# How does your home's energy usage compare?



## semipro (May 20, 2013)

https://www.energystar.gov/index.cfm?fuseaction=HOME_ENERGY_YARDSTICK.showGetStarted


*Assess the energy efficiency of your home and see how it measures up:*

EPA's Home Energy Yardstick provides a simple assessment of your home's annual energy use compared to similar homes. By answering a few basic questions about your home, you can get:

Your home's Home Energy Yardstick score (on a scale of 1 to 10);
Insights into how much of your home's energy use is related to heating and cooling versus other everyday uses like appliances, lighting, and hot water;
Links to guidance from ENERGY STAR on how to increase your home's score, improve comfort, and lower utility bills; and
An estimate of your home's annual carbon emissions.


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## Augie (May 20, 2013)

I know for a fact I have decreased my electrical energy over the past 5 years, installed LED or florescent lighting, Went to a much smaller water heater tank, from 40Gal to 5gal. (for a single guy in a 1100sq ft home it is perfect, 10min shower, load of laundry or dishwasher, just cant do more than one at a time.) But overall I'm guessing my total energy usage has increased. I keep the house 70-80 with wood instead of 58-65. I also have a habit of cranking the stove up once a week or so getting the house really warm and opening a few windows in the winter to get fresh air circulating. and My gas has almost dropped to zero, just enough for cooking.


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## woodgeek (May 20, 2013)

5.8

Same site 5 years ago: 2.2


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## semipro (May 20, 2013)

woodgeek said:


> Same site 5 years ago: 2.2


Based on the announcement I thought it was something new.  
Its good to see you've improved.  I'm scared to do mine.


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## Highbeam (May 20, 2013)

2.7

I really think I have a problem somewhere with my power consumption. Even when I shut the hot tub off for a month, July every year, I am nearly 1000 kwh of consumption. Small house, young daughters (still in the minimal shower stage) high effici wash machine and cold water wash. I don't get it. Old house, newer meter, maybe there is an internal wiring fault somewhere.

Without home heating demands, the next largest consumer is water heating. I have an electric tank heater in the heated part of the house. Can't see how it could suck so much power.


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## PapaDave (May 20, 2013)

7.7, but I put the same number in for every month of elec. use, and it's a bit high for some months.
Probably closer to 8, but I didn't feel like getting all my numbers. They're pretty consistent month to month.
Highbeam, have you checked for phantom loads?
If I used electric to heat water, my bill would go up about $20/month compared to nat. gas.
We have elec. stove/oven, and dryer.


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## woodgeek (May 20, 2013)

semipro said:


> Based on the announcement I thought it was something new.
> Its good to see you've improved. I'm scared to do mine.


 
The site looks updated compared to the old yardstick site, which was pretty primitive.


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## Highbeam (May 20, 2013)

PapaDave said:


> Highbeam, have you checked for phantom loads?
> If I used electric to heat water, my bill would go up about $20/month compared to nat. gas.
> We have elec. stove/oven, and dryer.


 
I did check for 120 volt phantom loads and even data logged the fridge and freezer with a kill-o-watt. Those things harly use anything by the way. I'm starting to think that I need to use some sort of a whole house monitor and look for some retarded base load. Maybe isolate a bad circuit. Clamp on amp-meter maybe.

33 killowatt hours a day. That's a lot. Something would have to be shorted out.


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## woodgeek (May 20, 2013)

Highbeam said:


> I did check for 120 volt phantom loads and even data logged the fridge and freezer with a kill-o-watt. Those things harly use anything by the way. I'm starting to think that I need to use some sort of a whole house monitor and look for some retarded base load. Maybe isolate a bad circuit. Clamp on amp-meter maybe.
> 
> 33 killowatt hours a day. That's a lot. Something would have to be shorted out.


 
Recirc on DHW?  Demand hot water in sink? Fan blower on 24/7?  Neighbors with grow house stealing your power?


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## semipro (May 20, 2013)

woodgeek said:


> Neighbors with grow house stealing your power?


If so, may I suggest bartering?


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## PapaDave (May 20, 2013)

Not exactly apples to apples, but I'm between 8-11/day, for a comparison. Most things on power strips. Use goes up a bit when we use the big screen  (which is daily now that mom's here).
Lots of stuff plugged in with power bricks?
33/day and I'd be turning off the main.
Yeah, we have newer fridge and a 14 cu ft upright freezer too. I don't think either uses much power.
Something's wonky.


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## Where2 (May 21, 2013)

8.5 on an all electric house @ 31.7kWh/day (11,559 kWh/yr, 1900sq.ft., built in 1961, two adults, in hot/humid South Florida @ 26°N latitude). That is my baseline number _Before_ I install the 4400W grid-tied PV array. I went around the house with my Kill-A-Watt, flipped the switches on a few power strips, put X-10 modules on a few other devices like the DVD recorder. I've installed a digital timer on my 50 gallon electric water heater, turned off ceiling fans in empty rooms, switched out 90% of the light bulbs to CFL, swapped out the halogen bulb in the floor standing lamp to a pair of LED (60W equivalent, 800 lumen) dimmable bulbs (Originally used a 300W halogen, now draws 19W at full bright, dims as low as 0.5W).

In the laundry I've got a ~4 year old Washer/Dryer, (4.5cu.ft./7.3cu.ft respectively) Samsung front-loaders. They each run (on average) one load per day.
In the kitchen, I've got a 26.7cu.ft. side-by-side refrigerator (2001 model), a standard dishwasher (1998 model). Electric stove, oven, convection/microwave, and a little 3cu.ft. wine fridge.
In the garage, I've got a 8,000btu (1995 model) window A/C unit on a digital timer set to run ~7 hours per week to keep the humidity down).
In the house, the A/C is a 3.5 ton, 14 SEER (1998 model), it runs nearly every day from April to December! It's on a NEST thermostat with a very detailed program.

