Just threw up in my mouth a little bit... the electricity bill came
 

Well I am still laying on the floor and think I am having a coronary :redface:When we started cycling the 260 a few months ago, the bill went up about $75. The Teklights brought it up to $100 more for power. I just got the bill for the last month we have been running the two 500w heaters , the three 250w halides, the teklights in the basement for the sump and whatever else I cannot think of that we are running now with a full system. Our bill before the start off this tank was about $150-$175 a month for the house.

Today I gt the bill and it is now up to $416!!!!

I have had such a blast stocking up the tank, buying all sorts of fun and wonderful stuff, and now the party is officially over for now. Better grab my Queen angel tonight before I show hubby the bill:lol: I need paramedics to be standing by for him.

My canreef buddy said we should go collect cans and bottles of the streets to finance the hobby. He warned me it would be bad, but I was in denial about it. I always thought you have way more stuff then me plus three 400w halides so of course mine will be better then his...You can put your head in the sand until there is a bill with YOUR name on it. You would think with a jump in my bill of over double the cops would have kicked my door down for having a grow op by now.

I feel faint... I think I need to go lie down now and make sure I have no other power on in the house aside of my tank... I have so many words t say, but none can be posted.:wink:

So... how much is your tank to run a month. What was it like when you got the first bill showing what it cost you? Are you now on ulcer meds and heart medication... Valium... or anything else that calms you down for bill payment time? I need to drink some alcohal now... I'll just crawl across the flor to go get it, my knees are still weak.

have you run your system through this calculator?

Had I have done that... I probably would have never started in the first place. I have no regrets in doing this but this was a shock... I still don't have the total damage just yet, next month will be the real deal. I am always one f those people whom has lights shut off and the furnace off all the time...

I need solar panels on this house.

Why do you need T5s on your sump?

My tanks only cost me about $40-45/month in electricity.

That's with 6 tanks: 27g shrimp condo; 60g goldfish cube; 65g community planted; 90g seahorse fuge; 120g fowlr; and 210g reef.

What are you paying per KWH? IMO Enmax is the way to go as you can lock in for $0.08 per KWH and there is no penalty to exit the contract, just 30 days notice required. It would make a big difference if you are paying $0.13 with Direct Energy.

My bad it is on my fuge which is full of cheato and frags.

I signed up with Enmax @ $0.07/kwh. I used to pay about $80/month now with my tanks it's about $120/month. Yours seems unusally high....?

lay the bill on his truck hood... :)

I'm with Epcor and all I can find is that is csts $14.90 a day. That is up from $6.89 a day last month.

Oh wait last month it was 9.95/kWh and this month it was 10.91/kWh

I live out in the sticks so maybe that is why???

Seriously though check if they were estimating and now are not...that seems to bite everyone. We usually get a bill for 160-180 for 2 months...this time was 180 for one month...they were estimating and screwed up.

I sure hope that is cents/kWh...

on a lighter side i hope you savored the little bit of throw up...from now on it will taste like kraft dinner.

How does every one know what there tanks cost per month. I have tried those calculators and such. But i still get a very high bill. And the bill does not break out my tank for me. Since i have had a tank i have seen my bill increase quite a bit. But i cannot say my tank costs 200 a month or 50 a month, How do others come up with tank costs. It seams like every month enmax has a new fee for this or that.

Same here, after adding 4 powerheads, 2 250W MH, and the 6 bulb TekLight, the bill was $359! I'm with Enmax, so maybe I would have broke $400 with Direct Energy...

How did you know!!! I have been eating it a lot these days any ways.:lol:

My last bill was $569.00, if it comes in that high again this month please watch for the shutting down tank sale!!

It sure adds up... I have to figure out how to break the news to hubby.

My gas, water electric combo bill (though easymax) was $570 last month (usually about $250 or so), due to them estimating everything since the summer and then finally going to read the meter in January, I called and chewed them a new (you know what) I knew that they were there reading the meter as they left the gate open AGAIN for the dogs to get loose as they always do, so reamed them out about that too. Hopefully your situation was like mine and it'll just be one really nasty bill to begin with and then be basically back to normal next month.

Elliot

Most of us will always get hit with a high electric bill every few months. The Electric company invoices monthly rates based on estimates. Then every few months (depending) you will get an actual reading. For some people they may even get a discount but anyone in the hobby will likely get a large bill. You can call the electric company and have the estimates changed if you want.

Bottom line is you're not paying $400 a month, you just didn't pay enough on your last few bills to cover the actual usage. Next month it will be back down to what it was before.

See these look more realistic. This is what i end up with as well i have approx 350 gallons with 3 400 watts 4 48" T5s 2 tunze power heads 2 tunze wav boxes Dart return pump bubble king skimmer a chiller that does not run in the winter and my last bill was just under 500. I am always blown away at peolpe who try to say that their tank only costs 60 80 dollars a month to run. I must be doing something wrong. Before i had a tank 3 years ago our bill was approx 150 a month.

I'm paying $160 a month on an equal payment plan and so far I've paid more then I have actually used. If my hydro ever reaches $400 a month I'm quitting :mrgreen:

I moved in with my boyfriend (now husband) and his bill was about $40-50 per month without me and about $100-$110 with me. I'd say thats pretty much my tank that took care of the increase. Previously I had run it through that calculator on RC which gave me about the same values.

I don't have a large tank yet but with my 70 and my HQI nano I only burn about $17/mth. I did get a Kill-o-Watt Meter and check all my devices though when I set things up and I had a quietone pump that was pulling 3x what they said it would. I got it replaced and now it reads really close to what it should.

Beyond the lights, I think it's often the big returns that gobble up power on your large tanks.

