. The storage heaters have a switch next to each of them, with a red light that indicates when theyre turned on, im going to monitor when these go on and off. (came on around midnight last night)

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Ill take your advice on the consumption meter, i dont know if the clock in the meter is correct (its a digital one), i have no way of checking this out personally.

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It's not that hot in here.

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We cant, its a rented property.

I cant get rid of the monitors, i need a 3 monitor system.

I use the PC system in order to be able to check the property from anywhere in the world, it also uploads motion detection to upload images to a server elsewhere in the world, if PC gets nicked, i still have CCTV images.

Not an option im afraid.

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I have a similar set-up to you - with the exception of the night storage heaters - and my bill is less than 500 per year. But my heating is gas - about another 500 / year.

My heating is gas also, LPG, (can't get gas mains where we live) it costs about =A31200 for this per year.

[paulc]

I have an LG model, the manual tells you to specifically turn off with the remote, these things have to be cooled correctly, thats possibly why your model has no off switch.

the tv to be put fully into this mode, though you lose the picture immediatley.

[meow2222]

If replacing a freezer, an upright tends to be more energy efficient as well as more convenient.

Drivel wrote:

This is really not a good idea.

The cost of doing that will outstrip any apparent savings, so if you've got CRTs I'd stay with them.

NT

[chris French]

In message , [e-mail] writes

Then you need a bigger bulb :-) - you can get larger wattages from specialist suppliers than the ones normally sold in the sheds. But it isn't going to help much with your bills

Meters are very reliable, and you said it had been checked by the supplier anyway.

[paulc]

Sorry, forgot to mention that, wife prepares evening meal maybe 2 or 3 times per week, at other times were not at home.

Can you explain how i would do this ? (are you thinking of one of those units sold by maplins or some other way)

Doing this now, it's looking OK so far.

Can you explain how i check for this ?.

This has been done once, the engineer used his equipment to monitor the meter.

We have 2 turned off, the other 4 are triggered by PIR, we live in the middle of nowhere, no street lighting or anything, ill change the bulbs for 150w.

The place hasnt been rewired since being built, is this what you mean ?.

We dont have any neighbours.

I do need the freezers, sometimes i end up with just one running though.

I discovered this last year, fridge was cold, (outside in the garage), so didnt fire up freezer, result was loss of freezer contents.

I have no idea im afraid, the system appears fully automatic.

Can you explain about storage heaters / electricity prices / economy 7 a little, never had them before.

It was the price of the warranty for plasma, and the fact that i was told by the salespeople that they didnt expect a plasma to go more than

18 months without requiring major surgery, that made me go for LCD.

The system is great, but (and i know this will sound stupid), we watch a 12 inch tv in the kitchen MORE than we watch this.

OK, Thanks

[Colin Wilson]

That`s probably about all you can do off the top of my head - apart from checking that the meter is also switching over the set of digits its racking up.

[meow2222]

Well... I'd approach the landlord and say the bills are excessively high, and that you've taken some advice, and have learnt that its because you have electric storage heating, which is by far the most expensive form of heating to run. Then I'd explain that if the system stays as it is, he can expect a number of tenant quits over bills, leaving him out of pocket while he finds new tenants. IOW it will be better for him as well as you if he puts CH rads in the rooms, and insulates too. It might work.

If you cant get any action this way, the last cost cutting resort is to leave the interior doors open and either turn the storage rads off or set them 2-3C below the rest of the house. The heat flow from gas heated rooms will reduce E7 consumption.

You can set bedrooms to only be heated for 90 mins before bed time, and once in am too, not all through the day. That'll save you.

Why not get higher wattage bulbs, or if its a big place, more of them? CFLs have a fraction the total cost of filament bulbs, but the power equivalents marked on the boxes are not realistic. It will save you money, but no huge amount.

yes, linear fls are nearly as good as cfls.

wrong tree

I wouldnt worry about it. If you had 3kW of halogens _not_ on PIRs you'd have a problem, but 6x 150w on PIRs is a non issue. (Intermittent vs continuous, cable rating vs fuse rating, 900w vs 3kW, and load diversity.)

