Outrageous electricity bills - Calgary
 

What's the best way to minimize the Enmax bill? Do they offer any better rates?
Utilities this month were $400.

Running:
3x250W MH
Ice Cap 660 T5
Reeflo Barracuda Pump
Magnum 8 powerhead
Octo Skimmer
2 500W heaters

Mine was over $400 I posted about it down the line a ways... pretty awful isn't it.

Ahh, I found your thread, sorry to start a new one...I was just a bit shocked and my first instinct was to create a new thread.

how big are your houses?

Is that inclusive of water/sewage and garbage?

I don't understand the need for 2 500W heaters... my large system is at a steady 80 degrees with 4 pumps (2 return and 2 for the octo skimmer) and 4 powerheads in the water. Doesn't really fluctuate with lights on or off either. Maybe consider taking them out and see if it makes a difference in temp and cost.

Just so we can compare, my bill was $369 with Enmax:
2 250W MH
6x39W T5
OceanRunner 6500
QuietOne 6000
LifeTech 5500 x2
3 Koralia 4
1 Vortech MP40W

The electricity portion of the bill is only $175/month, so it sounds like I'm not doing too bad. I'm only running the MH lights from 2pm - 7pm, when I should be running a 10hr cycle for max coral growth.

I'll turn off a heater, but my system is made to run in the summer without a chiller. I've got a fan-driven open hood design that doesn't hold any heat from the lights, plus the overflows drop the water to the sumps in the garage, which is quite cool.

The return pump pushes the water back up 15ft, drawing lots of power. I'm going to buy a Kill A Watt, anyone seen them in stores? I'll buy it online if not.

I am going to get one of these ones tonight so i can do some checking on my stuff. Also Enmax has a program called easymax that lets you lock in your rate a 8 cents per killowatt for 5 years if i had done this before Jan i would have saved almost 100.00 on my Jan bill.

http://www.canadiantire.ca/browse/pr...08474396672790

My house is over 3000sf. I have a well/septic tank so my bill is strictly for power alone. There are two of us and we do not use the entire house and have lights on all the time. I do have to turn stuff off after hubby all the time though.

I have the following

3x 250 halides
6x 65w compact florescent
2 700 Korilla power heads
1 Korilla 500 power head
Aqua medic skimmer t5000
A really crappy Blue line 100 pump 250w(month old and shot)replacing with better since its consumption is 390w don't buy on they suck

500w heater (hardly runs only at night when halides are off)
250w heater (water storage only runs to keep water at temperature)
36" Tek lights (over fuge)
36w turbo twist UV
Deltech phosban reactor

Okay I'm really just whining...upon closer examination, my household used 1400kWh at 8 cents for a total of $113. The Reef Central calculator told me I'm using $70 worth of electricity for the reef. I can live with that.

The criminal part of the bill is the Easymax fees:
$8 Administration charge
$19 distribution charge
$19 Trans access Defer Acct Rider ??????
$22 Local access fees

plus 3 other small fees

Yup, I hear you. My utilities are in that ballpark too, but I have 4 reef tanks and a freshwater tank. I'm cutting back though, I'm hoping there will be a slight reduction, but it's as you say, the electrical portion is really just a small component. All the other fees are a complete joke. I like how they are individual line items as if they are optional. "Oh I don't want that, so I'll opt out of the trans access defer rider for this month." :lol:

In my thread someone mentioned that that my rate could be estimated. Well that was the case fr January and I am paying what I used in reality total for two months. The estimate was much lower I guess then usual. The gas and power people come give my pups cookies when they come and when I think abut it, I did not see them in January.

My distribution charge is $40.70 and transmission charge $31.13 for that billing month. Geez I thought Enmax was criminal when I lived in Calgary. I'm going to call and whine to Epcor anyways, it won't hurt...

Can I borrow it:mrgreen::mrgreen::mrgreen:

Someone mentioned the one at Costco is really god so maybe I'll grab one when I go back in a week or two. I am thinking my crappy Blue line is a power sucker. Time to get rid of it...

Trade you bills...
 

my Enmax bill in December was $615 and the kicker is that the house was empty for 3 weeks and the temps turned down....

i used 1558kwh in january i switched to enmax this morning for the 8cents and it should save me $30-40 per month
fyi computers use alot of power also so start turning them off when your not using them for a while if possible
also pluging in your car overnight costs about 50cents so get a timer if you plug it in often

gas is a lot cheaper than electricity, leave the heat up so you dont spend the money on heating up your tank

That's a good point, I remember when I built my computer I put in a 500W ultra quiet power source...definitely need to do some investigating with the Kill A Watt.