The 4400W grid-tied PV array should cut my current electric consumption in half, according to PVWatts 2. My estimated PV output should be around 6,088kWh/yr.


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## nate379 (May 21, 2013)

I usually use around 400KwH a month.  Probably most of that is from an electric heater in the chicken coop, and tools (welder, plasma cutter, chop saw, etc)



Highbeam said:


> 2.7
> , I am nearly 1000 kwh of consumption. .


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## SmokeyTheBear (May 21, 2013)

8.8


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## Highbeam (May 21, 2013)

woodgeek said:


> Recirc on DHW? Demand hot water in sink? Fan blower on 24/7? Neighbors with grow house stealing your power?


 
I'm dying here with my high usage. I'm the guy barking at kids to turn lights off, (they are now well trained) shut the firdge door, and heat with wood to cut waste to zip. I turn off my shop lights when I go inside for a snack. All CFLs in the house and we suffer through the long warm up times to save energy. My single ceiling fan is energy star and uses 6 watts to operate.

No recirc, or on deman heaters, no central furnace, no well pump, no septic pumps, and the stove blower does not run more than one hour per week, old house with old transformer on the pole but I think I have a ground fault. We do watch lots of TV. It's dark here in WA most of the year and with young daughters and netflix, yeah, we watch TV. I replaced the panel with a nice, new, siemens load center 6 years ago so no corrosion or faults at the panel and my grounds are multiple and excellent.

I could have 50 wall warts at 3 watts each running 24/7 and that would only account for 3.6 kwh per day. Wall warts aren't the problem. I've got something bigger going on.

We have no gas, all electric.

Looking at home usage sites, it is "average" for just a 50 gallon water heater in a four person household to use less than 10 kwh per day.

This is BS, I'm getting a clamp on ammeter and hunting. It should be obvious what is thumping my bill like two extra water heaters.


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## woodgeek (May 21, 2013)

Maybe heat can provide a clue....what is big and warm enough to be blowing 500W continuous that you wouldn't notice?  Heck, that room would run warmer than all the others....that is how I found a thermosyphon when I went sleuthing for too high oil usage once.


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## Ashful (May 21, 2013)

I did it two ways, both before wood, and with wood:

Before wood: Your Score: 0.3
With wood: Your Score: 0.3

Since adding the wood stoves, fuel oil usage went down from 1400 gallons to 784 gallons, and propane went down from 100 to 50 gallons, but electricity usage stayed above 20 MWh per year.

I am married to a woman who had a $300 / mo. electric bill when she lived alone in a 1000 sq.ft. apartment... it's a battle I will never win.


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## daveswoodhauler (May 21, 2013)

8.1 here. Used actual monthly readings for the electric and 2 cords of wood. I guess thats pretty good.


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## Vic99 (May 21, 2013)

Whoa, 9.4.  Used all actual data.  Solar electric since October, 3 cords of wood, minimal gas, a grilling with propane ~once/week.


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## lukem (May 21, 2013)

Highbeam said:


> This is BS, I'm getting a clamp on ammeter and hunting. It should be obvious what is thumping my bill like two extra water heaters.


 
Should be easy enough to narrow it down to the one (hopefully) circuit.  Then the fun begins.  I was leaking voltage in the ground to my detached garage for a while.


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## PapaDave (May 21, 2013)

Where2 said:


> should cut my current electric consumption in half


Cutting your usage requires not using, unless you're merely talking about transferring usage to non grid power.
Your 8.5 must be due to less/no use from a stove or something. It's odd to me that your electric use can be over 3x mine, yet your is "score" better than mine.
Hmmm.
Smaller overall carbon footie-print, maybe.


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## BoilerMan (May 21, 2013)

Wow, after reading all the posts I had to try it.  I'm scared to post for fear of either the BS comment (it's happened before).  9.8 all actual useage numbers were used for my family of 3. 

2,377 kWh
50gal propane (two 100# cylinders lasts ~ 14 months but I said a year)
50 gal (estimate, filled tank in 2010 and half full mesured by sight tube) kero hot water for a few months in summer
4 cord wood

Just for the numbers


TS


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## Where2 (May 22, 2013)

PapaDave said:


> Cutting your usage requires not using, unless you're merely talking about transferring usage to non grid power.
> Your 8.5 must be due to less/no use from a stove or something. It's odd to me that your electric use can be over 3x mine, yet your is "score" better than mine.
> Hmmm. Smaller overall carbon footie-print, maybe.


 
Remember, I'm at 26°N. This place was impracticable swamp (unfit for general habitation) before A/C became prevalent. My electric use is elevated considerably from the use of A/C and my electric dryer. I had less than 10 days this winter where I actually ran my electric heat. (no wood stove, no fireplace, if I want warmth it's $0.11/kWh all electric) My wife came from 46°N, she'll open the windows if it's 60°F outside! My 2012 carbon footprint was 6MtCO2(eq), the equivalent of 1 car, despite my 11,559kWh/yr consumption.

When I input my zipcode into the web page, I presumed it compared my use to that of my relative peers. Comparing power use between identical homes located in Northern MI and South FL is not reasonable. Comparing my use to that of my peers and neighbors, that's actually quite reasonable for comparison's sake. Apparently, my neighbors are energy hogs, at $0.11/kWh. My wife used to have $200-$300 electric bills (10 years ago) in a 1,000 sq.ft. townhouse. Her thermostat lived at 74°F, and that's only because the A/C system would never ever cool to 72°F!

