Why do you use so much electricity?!?!?

[chops]

Was at 5kwh/day back when we lived in our house.  Now that we're in a 500 sq ft apartment, we're at 3kwh/day.  We just keep everything off until we use it, use windows for light when the sun is out (Bakari tip), and only use our tv for the occasional library dvd.   

[adam]

Month--------Avg Usage(kwh/d)--Total Usage-------Avg Temp---#d>90---#d>80
July ----------33.83kwh/day---------1016----------------83----------22--------29
August-------33.00------------------990-----------------82----------13--------30
September---32.52------------------1008----------------78-----------3--------30
October------25.17------------------755-----------------69-----------0--------17
November----21.00------------------588-----------------51-----------0---------3  -under 50* = 19
December----19.07------------------572-----------------56-----------0---------0 - under 50 = 21
January------23.68------------------805-----------------54-----------0---------1 - under 50 = 25
February-----19.38------------------562-----------------51-----------0---------0 - under 50 = 26, under 40 = 18
March--------22.79------------------638-----------------54-----------0---------1 - under 50 = 23, under 40 = 11
April---------18.55------------------612-----------------61-----------0---------7 - under 50 = 16,  under 40 = 5
May----------19.80------------------594-----------------71-----------0--------15 - under 50 = 2
June---------33.45------------------1037----------------78-----------3--------30
July----------31.81------------------986-----------------82-----------7--------31
August------40.28------------------1289----------------82-----------12-------30 - 32 billing days
September---29.97-------------------869----------------80----------12--------29 - 29 billing days
October------22.43------------------673-----------------71-----------0--------15 - under 50 = 0, 30 billing days
November----17.36------------------486-----------------60-----------0--------2  -  under 50 = 16
December----22.12------------------708-----------------56-----------0--------3 -   under 50 = 24, 32 billing days
January------22.25------------------712-----------------49-----------0--------1 -   under 50 = 28
February-----21.03------------------652-----------------50-----------0--------2 -   under 50 = 27
March--------18.03------------------523-----------------54-----------0--------1 -   under 50 = 21
April----------17.43------------------523-----------------64-----------0--------11 -  under 50 = 9.


I feel like we've hit bottom regarding what electricity the HVAC is using.  I don't think it ran more than 2 hours all month.  To be sure I'll have to wait for my email from my Nest.  That means we're still running over 500 kwh from everything else.  Maybe I should just be happy with that?  I don't know.

[aj_yooper]

Smarch!

Month--------Avg Usage(kwh/d)--Total Usage-------Avg Temp---#d>90---#d>80
July ----------33.83kwh/day---------1016----------------83----------22--------29
August-------33.00------------------990-----------------82----------13--------30
September---32.52------------------1008----------------78-----------3--------30
October------25.17------------------755-----------------69-----------0--------17
November----21.00------------------588-----------------51-----------0---------3  -under 50* = 19
December----19.07------------------572-----------------56-----------0---------0 - under 50 = 21
January------23.68------------------805-----------------54-----------0---------1 - under 50 = 25
February-----19.38------------------562-----------------51-----------0---------0 - under 50 = 26, under 40 = 18
March--------22.79------------------638-----------------54-----------0---------1 - under 50 = 23, under 40 = 11
April---------18.55------------------612-----------------61-----------0---------7 - under 50 = 16,  under 40 = 5
May----------19.80------------------594-----------------71-----------0--------15 - under 50 = 2
June---------33.45------------------1037----------------78-----------3--------30
July----------31.81------------------986-----------------82-----------7--------31
August------40.28------------------1289----------------82-----------12-------30 - 32 billing days
September---29.97-------------------869----------------80----------12--------29 - 29 billing days
October------22.43------------------673-----------------71-----------0--------15 - under 50 = 0, 30 billing days
November----17.36------------------486-----------------60-----------0--------2  -  under 50 = 16
December----22.12------------------708-----------------56-----------0--------3 -   under 50 = 24, 32 billing days
January------22.25------------------712-----------------49-----------0--------1 -   under 50 = 28
February-----21.03------------------652-----------------50-----------0--------2 -   under 50 = 27
March--------18.03------------------523-----------------54-----------0--------1 -   under 50 = 21

29 billing days pretty much makes up a full month.  As I've said before, my goal is to keep our average daily usage under 20kwh, so March was a success in that respect.  I'm not sure what is using all this power so maybe its time to start thinking about finding a kill-a-watt and going to town.  The next few months should not show much increase over that 500-600 kwh range I hope.  Its June I have to worry about, and that's when I will find out if the Nest is going to help or not.  Forecast says we're going to start hitting low 80s this week.