NT

[Dorothy Bradbury]

If not at home entirely, do you turn off the storage heaters?

E7 Contactors do fail... o They can fail on continually or fail off o Timer conceivably can put them on during day rate o Most modern timers are radio etc triggered

In which case all that's left is checking E7 switching... o Check when the timer operates -- re not running into Day Rate o Check the timer operates correctly -- re on/off

Check storage heaters Control Dials... o Charge Control - even if Automatic adjust nightly re 1-6

---- the automatic capability is very poor, little better than manual

---- if it goes warm overnight they will easily overcharge

---- tuning 1-6 based on nightly forecast will save a lot of $ o Room Temperature - if left open at night, they waste $

---- dials strip leaving it stuck on open - losing heat when charging

---- automatic charge controller tries to compensate - wastes $

---- people turn the charge controller higher to compensate - wastes $

If you can replace just 1 storage heater with a radiator, do so.

150W is fine... o Cheap change to do vs buying new lights o Gives lots of light, still the "floodlit" effect o Saves a lot of $ over 500W 3000W is a big electric heater outside :-)

Partly, 3000W of halogen lighting has 2 characteristics o Burns 50% more than a 2000W convector heater set to full :-)

---- it may only be a few minutes a day, but it adds up o Has very high turn on surge & high current consumption

---- most lighting circuits are 6-10A

---- 3kW is 12.5A so I assume on 2 circuits, a hefty lighting load

I considered that, but they call it a criminal offence :-)))

Normal pricing... o You may a medium price for all hours of the day

Economy 7 pricing... o You pay a higher price for Day rate than normal pricing o You pay a very low price for Night rate, far lower than normal pricing

A 3000W storage heater... o Takes about 50-80p a night to charge depending on set to 1 or 6 o Comes out to 90-110ukp for the whole winter period

I assume you have storage heaters that don't boost in an afternoon, and also don't use conventional day-rate to boost or run a fan heater.

A 2000W wet radiator... o Costs probably 25p to deliver the same daily heating, considerably less o So instead of 90-110ukp for the winter period, it's 25-40ukp

So for every storage heater you remove, you will save ~50-70ukp per year.

If you can remove all 3, I suspect you'd probably save 250ukp per year. If larger than 3kW, re industrial sized, it could be 500ukp per year.

Plasmas are ideal for business or presentations or media buyers. o They have a finite life, lots of sunk cost, lots of risk for consumers o Running costs are also ugly - 200ukp/yr for the biggest units

An LCD has a backlight half-life of 30,000-40,000hrs (4-5yrs) and a failure curve which if it lasts the first year, it should last a good time.

In 4yrs an LCD TV v Plasma TV will have saved enough electricity to... o Pay for its replacement outright, or o Pay for a mid-range branded 3yr warranty laptop outright

Fine, don't power down 3.5" HDs. The FDB used in them is different to 2.5" HDs re stop/start cycles.

If lasers it is *really* worth doing - along with printing "bulk"... o Power off + Set the printer driver to paused o Power on when enough documents in the queue + Unpause the printer

This also helps you save paper.

Another trick when you want just a record is... o Install CutePDF -- it is a Printer which creates PDF files o Say you want a short-term hard copy of something -- print to CutePDF

Examples are online purchases or web pages etc, it stores a copy which you can later print to paper if required, or delete if no longer required. Free program, no logo or annoying pop-up, works fine.

Finally, check any electric water heating - failed thermostat or stuck on. Had a unit fail to the "bath" element & thermostat fail closed - never cut out and used to boil the water if left on long enough. Manual timers can be had for electric boosting - eg, 5/10/15min push-button.

[Ed Sirett]

This is very high usage. It amounts to 3kW. The fact that is high suggest that there is some sort of heavy off peak usage. I wonder if there is a sub main feed to a storage heater (in an out building?) Anti frost loft heaters. Electric ceiling heaters .