I should rephrase my comment: When I said "cutting my usage", I really meant "reducing my dependence on the power company to supply every kWh I use". I went back and calculated my yardstick for the previous year 2011-2012 and I was at 7.4 with 14,357kWh/yr and 8Mtco2(eq). I do continue to wander through my house and look for things I could change or automate conserve more electricity. I'm probably still at 2kWh-3 per day for the electric water heater.  I have not maximized my savings with super precise timing maps based on my hot water use, and I continue to consider a HPWH to serve two purposes.


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## jebatty (May 22, 2013)

All electric home, incl heat (except for wood stove), household of 3, north central (cold) Minnesota. Electric clothes dryer year-round and dehumidifier in summer are the big consumption items, other than electric heat. Depending on how I run the numbers, the score is 7.4 or 5.7. The difference is on number of cords. We use 4 cords of aspen, which produces the 5.7 score, but if I convert that to oak (2.4 cords) based on equivalent btu's, then the score is 7.4. Average per day is 30 kwh. During non-electric heat and non-dehumidifier months, average is 15-20 kwh/day.

I'm also not sure how to treat our lower level, which is 1/2 basement storage and 1/2 finished living space, and we keep the entire space at about 55F most of the time during the winter. I added 1/2 the sq footage to our total area for the basement because it is partially heated, and that heat is all electric. 

We are planning an install of grid-tied solar electric and hope to have that on-line sometime in June. Although we now have a generator and transfer switch for key circuits to cover power outages, I'm thinking that it would be useful to have the solar system setup to allow an easy transition to off-grid in the future, probably a transfer switch to disconnect from the grid and have the solar charge wonder batteries of the future. Probably also would have to add solar capacity if 100% off-grid was to be realized.


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## PapaDave (May 22, 2013)

Great response Where2. I appreciate the clarification.
I'm curious how your on-grid elec. is generated.
I went back and redid the "test". Tripled my elec. #, dropped wood use altogether, and left nat. gas alone. Got an 8.1.
Got a 7.8 by changing again to reflect all nat. gas and slightly higher elec. usage due to no wood use ( this would better reflect an actual no wood scenario for me).
Most of our elec. power is coal generated. Can we presume coal is cleaner than wood? Wood is about the same as gas? There is no accounting for type of wood stove eff., or nat. gas efficiency either.
If it gets people to conserve a bit, even though it's pretty generic, it's a gooder thing.


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## jebatty (May 22, 2013)

I think the evaluation would get too complicated if many more variables were added, and I would say that the numbers probably are pretty close to an "average" homeowner and give the homeowner a relative tool both to measure use against other users and to see how reduction in use moves the number up.



> Can we presume coal is cleaner than wood? Wood is about the same as gas?


Coal might be cleaner from particulates and noxious (other than CO2) emissions per btu, but because coal is a fossil fuel and adds CO2, and wood is not a net add to CO2, I would say that wood in general is cleaner although it may present problems in certain areas, as in fact it does. Plus, coal is located far away from users and the adverse effects are not seen but hidden in the upper atmosphere, to come down as acid rain, mercury pollution and more CO2. Coal's long term effects, which are now being seen, is not good for healthy living things. Many of the effects of burning wood are seen immediately, i.e. smoke, etc., and wood burning comes under closer scrutiny in part because of that.

Gas is very clean in the most of the areas where coal is bad except that it too is a fossil fuel. The adverse effects of CO2 buildup in the atmosphere are not now good and will be much worse in the near term future.


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## Highbeam (May 22, 2013)

lukem said:


> Should be easy enough to narrow it down to the one (hopefully) circuit. Then the fun begins. I was leaking voltage in the ground to my detached garage for a while.


 
Okay, I'm making progress now. Clamp on meter, accurate enough to read the "draw" from a GFCI. No bad circuits though I have found a frequently cycling electric water heater and a weird leakage to ground.

Check out the pic with the ampmeter clamped over the ground and this is with the main breaker off. I am getting 0.2 amps from the neutral to ground. Is that normal?

Also included a pic of the electric dryer element running.


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## Ashful (May 23, 2013)

Is the meter reading zero with the clamp closed on no wire?  Some (most) clamp on ammeters must be manually zeroed.

Galvanic voltages will produce some small current, and it don't take much V to produce I = 0.2 with R < 1!


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## Highbeam (May 23, 2013)

Joful said:


> Is the meter reading zero with the clamp closed on no wire? Some (most) clamp on ammeters must be manually zeroed.
> 
> Galvanic voltages will produce some small current, and it don't take much V to produce I = 0.2 with R < 1!


 
Yes, meter reads zero point 000 with no wire and my main feeder wires flow zero current with the main breaker shut off. Pretty nifty meter.

I tried a volt meter to see what is pushing the current through the ground wire (and neutral) but what is the reference? I need to measure voltage to ground from my ground. Just seems odd that current is flowing through my neutral to the ground rods. What happens when transofrmers go bad? Surely mine is 50 years old.


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## Ashful (May 23, 2013)

I do suspect that a transformer with loads not perfectly balanced may have some voltage on the neutral, which your ground may be sinking.  I'm not sure if they ground bond the neutral back at the transformer.

In any case, I do not believe this is a factor in your energy bill.  Even if the 0.2 amps was sinking thru your meter (which I do not believe it is), we're talking about 17 kWh per month... a whopping $3.


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## pdf27 (May 23, 2013)

Scored 9.7 with lots of estimations (coastal Washington is the best approximation I can get to the UK). ~2000 kWh of Electricity and ~300 Therms of Natural Gas per year. Hoping to cut both down by about half over the next year with wood stove (finally), solar PV and solar hot water. Oddly, that gives a score of ~9.9, when I'd personally regard that as a fairly mediocre performance - certainly what I have at the moment is nothing special.