Do you have electric heat? How big is your dwelling?  Your usage has gone down, but is there room for more? 

[zolotiyeruki]

Our usage dropped to about 18kWh/day for us, last month, down from about 22kWh/day the month before.  That means a nice, low bill of $66 this time.  Woohoo!  It's probably due to the warmer weather requiring the furnace to run less.

[adam]

I have gas heat.

[aj_yooper]

I have gas heat.

Adam, you are making some progress, but 18/day is still pretty high.  We do cfl s, 68/62 in the winter and 78/84 in the summer in a 2400+ ranch and are way under that.  We are strict about lights, turn off zombie tv and modem whenever we can, etc.  Have you looked at your utilities conservation suggestions?  Wishing you well.

[wealthywinters]

Mr. W and I have a laptop each, he runs a server, and we don't have a TV or dishwasher - our average usage varies between 7.5 to 9kwH (the latter being for the air con in 44 degree celsius summer heat for 4+ days). I plan to reduce this by switching to cold water for washing clothes (we have a dryer but use it for small items in winter when we have a lot of washing, especially with baby clothes).

We have gas for heating and hot water but our gas bill has varied from 20MJ per day to 170mJ over the last 9 months so I'm trying to start tracking it and make sure we don't over-use it.

[adam]

I have gas heat.

Adam, you are making some progress, but 18/day is still pretty high.  We do cfl s, 68/62 in the winter and 78/84 in the summer in a 2400+ ranch and are way under that.  We are strict about lights, turn off zombie tv and modem whenever we can, etc.  Have you looked at your utilities conservation suggestions?  Wishing you well.

I really think its the wife running the washer and dryer all the time.  If I could get a day by day breakdown of kwh used I bet I could prove it.  Guess I need to start reading the meter on my own.

[rocksinmyhead]

I have gas heat.

Adam, you are making some progress, but 18/day is still pretty high.  We do cfl s, 68/62 in the winter and 78/84 in the summer in a 2400+ ranch and are way under that.  We are strict about lights, turn off zombie tv and modem whenever we can, etc.  Have you looked at your utilities conservation suggestions?  Wishing you well.

I really think its the wife running the washer and dryer all the time.  If I could get a day by day breakdown of kwh used I bet I could prove it.  Guess I need to start reading the meter on my own.

haha. if my boyfriend said this about me, my response be THEN HOW ABOUT YOU DO THE LAUNDRY?!? ;)

[Ozstache]

I have gas heat.

Adam, you are making some progress, but 18/day is still pretty high.  We do cfl s, 68/62 in the winter and 78/84 in the summer in a 2400+ ranch and are way under that.  We are strict about lights, turn off zombie tv and modem whenever we can, etc.  Have you looked at your utilities conservation suggestions?  Wishing you well.

I really think its the wife running the washer and dryer all the time.  If I could get a day by day breakdown of kwh used I bet I could prove it.  Guess I need to start reading the meter on my own.

haha. if my boyfriend said this about me, my response be THEN HOW ABOUT YOU DO THE LAUNDRY?!? ;)

I call my wife's bluff and say yes whenever she responds this way to me about me saying she overdoes something. It's because I truly believe she is overdoing it and she knows I will be annoying by doing the job more efficiently myself and implying 'I told you so'. I also know she loves housework as much as most men like sex (seriously!), so I know she won't cut off her nose to spite her face. She usually meets me halfway and tones it down a lot. Ah, relationship negotiations!

[wealthywinters]

I really think its the wife running the washer and dryer all the time.  If I could get a day by day breakdown of kwh used I bet I could prove it.  Guess I need to start reading the meter on my own.

Do you have the option of off-peak? Here you can run those things between 11pm and 7am and the rate is between a third and a half or the normal rate. If she could shift putting the washing on until late at night, and then putting things in the dryer really early, you might be able to reduce your bills just through that?

[Greg]

Just got another Home Energy Report from our electric utility, PSE.  It's a new thing they recently started doing.  Probably a great idea, creates a bit of competition.

We used 41% less energy than our efficient neighbors.  555 kWh vs. 933 for the average efficient neighbor.  555 kWh in one month sounds a little high, but does include a rental on the same meter.  Down from 12% less and 890 kWh the previous month.