SO frustrating, on the whole utilities bill I counted 18 random charges.

The funniest part of it all is my water bill was only $11 (without random fees)

That's almost a $1/gallon... :lol:

So... are you still laying on the floor, or are you up on the ceiling... When you call they will give you the "jedi mind trick" and confuse you into thinking the bill is right.

Little known fact, you can borrow Kill-a-watt's from your public library!

Really! I'll have to 'check' that out

My last utilities bill was over $500 ....2100 square foot home......Power was $210...which is pretty normal........but my gas bill was $296....which is about double what it usually is....Now this covered from Dec 24th to Jan 24th...and I recall it being damn cold then.....and I know the little half likes to have the GAS fireplace on......but I was still shocked when I opened the bill......

My place is 2800 sq feet on four floors, two furnaces and two water heaters. I'm pretty much screwed no matter what I do :(

Yup I have two furnaces and two hot water tanks as well. I never have the furnace on in my place to my hubby's dismay. I put on a sweater and slippers if it's cold in the house. One furnace runs the main floor and one the upstairs. If we are not on one of the floors the furnace is off. Sometimes I will be in bed and hear the furnace kick on downstairs and I won't sleep unless I go shut it off...

The fish tank must run at all times, but I am already looking at how long the lights run for and how long they should run for. I like the halides on all day but that won't be happening anymore.:wink:

Does anyone know if Epcor has a plan the same as Enmax? Right now I am paying ~11.65 cents per kWh with Epcor. I will have to check out Enmax as well..... thats a good savings! Thanks 24storm! Brad & Sharon.

I'll have to look into it...my electrical is 7 cents per kwh...the temps in my tank wont vary much as the volume of water is significant...

tell me about it, last months bill was $700

You would actually get much better coral growth by NOT having the halides run all day. There seems to still be a big debate about how long is best but it has been determined that its certainly NOT 8-12 hours a day like many people do but much less. I think one of the last few TOTM on RC was running his 5 hours a day. I am at 6 hours a day now.

wow, $700 is insane

I need to do some homework about this or I will have a conniption when the next bill arrives...

Search RC for the threads. Basically there is only so much light corals can use in a day. The rest of the time, its wasted light and in some cases, not even good for the corals. Many people are seeing nicer color with a shorter photoperiod.

Thanks Justin it is much appreciated.

OMG I'm not the only one! I'm exactly the same way. Everyone I know tells me I'm crazy for turning the furnace down so low (15) at night. All I know is that I can't sleep with the noise it makes.

you can calculate each devices cost and your entire tank cost by taking the watts of each device and dividing by 1000 to get Kw then multiplying by how many hours they are on per day, then multiply by the number of days in the month then by the KWH (KiloWatt / Hour) rate
EG
250W MH
250 / 1000 = .25KW X 11 = 2.75 X 30 = 82.5KWH X (rate) $.069 = $5.69 per month roughly

Be careful with the locked in rate plans. I know a few people who have signed up for them and their bills actually went up significantly. They tend to charge less for electricity, but get you on all the extra fees (which aren't locked in). If you look back through this thread you'll see that a lot of people on those plans are paying more in administration fees than electricity, which isn't the case with my Epcor bill :wink:

Not from what I have experienced. My last place, a three floor Duplex, was solely elec heat. My elec bill was less than my buds gas bill for his place.


When talking Large ovens, Like my Powdercoat ovens, Elec is cheap. Just takes a while to heat a 7'x6'x5' Oven. 18KW of elec heat.

My gas bill for just my trailer is about the same as the Hydro bill for the house AND the shop/oven. But then, I was stupid a while back and locked my gas in BAD DAN, BAD....

i found my heaters ran about half the time and when you have about 1000w of heaters the savings add up, also remember half the gas bill is fixed rates and fee's the actuall part that goes up with usage didnt go up that much for me.

as far as enmax they dont have plans any only use the monthly wich over the last 2 years has hovered between 9-12cents enmax has a locked in rate right now for 8cents, its a 5 year term but you can change it or get out of it anytime with no penalty, i switched from epcor to enmax online the other day and now have to wait 5-8weeks to start saving money.

I called enmax yesterday and locked in on the easymax plan and they told me it goes into effect the next day. You may want to give a call and check they actually answer phones there to. I think i was on hold for all of 1 minute.

Keith