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## Where2 (May 23, 2013)

Highbeam said:


> Okay, I'm making progress now. Clamp on meter, accurate enough to read the "draw" from a GFCI. No bad circuits though I have found a frequently cycling electric water heater and a weird leakage to ground.


 
What sort of frequency is the WH cycling, what is the duration of time an element is running and how much current is it drawing during a cycle? I've got mine on an easy to construct digital timer.


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## Highbeam (May 24, 2013)

Where2 said:


> What sort of frequency is the WH cycling, what is the duration of time an element is running and how much current is it drawing during a cycle? I've got mine on an easy to construct digital timer.


 
It is drawing the proper 18 amps but only running for 10-15 minutes per cycle when no water is being used. Time between cycles I don't know yet. I do know that it runs with each use of hot water such as laundry or showers. I will have to do some more logging but if everything else checks out then water heating is the most likely culprit.

I don't believe in water heater timers, the kind that shuts off the circuit for most of the day, unless you have variable power rates. Do you have some sort of a run time meter to monitor use? In my reasearch, a good tank just doesn't loose much heat which is the only way that a timer will save energy. Stand by losses are nearly zero with modern water heaters.


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## woodgeek (May 24, 2013)

I agree. I don't like WH timers either, standby on electrics is usually 5-10% depending on insulation.

If you want to track hours, find a cheap 240V 'hour timer', and just wire it across the bottom element (maybe disconnect the top element for diagnostic certainty).

Here is one I found in 30 seconds:

http://www.dhgate.com/p-ff8080813ada6e40013b20fb7daf3f89.html?utm_source=GMC&utm_medium=Adwords&utm_campaign=trustwin-win&utm_term=147919820&f=bm|147919820|041015-Timers|GMC|Adwords|pla|trustwin-win|US||c%7&gclid=COvUvOeJr7cCFcef4AodJXgAfw

the hong kong shipping is sometimes a PITA, you could look for something equivalent shipped from the US.

I used something very similar to track my oil burner usage back in the day. They're handy things to have around.


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## woodgeek (May 24, 2013)

pdf27 said:


> Scored 9.7 with lots of estimations (coastal Washington is the best approximation I can get to the UK). ~2000 kWh of Electricity and ~300 Therms of Natural Gas per year. Hoping to cut both down by about half over the next year with wood stove (finally), solar PV and solar hot water. Oddly, that gives a score of ~9.9, when I'd personally regard that as a fairly mediocre performance - certainly what I have at the moment is nothing special.


 
Interesting.  I played around with the floor area parameter, and find that if I put in a small square footage, I get a lower score, and the reverse.  At fixed energy, if I lived in a shack, it would be a huge energy hog.  Same energy in a mansion, super energy efficient.

So, what was your square footage/meterage?  Free standing house (common in the US) or a rowhouse with conditioned space on both sides??


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## Where2 (May 25, 2013)

Highbeam said:


> It is drawing the proper 18 amps but only running for 10-15 minutes per cycle when no water is being used.


 
Based on the 18A current consumption value, you have ~4kW element(s) in your WH. So, 15 minutes running is 1kWh consumed. I would determine how often that bugger is running when no water has been used... If the tank is solid, you can buy a set of WH thermostats and elements as a kit at most big box stores. Heavy mineral deposits on the elements act as insulators between the element and the water you are trying to heat. Consider plumbing in a heat trap if you don't have one already.

I've encountered plenty of people who don't believe in WH timers and some who don't believe in programmable A/C thermostats. I design automated control systems for a living.

In my case, my WH is _inside_ my air conditioned space. Energy units I purchase to heat water that escape the WH insluation as losses actually cost me double, because the A/C system finds the heat and tries to remove it from my air conditioned space. This past week, my average energy use to run just my central A/C has been12kWh/day. That is not a number I am proud of, it is an admission of reality. I use the digital Max/Min thermometer to fine tune my WH digital timer programming. I can tell "how close" I am getting to running out of hot water by how low the lowest reading has been. At some point, I may set up a true monitoring and logging system for power and temperature like a Brultech GEM.

I expect in the next 5 years, my POCO will roll out TOU pricing on electricity. They've been facing a growing opposition toward construction of additional generation facilities in my state, and very few people are adopting renewables due to the lagging economy. With smart meters on every house, TOU pricing becomes easy for the POCO to roll out as a "software" update. I hope to have plenty of data collected and automation installed before TOU pricing comes along. As it is, the POCO has been collecting a detailed record of my energy consumption for over a year now.


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## brian89gp (May 26, 2013)

Highbeam said:


> It is drawing the proper 18 amps but only running for 10-15 minutes per cycle when no water is being used. Time between cycles I don't know yet. I do know that it runs with each use of hot water such as laundry or showers. I will have to do some more logging but if everything else checks out then water heating is the most likely culprit.


 
Do you have a leaky faucet anywhere?  A slow drip might be causing the WH to cycle more then it should.


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## pdf27 (May 26, 2013)

woodgeek said:


> Interesting. I played around with the floor area parameter, and find that if I put in a small square footage, I get a lower score, and the reverse. At fixed energy, if I lived in a shack, it would be a huge energy hog. Same energy in a mansion, super energy efficient.
> 
> So, what was your square footage/meterage? Free standing house (common in the US) or a rowhouse with conditioned space on both sides??


89 square metres, so approximately 1000 sq ft. Mid-terrace house so conditioned space on 2 of the 4 walls. Double glazing, walls are insulated masonry cavity, roof has ~15 inches of fibreglass insulation. LED lighting for most of it, CFL for the rest, super-efficient appliances. Heating is hydronic from mains gas, and the climate means air conditioning is practically unheard of. Typical energy consumption currently is ~2,000 kWh/year of electricity and ~10,000 kWh/year of natural gas.
Still to go are wood stove, solar PV and solar hot water. Target is ~1,000 kWh/year of electricity imported (we don't have net metering) and ~6,000 kWh/year of natural gas (hoping to go below this, will depend how much the stove gets used).