The average use in our greater 100 neighbors is 1670 kWh. Holy crap!  We've always tried to stay below 600 kWh, because that's the point above which you pay a higher rate.  So the more you use the more you pay per kWh.

It also gives us a ranking in terms of efficiency.  Out of 100 neighbors we were at #19 in Oct, now we're #7!

[Ottawa]

It also gives us a ranking in terms of efficiency.  Out of 100 neighbors we were at #19 in Oct, now we're #7!

This is a fuckin' awesome idea!  Wow.  Good work too...now...top 5 next?

[Greg]

I think it's attainable. 

With summer coming light usage will continue to go down.  We don't have A/C but instead have a tree shaded house and a cool concrete floor.  So no A/C costs.  No big appliance draws.  The trick is being sure to turn off lights and fans. 

And hopefully the same for our renter but we try to stay out of their business unless we see something odd like lights on when they're gone.

[TGod]

I don't know how you guys get such low numbers. I've started being really stingy with the power, with furnace turned off and for the last 3 days we used 29, 28 & 30kwh/day, and these are cheap days. Input would be great.

We just had our broken smart meter replaced so I've only got about 2 weeks of energy usage to reference on this house which we moved to last August.

We have a 3K sqft house, 1/2 basement - walk in rancher style and the vents are blocked in the currently being reno'd basement. We have a computer that is on but in sleep mode all the time. We have at tv and 3 game systems that are turned off, but not at the power source (sometimes I remember to turn the switch off before heading out to work).

We have an electric  furnace which we switched to only use 10,000Watts instead of the 20,000watts. We have LEDs and CFLs. Lights off all day while we're at work or kids at school. Since jumping on the MMM bandwagon I bought a programmable thermostat and set it to go to 59 at night and during the day and max was 65 in the morning (an hour) and evening (a few hours). My husband gets home early afternoon tho and he turns it up to 68...grrrr. Where it sits till 5 when I get home and turn it down. I know how much that bloody furnace costs us so I try to avoid using it much.

We have a dishwasher which I run once/day or every other day, with no heat dry. We do a lot of laundry, as a general rule only cold (but again my husband washes his gi in warm). We're only just getting the laundry line set up so we've been using the dryer way more than I'd like.

We have a water pump for the well, 12 year old hot water tank...which I turned down to 120, a heat exchange unit which doesn't always run, I might turn it on in the evenings when I'm cooking. Fridge, 2 smaller chest freezers. Also right now I have a tomato grow op with 4 fluorescent lights on all day.

I don't know what is drawing the energy. Even when nobody is home and the furnace is turned OFF, it's still using ~0.5kwh/hr. When we're home it ranges to 2.5-4.5kwh/hr.


We plan on doing a meter test this weekend by turning everything off to see if we have an electricity leak. Everything is electric so no gas. It seems like many posters have a gas component...does this explain why your usage is so low?

[aj_yooper]

TGod, refrigerators and 2 freezers sound like likely culprits as does the tomato grow setup.  Wouldn't it be cheaper to buy tomato plants?  Have you had a family meeting to talk about saving electricity?  2.5-4.5Kw/hour sounds ghastly!

[Ozstache]

I don't know how you guys get such low numbers. I've started being really stingy with the power, with furnace turned off and for the last 3 days we used 29, 28 & 30kwh/day, and these are cheap days. Input would be great.

...

We plan on doing a meter test this weekend by turning everything off to see if we have an electricity leak. Everything is electric so no gas. It seems like many posters have a gas component...does this explain why your usage is so low?

Yes, but that's not all there is to it. I think it's your combination of large house, everything electric, equipment left on (even standby can be naughty on older gear), a power hungry heater, and a power apathetic husband. At least you're aware of the issue and are working with your family to resolve it. FWIW I probably pay as much for my 10 kwh per day as you are paying for your 30 due to rip off electricity rates where I live, so don't feel too bad about it all.

[TGod]

Tomatoes.....at least they are about to get punted outside as of the weekend. I haven't really thought about them as an energy suck. I guess I had this brain fart that they were fluorescent, so weren't really costing much.
The 2 freezers are probably adding to it, agreed. But we are big salmon and berry consumers so they are usually full of good stuff. We are attempting to do a Eat your Pantry challenge ala NWE. So I'm hoping to empty out one freezer entirely at some point soon and i'll be able to turn it off and see the impact.
When you take away the stupid furnace (we are getting a woodstove this year) and the dryer (which will not be used over the summer and with the woodstove we'll be able to dry clothes in the basement), it's just a lot of little things.
I feel like throwing the breaker when I leave for the day!

