Electricity bills

Jarrok

Jarrok

New member
Just kind of trying to figure out what everyones' power bills are running them on the average. Mine shot up to 169 bucks from 98.

Since my tank finished cycling at the beginning of december my bill has skyrocketed, I expected an increase, but not nearly this much. 38.7 KWH per day vs. 18.6 without the tank.

I've toned down my photoperiod to 5.5 hrs white light, 8 hours actinics, completely pulled my QT tank off the grid until it's needed. I had 3- 300w heaters running, toned that down to a single heater tonight to see if it can keep up with the temp. I was running refugium lights 24/7, moved that to 8hrs overnight.

Any other tips on things I can do to tone it down? Wife's going to cut my head off if this keeps up. Not that it's going to break us or anything, but she makes the vast majority of the cash so I've gotta give in, ya know?
 
It was the 3 heaters that did it, especially during the winter months. I'd keep two heaters in there personally.
 
Just blame it on her. Tell her shes blow drying or straightening her hair to much and use the bill as proof. Then slowly turn down the hours you have the lights on to match the less time she uses to straighten or blowdry and show her the bill next month as proof that it was her! HAHA
 
That doesn't sound unreasonable with the unseasonably cold weather we've had these last few weeks. Once you add in metal halides, actinics, return pump, and skimmer,and heaters are the worst offenders.
 
jolopy409 said:
Just blame it on her. Tell her shes blow drying or straightening her hair to much and use the bill as proof. Then slowly turn down the hours you have the lights on to match the less time she uses to straighten or blowdry and show her the bill next month as proof that it was her! HAHA
Click to expand...

I WISH I could convince her that she was the source.

This is one of those gals who gets upset with I turn on lights to get around the house at night. "You're wasting electricity! You know your way around this house!"

I'm screwed! :headwally:
 
Jarrok said:
I WISH I could convince her that she was the source.

This is one of those gals who gets upset with I turn on lights to get around the house at night. "You're wasting electricity! You know your way around this house!"

I'm screwed! :headwally:
Click to expand...

Ahh so im not the only one who has one of "those" lol. Same with the heat.
 
cutting back the heaters won't help. It's still the same volume of water being heated to the same temp. The one heater will just run longer to make up for the absence of the other two.

I've been mulling over in my head how convert a chiller into a heater/chiller combo so it would work like a central air heat pump(ac in summer, heat in winter). Such a device would use a lot less electricity to run and a resistive element heater.
 
fermentedhiker said:
cutting back the heaters won't help. It's still the same volume of water being heated to the same temp. The one heater will just run longer to make up for the absence of the other two.
.
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+1

Consider reducing the tank temp. If u keep ur house at 70 and tank at 80, one degree is a whole tenth the power or more since the furhter you get the harder it is to fight ambient temperature. Also heaters use a lot of power but aren't on all the time.

Photo period is going to be your most expensive issue followed by the return pump. 20kwh seems high. Is there something else going on? Calculate each piece of equipment and verify that's all from the tank.
 
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lhscouchmonster said:
+1

Consider reducing the tank temp. If u keep ur house at 70 and tank at 80, one degree is a whole tenth the power or more since the furhter you get the harder it is to fight ambient temperature. Also heaters use a lot of power but aren't on all the time.

Photo period is going to be your most expensive issue followed by the return pump. 20kwh seems high. Is there something else going on? Calculate each piece of equipment and verify that's all from the tank.
Click to expand...

Well, I'm certain the cold temps haven't helped. We were at zero or below for a good portion of that time, which means the furnace was running quite a bit. I tend to keep the tank at 78 and house at 65.
 
My electric bill in the summer is $80. That's with electric hot water, ACs, and a 200gal tank. Keep in mind though that when your tank loses heat it loses it to your house, so you save a little on your heating bill.
 
I just remembered I installed a 1000w de-icer for the horses' water trough. Pretty sure that bad boy was running 24/7 and accounts for over half of those kWh.

Best part? They're the wife's horses.

Victory.
 
Ha yeah my jump was from $40 to $80 running 2 175watt halides, and a pair of t12vhos. And now I'm waiting for th next jump from the 400watt over the frag tank.
 
Looks tacky and horrible, but insulation board around the sump, and a few sides of the tank will help to hold heat in, redusing the output of the heaters.
 
Our heated buckets in the barn draws a lot of electric too in the winter; there is also the $130 a month hay expense, plus all the grains. Vet bills can be huge; my other being one saves tremendously. It's rather typical for our medium size systems to easily double a households electric usage. I tried hard in my planning trying to keep my system below 17000 watts per day and it's not easy. LEDs can cut lighting bills in half, but what do they do for the heating bill??? Anyone who says nothing is full of it, or lives in a warm climate. Cutting as many watts as you can by using efficient pumps for the skimmer and return can easily save 1kw per day; not a lot, but $4-5 a month either makes the bill look a wee bit more affordable and/or saves enough to buy a rather nice quality frag(s) every year.

I divide my lighting schedule to roughly 5 hrs on, 3 hrs off, 3 hrs on. The way I see it, if two 300w heaters are one, then two 250w halides may as well be. Along the same line, I played with the idea of using a submersible pump in a c.l. that would turn on and off with the heaters; may as well get something out of the watts. Watts are watts.

Another idea I have for saving on the heating bill is to use space/survival blankets to curtain the tank at night. Radiational cooling through glass can be significant, and I believe some real savings may be found by simply covering up the tank at night.
 
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Yeah my old lady was shocked at the electric bill going up about $50 this last month. I added another 300 watt heater to help keep up with the cold weather. Time to start figuring out some ways to get that back down during the winter.
 
tommyz44 said:
Looks tacky and horrible, but insulation board around the sump, and a few sides of the tank will help to hold heat in, redusing the output of the heaters.
Click to expand...

True if your sump is in the open, but if it is in a cabinet with the doors closed then the closed cell foam won't do that much, especially if there is a refugium light and an external pump running.
 
I'm consistently over $200, and frequently get letters from NiMo comparing me to my neighbors. I use so much more electric than the average that I envision a swat team showing up some day hoping to take down a grow operation.
 
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