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## BoilerMan (May 26, 2013)

pdf27 said:


> 89 square metres, so approximately 1000 sq ft. Mid-terrace house so conditioned space on 2 of the 4 walls. Double glazing, walls are insulated masonry cavity, roof has ~15 inches


 
More of what would be in urban US, unit housing (conditioned space on two or more sides) is basically non-existant here in the northeast US, older city or tract developments. Mostly rural, detached housing with hundreds of meters of land and trees in between dwellings.  Almost exclusively wood-framed or masonry faced wood-framed construction as well.

TS


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## pdf27 (May 26, 2013)

I'm reasonably well aware of it (my in-laws are in NJ). There's no reason they can't attain significantly higher insulation values than I do - most of Scandinavia does for instance using pretty similar construction methods and housing layouts.


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## Ashful (May 27, 2013)

pdf27 said:


> 89 square metres, so approximately 1000 sq ft. Mid-terrace house so conditioned space on 2 of the 4 walls. Double glazing, walls are insulated masonry cavity, roof has ~15 inches of fibreglass insulation. LED lighting for most of it, CFL for the rest, super-efficient appliances. Heating is hydronic from mains gas, and the climate means air conditioning is practically unheard of. Typical energy consumption currently is ~2,000 kWh/year of electricity and ~10,000 kWh/year of natural gas.
> Still to go are wood stove, solar PV and solar hot water. Target is ~1,000 kWh/year of electricity imported (we don't have net metering) and ~6,000 kWh/year of natural gas (hoping to go below this, will depend how much the stove gets used).



Geez... I'd be thrilled if we could just get or electric below 20MWh/year.  We currently have no electric heating, but will be adding two heat pumps (mini-splits), so i guess the number will only climb.

That said, there's no way I'm subjecting myself to life under harsh LED's or glaring CFL's.  I get the urge to try them every year or two, knowing they're always improving the technology.  I always buy those very highly reviewed to be a nice "warm" light, but they all look awful to me.


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## pdf27 (May 27, 2013)

When electricity is ~$0.30/kWh, the incentive is a lot bigger  Even at those consumption levels, I'm paying over $1,000/year for gas and electricity.

I actually prefer warm white LEDs (and SOME CFLs, although that depends as much as anything on the colour the room is) to incandescent - the colour reproduction is much closer to natural daylight. Tungsten filament is just too yellow for me.


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## Ashful (May 27, 2013)

I agree.  Just personal preference.  We live in a 1770's farm house, so the amber glow of low-wattage incandescents just seems "right", for us.

Differentiating between black and blue pants or socks can be hell, in our lighting, tho.


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## woodgeek (May 27, 2013)

Joful said:


> That said, there's no way I'm subjecting myself to life under harsh LED's or glaring CFL's. I get the urge to try them every year or two, knowing they're always improving the technology. I always buy those very highly reviewed to be a nice "warm" light, but they all look awful to me.


 
The L-prize bulbs from Phillips are 100 lum/W and have a color index of 91, indistinguishable from incandescent.


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## jharkin (May 28, 2013)

Our score.....

2.6



ugh.  But not unexpected.  A big problem as I mentioned in other threads is the dehumidifier we need for our constantly damp basement.  If I spent $20 grand to excavate and waterproof the place (not happening) my score might go up to 5.  There is only so much you can do in a very old house.


BTW, I can vouch for those L Prize lamps.  We have a bunch now that I can get them for $10 with rebates. People who visit dont know they are not incandescent.  Similar good reaction to the Cree LED downlights in my kitchen.


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## semipro (May 28, 2013)

We've tried a few of the LEDs now including the L-Prize and nobody that's seen them at our house can see any difference in light quality from the incandescents.   At this point its become a no-brainer as far as using them for us.  The hard part is dropping $10 on a light bulb.


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## PapaDave (May 28, 2013)

Which is sort of how it was when CFL's came out, but LED are even higher priced.
Still waiting for the magic price point on these, as the ROI isn't good just yet.
Our Power Co. offered free CFL a couple years ago, so I took advantage of that. If they'd do it with LED, I'd jump on it.
I had already switched the whole house to CFL when I got the free batch. May take forever to get into CFL at this point, since the ones I put in several years ago are still going strong.


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## Highbeam (May 28, 2013)

On that calculator, they heavily penalize you for cords of wood. I can move from 3 almost 6 by reducing my wood consumption from 3 to 2.


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## PapaDave (May 28, 2013)

I believe you're on the right track Highbeam. Heavy bias against wood use.  By moving numbers and type of fuel, its pretty obvious the EPA doesn't like us.


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## DickRussell (May 28, 2013)

I got 8.9 by entering just the electrical usage month by month. Then I added the roughly half cord of wood I burned over the year; it reported 1, not 0.5, so maybe it rounds up? Anyway, with the wood usage I dropped to 8.6. Not bad, but I had hoped for higher. The house is superinsulated and is heated & cooled by a two-ton ground source heat pump.


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## Ashful (May 28, 2013)

Highbeam:  I varied my wood usage a good bit, and my score held strong at 0.3, either way.  Maybe it hates electric use more than wood?


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## jebatty (May 29, 2013)

I don't think there is any bias against wood. I used a "standard" house at 1500 sq ft and then ran the numbers assuming only wood at 3.25 cords oak, what our house would use if we burned oak, 3400 lbs/cord, 6050 btu/lb available heat. The program requires some use of electricity, so I put in 1 kwh/mo. The number was 9.9.