[tugmistress]

Ok just been put onto this by a friend and we are having a similar problem though not the same. until a couple of bills back, i was paying £80 per month on DD and this was covering my usage. we also have economy 7. i had running 3 x storage heaters

2 x computers (1 on 24/7 as uploading weather station but monitor off over night) 1 x fridge freezer 1 x chest freezer 1 x electric cooker when in use (about once a day) 1 x microwave about 4 times a week light bulbs ranging from 1 x 100w to 40w and energy saving 11w 1 x kettle boiled about 10 times a day 1 x emersion heater on 24/7 1 x electric radiator with thermostat set to 18c (24/7) 1 x bedside light 25w 1 x radio alarm

the whole house is electric, no gas and no solid fuel and is rented.

a couple of bills back i got one for £800+ then the next one was for £700+ so i rang them up and changed to a card meter on 6th december. it ate £50 in 5 days. things started getting turned off.

i am now running

2 x comps as above 1 x 2kw convector heater thermostat controlled on number 3 1 x fridge freezer 1 x kettle 1 x cooker light bulbs the emersion heater is only being turned on over night

our current usage for the previous 24 hours is £6.37 units are R1 (day time i assume) 43.31 R2 (night time i assume) 36.05

R1 price 8.36p per unit? R2 price 3.61p per unit?

readings have been taken for over a week and i can't get the usage down. Tonight i have borrowed a calor gas heater off a friend so we will see what the readings tell me tomorrow, but where am i using all this power? do i have a leak?

[paulc]

etc etc.

Thanks for the detailed reply, its really much appreciated. Youre obviously a bit of an expert on the subject, i however am not so its going to take me a little while to digest what youve said / the advice youve given. Ill post a follow up to let all know how i get on.

Thanks again

[paulc]

I think so too.

OK.

There are none of what you suggest, no other electric heaters anywhere.

My wife thinks that "someone" else may be wired up to our place (theres one cable running underground to the garage). There is another 6 houses behind our house, we're totally detatched from them, and are shielded from each other by conifers (hence they cant see our lighting). All the properties are owned by the same landlord, and i do know that these 6 houses do NOT have electricity meters, apparently the landlords own property is metered for them (or one house has a meter for all six). I suppose it is possible that one or more is actually wired into our meter, i asked the engineer when he visited if this was a possibility, he said it wasn't, so i discounted the idea. Can anyone tell me any different ?.

[paulc]

So im not the only one then :)

Your appliances are similar to mine, but if anything you have less of them, so in theory your bills should be less than mine, theyre not.

Bloody hell !!!!.

I bet they did !!!.

Thats ridiculously high for the appliances you are running.

Please let me know of the outcome of your investigations, ill do likewise for you.

Good Luck.

[Dave Liquorice]

Without inspecting every inch of your wiring he cannot make such a positive statement. Simple enough to test for though, just unplug and switch off every single bit of mains electrical stuff you have and look at the meter disc (hopefully you have a meter with a disc). It should not be moving at all. There is an index mark on the edge, ring that to the front with a small load (100W light will do) then switch that off an make sure the disc doesn't move over the next few hours. Fridges and freezers won't mind being off for a couple of hours provided you don't open them. Might be worth doing this excercise during the day and during the evening.

[Matt Helliwell]

The easiest way to tell may be just to turn everything off and see if the meter still goes around.

[Ron Clark]

On Sun, 01 Jan 2006 09:37:42 GMT, Matt Helliwell wrote this (or the missive included this):

Throw the mains switch during EastEnders and see if any of the neighbours complain.

[Dave Liquorice]

Deadenders is going down the ratings better to pick The Street or Emm. B-)

[Andy Hall]

Purely on technical merit of course :-)

[paulc]

It would be if we had a meter that "went round", we dont, its an economy 7 meter, and digital at that.

There is a red led that flashes, i think it is related to how much electricity were consuming, but not certain.

For anyone who knows about these systems, the meter is a "Horstmann Radio Telemeter 2A", type NU077-124