My total household electrical bill last month was $199.80 with Epcor's rate 10 to 12 cent for the period (interesting how the rate changes throught out the period but yet they estimate usage).

Using RC calculator, tank is about $70/mon. Thinking about throwing some frags in the sump and adding a 175W MH, would expect to add about another $7.00 a month. Sell one frag for $10.00, I'm making money.

I think my tank only cost me around $10 a month ahah... except I don't actually pay for the electricity :)

Well then you must have some deep pockets to spring for some of our bills... :wink: Should have gt a nano...

I don't see how large returns would gobble up power. Most of the pumps I have seen for returns/closed loops are Reeflo pumps, and the popular ones, like the Snapper, Dart, & Barracuda, are equivalent to 1-4 household light bulbs running, and that's when they are running fully open, if you have them dialed back the power usage drops accordingly. At least I think that's what I saw on a chart at the LFS.

How the heck do you guys spend so much on electricity??? Do you keep all your lights/oven/dryer/dishwasher/etc. on 24 hours a day?

Bahahaha....awesome.




Sorry to hear about your power bill... ours is now like triple what it used to be before I lived here and before we had the tanks. :(

I am running a good size system and I calculated my electrical cost to be approx. $50 per month. I have used the RC calculator to approximate the cost of electricity consumed. I am very careful when selecting new equipment to ensure that electrical consumption is a consideration. My main system return is an Ampmaster pump and it uses about half of the power that Reeflow pumps use. Tunze product are also very low consumers as well.

http://reefcentral.com/calc/tank_elec_calc.php

Tom R

I add up the wattage of my equipment x the number of hours each set is on per day and multiply by 30. Then I multiply that by the $/kwh.

My systems are mainly low power, with the exceptions being 3 x 250w MH on for 10 hours/day. I also have 4 Sedra 9000 pumps going 24/7 (2 skimmer @ 55w/2 returns @ 90w) and those are my main draws.

Low power lighting over the fowlr, seahorse, goldfish, sump & shrimp tanks & med. power (4 x 55w PC) over the planted community. The HOB & cannister filters, powerheads & such draw very little & I keep my tank temps on the low side with no ill effects. Until a couple days ago, didn't even have a heater plugged into the reef tank & the fish/corals were fine in the low-mid 70s. On my other tanks, I estimate the heaters to be on 12 hours/day or less.

In the winter, my bill rises due to heaters but not huge.

I made sure I went with slow flow for the returns so less power needed (some friends use 300w return pumps for instance).

My wife's goldfish tank probably draws 50 watts max/hour with lights for 8 hours & 30w for the other 16 hours daily.

I use a clip on light with a 27 watt Phillips Daylight CFL bulb over my sump & 2 over my seahorse tank. (in other words, a Tek HOT5 is way over kill for a sump light)

The 210g reef draws approx. 315 watts 24/7 (pump, powerheads, skimmer, fuge light, 80w UV) and 1065 watts for 10 hours when the MH lights come on. At $.065/kwh (old rate), that's $.69 for 10 hrs & then $.29 for the other 14 hours. That's roughly a dollar for the reef or $30/month for my reef tank. All the other tanks' equipment combined do not equal what my reef tank draws. My rough calculations is $1/day for the other 5 tanks.

Actually, with those 2 new tanks I added since I last did this calculation, I guess I'm up to $60/month for powering this addiction. Averages out to $10/tank since I have 6 different tanks running. Not bad.

I know it's too late (you've already bought and installed your equipment) but there are low power alternatives to many things needed for the tanks. I went from a 250w MH pendant over my seahorse tank to 2 x 27w clip on CFL lights. I harvest and sell my macro every week or two, so they work fine for nutrient export. I have smaller heaters (150w to 200w) and keep my tank temps in the low to mid 70s without any issues.

It sounds like you have your sump in the basement & so you need a high power pump to send water up 10+ feet to the display tank, whereas I can get away with a 90w Sedra.

Anthony

hehehehe....wifes goldfish tank... :)

Ask my friends. She made me tear down a 6'6" planted community discus tank over a 6' rainbow/congo tetra tank, then tells me she wants a fancy goldfish tank as I'm draining my tanks of water.

Hey Anthony, does Irene do the maintenance on the goldfish tank? :wink:

a while back i bought a power meter from costco kinda like a kill-a-watt meter and i found other than the lights heaters where my biggest problem with 4or5 tanks usually running i had about 1000w of heaters which were costing me between $1-2 per day my 8 bulb tek light which is around 400w was costing me about $0.75 per day other things where seio powerheads and some things around the house, with all my tanks i average about $250 a month, usually one is a bit lower for the estimate and 1 is a bit higher and i calculate power at $0.11
some things actually use alot less power than they say or i would expect so that was a nice change,mh lights on the other hand use up to 20% more than they say so 750w of halides is probably over 1000w and costing you up to $2 per day

also about the heaters, i found it much cheeper to run my heat up all day and night then to have the heaters sucking up power

i think anyone with a bigger reef or multiple tanks should buy a meter, i got mine from costco online for $35 and ive seen canadian tire selling them in the flyers for about the same, kill-a-watt meters are about $50 but i think they have some better functions

My old tank with dual 400 halides, 320 watts of T5, 150 watts over fuge, return pump, powerheads, skimmer, ect. only cost $50 a month.

I really don't see how your bill can go up that much just from the tank!

all you guys wasting power with heaters, you need to get those 400W MHs

The reasons Lights use MORE power than the rating, is the Bulb Wattage is what the BULB uses. The ballast also consumes some energy in producing the Bulb wattage. Old TAR ballasts ya can be up to 25% ineffiecent. Electronics are way better