Then I assumed only electricity at 325 kwh/mo, 3900 kwh total for a year, which is the available btu/equivalent of 3.25 cords of oak. The number again was 9.9.

Then I assumed LP at 100,000 btu/gal for equivalent btu use, also 1 kwh/mo electric. The number was 10.0, and the difference is not significant and probably a result of rounding.


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## PapaDave (May 29, 2013)

Guess I didn't experiment enough.


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## BrotherBart (May 29, 2013)

5.3 here.


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## Highbeam (May 29, 2013)

Keep an eye on it, there's more going on in this black box than we can see. I suppose that's why it is called a black box.

Just got my last month's electric bill. 34.8 kwh per day actually up 1.5 kwh from last year despite warmer temps for the month.


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## begreen (May 29, 2013)

Highbeam said:


> 2.7
> 
> I really think I have a problem somewhere with my power consumption. Even when I shut the hot tub off for a month, July every year, I am nearly 1000 kwh of consumption. Small house, young daughters (still in the minimal shower stage) high effici wash machine and cold water wash. I don't get it. Old house, newer meter, maybe there is an internal wiring fault somewhere.
> 
> Without home heating demands, the next largest consumer is water heating. I have an electric tank heater in the heated part of the house. Can't see how it could suck so much power.


 
electric clothes dryer?


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## Highbeam (May 29, 2013)

begreen said:


> electric clothes dryer?


 
Yes, and cycles on and off at 23 amps as it runs as it should. Moisture sensor and with a HE front loader, the clothes going in are spun damp.

I've been researching energy consumption meters such as The Energy Detective. About 200$ and you can log the house's use. Each appliance has a signature amperage draw so it wouldn't be too hard to figure out what is cycling.

Taking advantage of the free PSE fridge program on Friday. The power company will replace your fridge for free if it is 1992 or older.


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## semipro (May 29, 2013)

We had a contactor in our HVAC go bad which energized one of the resistive backup elements 24/7.   I noticed heat coming up through one of our floor vents when the system was off.  
Our power bill sure spiked that month.


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## semipro (May 29, 2013)

Highbeam said:


> I'm the guy barking at kids to turn lights off, (they are now well trained) shut the firdge door, and heat with wood to cut waste to zip.


Same here.
Maybe its your doorbell transformer. 
Seriously, I wish I could find that little bugger in our house so I could disconnect it. Can't remember the last time someone used the doorbell.


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## Highbeam (May 29, 2013)

semipro said:


> Same here.
> Maybe its your doorbell transformer.
> Seriously, I wish I could find that little bugger in our house so I could disconnect it. Can't remember the last time someone used the doorbell.


 
My house is from 1963 when they didn't install doorbells I guess.


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## BoilerMan (May 29, 2013)

Highbeam said:


> Taking advantage of the free PSE fridge program on Friday. The power company will replace your fridge for free if it is 1992 or older.


 
This is interesting to me, why 1992?  Did they change to R134a from R12 then?  Even though R12 is more efficient at moving heat, but much worse for the ozone.



Highbeam said:


> My house is from 1963 when they didn't install doorbells I guess.


I've been in some old apartment buildings where they used pnumatic door bells.  The "button" is a bellows and a little hose go to the bell in the apartment.  From the 60s I'd guess, but man I wish I could find something as elegantly simple as that now, that wasn't made in China. 

TS


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## BrotherBart (May 29, 2013)

If I hadn't of had the whole house electricity monitor I don't know how long it would have been before I found out the check valve down on the submersible pump had rotted. The pump would pump up the bladder, shut off and the water would immediately drain back down into the well. Electric use went nuts for two days and I went hunting and found it.


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## Highbeam (May 29, 2013)

BoilerMan said:


> This is interesting to me, why 1992? Did they change to R134a from R12 then?


 
No idea. It's a sweet deal though. In fact, worth buying a crappy old refer off CL to qualify. A 1992 model is dang old, 21 years, maybe they were going for "20 YO" models.


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## BrotherBart (May 29, 2013)

Wish somebody would trade a new one for my 1985 one.


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## BoilerMan (May 30, 2013)

Highbeam said:


> No idea. It's a sweet deal though. In fact, worth buying a crappy old refer off CL to qualify. A 1992 model is dang old, 21 years, maybe they were going for "20 YO" models.


 
I just find it interesting, when we were paying $0.17/kWh it cost me just over $10 / month to run my garage sale side-by side manufactured in 1995.  At $120 of electricity a year and it's less now that our rate dropped to 0.147/kWh, I can't see much savings by junking a perfectly good food cooler, with working ice maker.  The throwing out of appliances because they are outdated seems way more wasteful to me than burning up a few more kW until their useful life is actually done, then buying a more "efficient" one.  I just can't stand the thought of throwing something aways that still works, and well.  Less than $10/month is not an energy hog IMHO.  The energystar website's calculator says my fridge used alot more kWh than it actually does as measure with Kill-A-Watt meter, which I know is reasonably accurate as I tested it with several known loads for weeks. 

TS


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## pdf27 (May 31, 2013)

Depends on the price of electricity - I'm paying $0.30/kWh. It's also probable that being in a garage in Maine your fridge has significantly cooler ambient temperatures than say one in a kitchen in Texas. Energy Star will be calculating an average for the entire country, probably based on an ambient of 70F for the entire year. Both will make an enormous difference to how quickly a replacement fridge will pay for itself.


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## Highbeam (Jun 1, 2013)

Bummer, no free fridge. The man came and claimed I needed an R-12 fridge to qualify and mine is R-134. I could have told him that and saved lots of time. Since we had the old fridge cleaned out and its compressor was clanking on shutdown I replaced it with a new e-star unit last night on my nickel.

