Comments on: Energy providers are screwing our residents over with high electric bills?

By: Matthew B

Matthew B — Thu, 04 Mar 2010 13:17:59 +0000

The first step is to work out what is using this much energy. Power meters can be bought for a whole building (~$100) or a power point (~$30). You can get real time values or daily, weekly, monthly totals. Find out how much standby energy you use. Find out how much energy is spent on hot water, fridges, entertainment. The building meter updates every 6 seconds on a indoor portable wireless display unit. Turn on or off any device and see the change in consumption. The meter can show in kWh or dollars per hour.
Check the consumption of heating, cooling and hot water. Check for hot water leaks. They are the largest consumers.

I have a review of meters on my website at
http://www.matthewb.id.au/index.php?view=article&catid=6:energy-efficiency&id=22:electric-energy-meter-review&option=com_content&Itemid=8

Regards
Matthew
http://www.matthewb.id.au/
References :
Energy Efficiency e-Book author
http://www.matthewb.id.au/

By: whsgreenmom

whsgreenmom — Thu, 04 Mar 2010 12:31:59 +0000

I live in a 2000 sf home, my highest electric usage is in the summer at 45 kwh per day. To get a $700 electric bill the rate would have to be .51kwh, mine highest tier is only .11 kwh. So either there is something wrong with your meter, or you are using an astronomical amount of energy or you have the greediest energy company on the planet. I would take a look the rate on the bill, if it is dramatically more than it used to be or if your usage is way up, I would contact the utility and ask them to look into it.
References :

By: dooberheim

dooberheim — Thu, 04 Mar 2010 11:46:59 +0000

Are you sure it’s not a mistake? Where do these residents live?

$700 at 10 cents/KWH is 7 megawatt hours, which would be virtually impossible to use even if everything in the apartment were on all the time.

There must be some mistake.

DK
References :