[Erica/NWEdible]

So WAY back in October 2012, I said this:

This has got to be our biggest area of suck-itude. We average about 41 kwh per day, something I really just have come face-to-face with. It's extra bad when you factor in gas, which powers a lot: heat, water, much of the cooking stuff. One electric oven, one electric drier, a hullova lotta lights and - wait for it - four full sized cooling boxes (fridges or freezers) make up the bulk of the consumption. We are looking at investment payoff timeframe for LED lights...and I may attempt an unplug your fridge challenge at some point. It's good to have a starting point.

And since then, this thread has become super huge! I just wanted to check back in and brag a bit to my MMM peeps for progress made.

So, about 18 months ago we were using 41 kWh per day. Our latest calculations are that, after a few lifestyle changes and upgrades to LED lighting, we are now averaging 15.5 kWh/day, and are on track to generate roughly 100% of our annual electricity usage via grid-tied solar panels we just installed on the roof.

Happy dance!

[Ozstache]

So WAY back in October 2012, I said this:

This has got to be our biggest area of suck-itude. We average about 41 kwh per day, something I really just have come face-to-face with. It's extra bad when you factor in gas, which powers a lot: heat, water, much of the cooking stuff. One electric oven, one electric drier, a hullova lotta lights and - wait for it - four full sized cooling boxes (fridges or freezers) make up the bulk of the consumption. We are looking at investment payoff timeframe for LED lights...and I may attempt an unplug your fridge challenge at some point. It's good to have a starting point.

And since then, this thread has become super huge! I just wanted to check back in and brag a bit to my MMM peeps for progress made.

So, about 18 months ago we were using 41 kWh per day. Our latest calculations are that, after a few lifestyle changes and upgrades to LED lighting, we are now averaging 15.5 kWh/day, and are on track to generate roughly 100% of our annual electricity usage via grid-tied solar panels we just installed on the roof.

Happy dance!

That is an awesome improvement Erica. Well done!

[Greg]

Yes, good job Erica!

Solar is on our to-do list.  I figure our first kilowatt will run about 10K.  I've spent that before on much less useful stuff.

[lithy]

8 kWh per day for February, down from 12 kWh per day from February 2013.

7 kWh per day for March, down from 9 kWh per day from March 2013.

8 kWh per day for April, down from 9 kWh per day from April 2013.

5 kWh per day for May, down from 7 kWh per day from May 2013

[Greg]

5 kWh per day for May, down from 7 kWh per day from May 2013

That's incredible!  Good job.

[rocksinmyhead]

I don't know how you guys get such low numbers. I've started being really stingy with the power, with furnace turned off and for the last 3 days we used 29, 28 & 30kwh/day, and these are cheap days. Input would be great.

We just had our broken smart meter replaced so I've only got about 2 weeks of energy usage to reference on this house which we moved to last August.

We have a 3K sqft house, 1/2 basement - walk in rancher style and the vents are blocked in the currently being reno'd basement. We have a computer that is on but in sleep mode all the time. We have at tv and 3 game systems that are turned off, but not at the power source (sometimes I remember to turn the switch off before heading out to work).

We have an electric  furnace which we switched to only use 10,000Watts instead of the 20,000watts. We have LEDs and CFLs. Lights off all day while we're at work or kids at school. Since jumping on the MMM bandwagon I bought a programmable thermostat and set it to go to 59 at night and during the day and max was 65 in the morning (an hour) and evening (a few hours). My husband gets home early afternoon tho and he turns it up to 68...grrrr. Where it sits till 5 when I get home and turn it down. I know how much that bloody furnace costs us so I try to avoid using it much.

We have a dishwasher which I run once/day or every other day, with no heat dry. We do a lot of laundry, as a general rule only cold (but again my husband washes his gi in warm). We're only just getting the laundry line set up so we've been using the dryer way more than I'd like.

We have a water pump for the well, 12 year old hot water tank...which I turned down to 120, a heat exchange unit which doesn't always run, I might turn it on in the evenings when I'm cooking. Fridge, 2 smaller chest freezers. Also right now I have a tomato grow op with 4 fluorescent lights on all day.