I went out to see how fast it made the meter spin and by golly, I have a brand new meter. We had called the power company to ask about why our bill was so high and they had no idea. Bam, new meter. Funny huh? Anyway, this new one is all digital and I am dating the install on the meter to log daily use. It is so much easier to read than those dial types. Too bad they buggered up the rubber meter gasket so I'll have to cut their tag.

The new fridge uses less than one amp so about 100 watts when running. Freaking weird. The tag claims 6 amps but that is surely during defrost.and maybe when the ice maker (I don't have) is fired up.


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## BoilerMan (Jun 1, 2013)

pdf27 said:


> Depends on the price of electricity - I'm paying $0.30/kWh. It's also probable that being in a garage in Maine your fridge has significantly cooler ambient temperatures than say one in a kitchen in Texas. Energy Star will be calculating an average for the entire country, probably based on an ambient of 70F for the entire year. Both will make an enormous difference to how quickly a replacement fridge will pay for itself.


 
Never said my fridge is in the garage, it's in my kitchen.  Conditioned space, about 12' from the wood stove so I'd think it does have to "work harder" at removing the heat from it's internal space. 

According to the DOE in the US the average electric rate is $0.107 and I measured my fridge (in conditioned space) at $0.17/kWh, don't remember what the actual useage was it was a couple of years ago.  I was just interested in the $$$ number. 

TS


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## BoilerMan (Jun 1, 2013)

Highbeam said:


> Bummer, no free fridge. The man came and claimed I needed an R-12 fridge to qualify and mine is R-134. I could have told him that and saved lots of time. Since we had the old fridge cleaned out and its compressor was clanking on shutdown I replaced it with a new e-star unit last night on my nickel.
> 
> I went out to see how fast it made the meter spin and by golly, I have a brand new meter. We had called the power company to ask about why our bill was so high and they had no idea. Bam, new meter. Funny huh? Anyway, this new one is all digital and I am dating the install on the meter to log daily use. It is so much easier to read than those dial types. Too bad they buggered up the rubber meter gasket so I'll have to cut their tag.
> 
> The new fridge uses less than one amp so about 100 watts when running. Freaking weird. The tag claims 6 amps but that is surely during defrost.and maybe when the ice maker (I don't have) is fired up.


 
The fridge may have a defrost heating element in it, the amperage listing is for the MAX amperage (used for sizing the circuit).  Generally any houshold refridgertion compressor is 150W or less. 

TS


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## TradEddie (Jun 6, 2013)

BrotherBart said:


> If I hadn't of had the whole house electricity monitor I don't know how long it would have been before I found out the check valve down on the submersible pump had rotted. The pump would pump up the bladder, shut off and the water would immediately drain back down into the well. Electric use went nuts for two days and I went hunting and found it.


I had the exact same problem last September, my electricity bill was way higher than usual, higher than July or August, but I put it down to visitors in the house taking long showers or blasting the a/c instead of opening the windows. Then Hurricane Sandy hit and when the power went out I soon realized that the water pressure was lost immediately, and when power came back I couldn't get up to pressure at all. The next day, as I'm calling the well contractor, I open my October electricity bill...

It probably cost me $200 in electricity, some huge loss of pump life, in addition to the cost of digging up my garden to replace the pitiless adapter. Who the hell thought is was a good idea to bury brass fittings in acidic soil to carry acidic water?

Anyway 5.2 was my score with consumption figures from memory.

TE


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## TradEddie (Jun 6, 2013)

pdf27 said:


> Scored 9.7 with lots of estimations (coastal Washington is the best approximation I can get to the UK). ~2000 kWh of Electricity and ~300 Therms of Natural Gas per year. Hoping to cut both down by about half over the next year with wood stove (finally), solar PV and solar hot water. Oddly, that gives a score of ~9.9, when I'd personally regard that as a fairly mediocre performance - certainly what I have at the moment is nothing special.


 
You see, that's just cheating! The only way we Americans (now that I've become one) can believe ourselves to be remotely energy efficient is by comparing with ourselves!

I like to pretend that four people in my 2200sqft house on one acre of land, 5 miles from the nearest store, kept at 20C/72F year round is energy efficient because I have a wood stove that I light a few weekends a year... never mind the two cars with 3.5L engines...

If I was paying the electricity or petrol prices I paid in England, we'd have much shorter showers and a much warmer house in summer, but I couldn't give up the volume pedal on my car!

TE


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## pdf27 (Jun 6, 2013)

TradEddie said:


> You see, that's just cheating! The only way we Americans (now that I've become one) can believe ourselves to be remotely energy efficient is by comparing with ourselves!
> 
> I like to pretend that four people in my 2200sqft house on one acre of land, 5 miles from the nearest store, kept at 20C/72F year round is energy efficient because I have a wood stove that I light a few weekends a year... never mind the two cars with 3.5L engines...
> 
> If I was paying the electricity or petrol prices I paid in England, we'd have much shorter showers and a much warmer house in summer, but I couldn't give up the volume pedal on my car!


Yep, seen all that (my in-laws are from the NJ/PA border). When they were over 18 months or so ago you could tell what rooms they had been in by lights on, etc.

I try to be energy-efficient, but the reality is that most of my lifestyle choices which end up saving energy aren't really for that reason. The new gas boiler was fitted because the old one was dilapidated and in the wrong place, not to burn less gas. Likewise with the extra insulation and probably new triple-glazed windows next year - my wife feels the cold badly. Solar hot water and PV, when it goes in (probably over the winter!) will be as much a toy and an investment as to be eco-friendly. 80% of my commuting, on average, is by bicycle for ~10 miles a day - saving money on diesel and gym membership is the main motivation there. The wood stove (couple of months time) will be as much for the ambience and ability to keep one room really warm as anything else.