I don't know what is drawing the energy. Even when nobody is home and the furnace is turned OFF, it's still using ~0.5kwh/hr. When we're home it ranges to 2.5-4.5kwh/hr.


We plan on doing a meter test this weekend by turning everything off to see if we have an electricity leak. Everything is electric so no gas. It seems like many posters have a gas component...does this explain why your usage is so low?

Ummm... I feel your pain. I don't know about individual days (I don't think my utility gives us that info and I haven't been checking the meter) but we sure haven't averaged anything as low as 30 KWH/day for any given month (until last month, April, which is the only month of perfect weather in OK... didn't run either the AC or the heat once and averaged 22 KWH/day). We have electric everything/no gas too, but get this... my house is about 1/3 the size of yours, two people live there, no tomato grow op and no chest freezers!!! Since I started getting a little MMM-crazy last fall, I use the dryer as little as possible (seems to be about once every two weeks). WTF is wrong with my house?!? We do cook a lot and it seems like we run the dishwasher almost every day... we don't use the heated dry, but could just heating the water and running the machine be a huge power suck? Our water heater is actually pretty new (within the last two years).

[KBecks2]

Our electric energy use is going down, and I don't' think that it's about the days getting warmer (although it may be about the days getting longer).

In Feb we were using 25 kWh / day

I misplaced the March bill

In Apr we used 14.97 kWh / day.


I am attributing this to a few new LED lights in the fixtures we use the most? 

It costs about $7 / day to power our house with gas and electric.  I want to reduce it.  Thinking about getting a clothesline / clothes rack and also taking a no-air-conditioning summer pledge….. or maybe…  no-air-conditioning under 95 degrees outside summer pledge.

Our gas is also shrinking from 8 to 4 therms a day.  Happy dance.

KBecks

[momo5]

ok, ready for this?
in september we averaged 100 kwh per day. I honestly don't know how. a/c I'm guessing. it was a hot september.
anyway, I've been slowly getting those numbers down, last month I got it down to an average of 45 kwh/day. so that's improvement but I think we have a long way to go.
3500 sq ft house, family of 7, we homeschool so we're home all the time and we dont all hang out in one room. tv is unplugged but we have two computers and two refrigerators. I do alot of laundry, have started airdrying 1-3 loads per week, plan to increase that.
I'm nervous about those numbers jumping again once we turn on the a/c. we do have two zones, so I can keep the bedrooms a bit warmer but its a ranch with an open layout so there's only so much I can do about separating the zones. I have to keep the windows closed until July (we have some severe seasonal allergies here) and even then, I keep them closed at night and when we are out for safety (lots of break-ins around here). Summers can get really hot and humid here, we tend to keep the a/c at 74 during the day and 78 at night. I'm going to see if I can inch those numbers up without facing a mutiny. I get really cranky when its too hot, but we'll try and see how it goes. or maybe we'll just spend more time at the beach :)
oh, and I think I'll ask dh to insulate our attic, he's been meaning to do that and I think he's forgotten about it.
we have gas heat/hot water/oven/stove, almost all of our lightbulbs are LED and a few CFL's. I've been really good about not leaving cell phones/ipads plugged in all day (we used to).

[aj_yooper]

momo5, this has gotta be a record!  45Kwh per day is very unusual.  I would look into your utility company's website and start following their suggestions.  Explore having an energy audit to see what is going on.

Put a Kill a Watt on your refrigerators and see what they are costing you.  Do you really need two?  Are you running a cyclotron as part of home schooling? 

[marty998]

ok, ready for this?
in september we averaged 100 kwh per day. I honestly don't know how. a/c I'm guessing. it was a hot september.

If I did that, I'd get charged $51 a day down here.

Fuck.

Take the batteries out of the a/c remote, and learn to adapt! When hot temps become the norm because we've pumped so much CO2 into the air from running all our airconditioners then you'll be ready for it.

[grantmeaname]

You pay eight times as much for electrons as I do.

[samburger]

I just got my first electric bill for my new 375 square foot apartment (me + wife) and had to come brag.

March (29 days): 56 kWh
April: (29 days): 62 kWh

That's a 2 kWh/day average so far. I'd been budgeting $50 for the electric bill. Ha!

Now to keep it low once the heat hits...

[myfirstdollar]

Thanks for sharing data points everyone.  My family of 4 lives in San Francisco,  we use about 7kwh - 10kwh per day.

[momo5]

momo5, this has gotta be a record!  45Kwh per day is very unusual.  I would look into your utility company's website and start following their suggestions.  Explore having an energy audit to see what is going on.

Put a Kill a Watt on your refrigerators and see what they are costing you.  Do you really need two?  Are you running a cyclotron as part of home schooling?

An energy audit is a good idea, and I will see about getting a kill o watt
I do need the second fridge, it cuts down on trips to the store, which cuts down on impulse items. I cook everything from scratch so I need the storage for all the produce, eggs, etc. I also cook in bulk when I can and freeze so the extra freezer space is also necessary.
No cyclotron, lol, just lots of lights being left on.
It's frustrating because I'm really trying to use less, but those numbers are still crazy high. I'll just try harder and figure out where else we're wasting electricity

[Greg]

Looking at our April PSE bill, our kWh use went down about 30% compared to April last year.  Averaging 14.3 kWh per day for our home plus rental on the same meter. 

Hard to know how much of this is effort and how much is weather etc. Still working on it.

[dcheesi]

I think I just had my lowest electric bill ever since moving into my house --$41! Normally at this time of year it would be nearly double that. Usage was 296kwh over the measurement period, or about 9kwh/day.

The two main differences were that I didn't turn on my central air at all (not even the fan), and I replaced my (dead) full-sized fridge with a very efficient 3.5 cu.ft. dorm-style unit (supplemented with another one I already had in the basement). 

[aj_yooper]

dcheesi, it's always good fun to see the bill go down!

[Greg]

I think I just had my lowest electric bill ever since moving into my house --$41! Normally at this time of year it would be nearly double that. Usage was 296kwh over the measurement period, or about 9kwh/day.

That's impressive!

[momo5]

I think I just had my lowest electric bill ever since moving into my house --$41! Normally at this time of year it would be nearly double that. Usage was 296kwh over the measurement period, or about 9kwh/day.

The two main differences were that I didn't turn on my central air at all (not even the fan), and I replaced my (dead) full-sized fridge with a very efficient 3.5 cu.ft. dorm-style unit (supplemented with another one I already had in the basement).

that's awesome!
I'm a bit jealous, even though my usage went down my bill went up due to PSEG taking over and raising rates. bah!

[Greg]

My local Home Depot has 4 pack 100w equiv. CFL bulbs for $1.97 right now.  Also 2 pack 40w equiv. LED for 5.97.

[momo5]

got my bill today...last month we averaged 39 kwh/day. which is great improvement for us, even though we still have a ways to go.

[Falconer]

So I just had a thought, since we all can agree that it is silly to heat up an entire house just to keep one person warm and we should just dress warmer until it really gets impractical. I was thinking the same goes for cooling. So I remember ones seeing a documentary about a device used for sports to cool down athletes very quickly. http://www.avacore.com/technology/what-will-it-enable-you-to-do

Now at this moment in time it is still a very expensive device, but ones the price goes down it could be adapted to cool you down even on the hottest day.

And living in a region of the world where AC is on 7-8 month of the year, it could really help keep that cost down.

What do you guys think?

found a diy version http://diybodyheatextractor.mckeemaker.com/

[grantmeaname]

Another option.

[Falconer]

Another option.

good luck with that in the Arabian desert. I am not talking about 37 degrees C, but 45-50 (113-122 F) degrees C for a good chunk of the year. Please explain to me how someone who has to work in customer service or any other job where you have to be close to people, can justify being drenched in sweat and developing BO? At 37 I don't even turn on the AC at all. That is spring temperatures.
To leave anyone without some kind of cooling when working at 45-50 C I would consider a human rights violation. If anyone on here things they can do physical labor at that temperature range for prolonged periods, please send me your CV as I have a very well paid job waiting for you.

[grantmeaname]

There's certainly an upper limit beyond which it's necessary to use AC no matter what. I just thought it may be a relevant post for everyone from more temperate regions of the world, especially since its older and so many readers may have missed it.

[rpr]

We use about 13 kWh per day. This seems like a lot when I look at what has been posted. We are an all electric house. But we have a solar PV system and our consumption was less than what we produced.

[marz1982]

Our latest bill - 9 kWh daily average in April, for two humans and two cats :)



It still gets me every time I look at my energy bill - look at the drop in December.  That's the month we turned our hot water heater down 5 degrees Celsius, somehow that equated to us saving a huge chunk of money. Guess we should have turned it down sooner!

This March was a bit higher than normal, as my Mom-in-law was visiting with us for a month, and she had daily baths, extra lights on and more cooking was done.

We're in the southern hemisphere, so some of it is because it was summer and we didn't need heating, but it wasn't that much warmer in December than in November - that big drop was mostly electricity saving activities.

I started turning our electric stove off at the wall, when not in use.  And I switched off our air conditioner at the wall (both appliances were "buzzing" even when "off").

We only have electricity heated water and electric stove, and we are renting so we can't get any electricity saving devices installed unfortunately.

Somehow, we also only use about "1 person" worth of water every month (according to the indicators they give us on the bill).  Similar to this post... how the hell do people use that much water??

Big thanks to this thread and the MMM forumers for inspiring me to cut down on our electricity bill!

[alsoknownasDean]

I used to use 7kWh a day at my old place, here it's probably in the 15-20 range (bigger place), but I haven't seen a bill in a while.

My parents' electricity consumption is crazy, averages around 60kWh a day. They've had quarterly power bills of four figures! That's for two houses on the same block, with a total of four fridges (including one that'd be every bit of fifty years old), two freezers, electric cooking/heating/AC/hot water, septic tank. The house is fairly new too (built 2009).

I wouldn't mind getting one of those power consumption meters to work out how much electricity everything there uses, especially that old fridge. I may need to suggest to them that it's time to get rid of it.

[Falconer]

There's certainly an upper limit beyond which it's necessary to use AC no matter what. I just thought it may be a relevant post for everyone from more temperate regions of the world, especially since its older and so many readers may have missed it.

No worries, your lack of explanation made it sound to me that you thought my suggestion was totally stupid. I read the article and do use as little AC as possible. And I do not even pay anything for my bills as it is included in my rent. I just want to see how far I can push the envelope. This morning at 8 am my flatmate came into my room. It was still nice and cool from sleeping with the window open and he called it a sauna. It seams that people who grew up in countries where AC is used all the time are more sensitive to heat.  They are used to being in the same temperatures all the time as they run from AC room to AC car and into AC shopping mall. So when the temperature is beyond the cool 19 C they think it is too hot.

I love turing of my flat mates AC when he is out of the house. He seams to think the TV that is running all day needs extra cooling. He pays for the bills so I don't care. His brother is even worth as he is a bit on the bigger side and sweats very easily. When he is over the living room has to be like a fridge.

And for these kind of people I thought the cooling device would be usefull. He can just stick his hand in it and keep his body temperature at a nice level without having to cool down the entire room. I need to find out how much electricity these things pull. Shame I cam no good with coding and electricians work or I would build my own.

[ohyonghao]

Anyone have good ideas for reducing the cost of outdoor security lighting?  The bulbs are 60 watt equivalent CFL's in standard fixtures at all the doors.

Having lights on outside for security is a sad myth.  Here is some reading material about outdoor lighting:
Lighting and Crime
Outdoor Lighting Guidence

The problem lies in that criminals need light to see just as much as we do.  Ask yourself this, which is more obvious, a flashlight wandering around in your backyard, or a dark figure hunkered down in dim light?  The second aspect of it is that light will also give off your security weakness, such as accidentally leaving the patio door ajar or a lower level window open.  Without the additional lighting at all entrances a prowler walking by might not notice.

In addition the flood light systems with motion sensors tend to blind both crook and witness including security cameras which may have been in IR mode for night vision.  If you are looking for security IR cameras at entrances may be more effective as deterrents, and more useful in case any crime was actually committed.

What I have heard of is motion sensors which turn on the lights inside the house, which is always alarming to a criminal to think that they had awaken someone, and that someone is walking around.

A similar thing can be said about privacy fences and the problems which they lead to, once someone jumps over the fence they are now screened from any outside view and can go about their business without worry of nosy neighbors.

[BlueMR2]

I love this time of year.  Down to 6 kwh per day for the last month (and $25 electric bill).

[rocksinmyhead]

really interesting, ohyonghao. I had been wondering if we should look into outdoor motion-sensor floodlights, but all those arguments against it definitely make sense.

this:

What I have heard of is motion sensors which turn on the lights inside the house, which is always alarming to a criminal to think that they had awaken someone, and that someone is walking around.

is a super good idea, never thought of that!