Prices for comparison:
Natural Gas: $2.32 / Therm
Electricity: $0.26 / kWh
Gas (Petrol): $7.95 / Gallon
Heating Oil: $3.36 / Gallon


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## Highbeam (Jun 6, 2013)

pdf27 said:


> Prices for comparison: Natural Gas: $2.32 / Therm Electricity: $0.26 / kWh Gas (Petrol): $7.95 / Gallon Heating Oil: $3.36 / Gallon


 

The difference between your petrol price and your heating oil price tells the real story. Your high energy prices are due to optional taxes placed onto you by your lords. The side effect is conservation.


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## Where2 (Jun 6, 2013)

TradEddie said:


> ... never mind the two cars with 3.5L engines...


In America, you can get vehicles with something smaller than a 3.5L engine. Every vehicle I own has less than a 2L engine. Two get 40+MPG on the highway and have enough torque to spin 225/45/R17 Continental ProContact tires. The third car will do 140MPH flat out and 0-60 in 7.5 seconds. All three were designed in Germany and have forced induction.


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## pdf27 (Jun 7, 2013)

Highbeam said:


> The difference between your petrol price and your heating oil price tells the real story. Your high energy prices are due to optional taxes placed onto you by your lords. The side effect is conservation.


Indeed, although the fact that petrol taxes are high doesn't tell the whole story as taxation is distributed differently. Property taxes, for instance, are radically less than US ones are (mine is ~$1,800/year on a ~$400,000 house in a fairly nice area with lots of schools), while income taxes are a little higher and VAT (~sales tax) is 20%. As a fraction of the economy government spending is slightly higher, but on current trajectories will go below that of the US by about 2020. Per capita government healthcare system is, for instance, already higher in the US than UK.

And conservation isn't so much a side-effect as a deliberate policy decision to use taxation to shape consumption. This is also shaped by the nature of the country - travelling from place to place takes a LOT longer by car in the UK than the same distance would in the US, largely caused by a mixture of dense population and small roads. That seems to be working fairly well - cars are significantly newer, smaller and more efficient relative to size than they were a few years ago, with I think people driving fewer miles as well.


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## Ashful (Jun 7, 2013)

pdf27 said:


> ... conservation isn't so much a side-effect as a deliberate policy decision to use taxation to shape consumption. This is also shaped by the nature of the country - travelling from place to place takes a LOT longer by car in the UK than the same distance would in the US, largely caused by a mixture of dense population and small roads. That seems to be working fairly well - cars are significantly newer, smaller and more efficient relative to size than they were a few years ago, with I think people driving fewer miles as well.


 


I only wish England would keep their high petrol prices, classically awful food, and funny little cars.  And America would stay a little less civilized with 7-liter engines under the hoods of muscle cars driven by men who look and act like Harry Callahan.  I wish the Japanese still wore Kimonos, the Chinese still built magnificent temples to Buddha, and tribes in Africa still lived the way of countless generations before them.  It's the differences that make this world and traveling interesting, and I wonder how the global homogenization we've seen in recent decades really helps anyone.


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## TradEddie (Jun 7, 2013)

I really wasn’t trying to derail the thread into a UK/US environmental/political discussion, my point was that the calculator doesn’t give enough (any?) credit for inherent decisions such as house size, only for how efficient that house is. As someone else pointed out, if you say that you live alone in a 5000sqft house, your score is somewhat relative to others also living alone in a huge house. I don’t see that house size should be included in the score at all, but possibly only used to recommend improvements.

TE


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## jebatty (Jun 9, 2013)

One little chart can't do it all for everyone. Comparing energy usage is useful because it may result in some doing things to use less energy than they did before and less than others. Some people are motivated by this comparison. Good. Others are motivated to conserve by other things, like saving money so that the money may be used for something more useful to them. Others are motivated by an ethic, etc.

One benefit of anything that causes people to use less energy is that people have changed their behavior, and I am a strong believer that behavior shapes values more than values shape behavior. So, behaviors that result in conservation lead to an increase in conservation values, which may lead to more awareness of the benefits of conservation and help a person to be more likely to adopt other conservation behaviors to support their increased value of conservation. 

Perhaps the chart should have a "Do you want to know or do more?" link at the end. That link might include info on structure size, passive solar siting, lowering the heat and raising the cooling temperature, living closer to where a person works, walking or biking rather than using a motor vehicle, etc.

On that last point, I wanted to make a bank deposit yesterday, weather was OK, and I decided to ride my bicycle instead. I live 14 miles from the town where the bank is, and I decided to take a little different, more scenic route, so my round-trip ride was 37 miles. No use of gasoline, healthier and fitter body, and improved state of mind. Priceless.


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## goldfishcastle (Jun 23, 2013)

9.9 using actual numbers.  We average 100kwh/mo.  We heat with gas and wood.  Our budget bill is $36/mo for both gas and electric.  But we are always looking for ways to save energy.  

We installed the wood stove in 2008 because my husband was tired or hearing me complain about being cold.  It reduced our gas consumption 40% and my complaining 90% so it was a success.  We haven't used our dryer in years.  Those were our 2 biggest changes.


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## Grisu (Jun 23, 2013)

goldfishcastle said:


> We haven't used our dryer in years. Those were our 2 biggest changes.


 
I wish I could convince my wife of that.  Right now, it is usually me rushing to get the clothes out of the washer and on the drying rack before my wife gets her hands on them.


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## begreen (Jun 23, 2013)

We just added to our electric bill. Sold the Prius and traded for a Volt. It's on the charger now. The solar panel input should balance this out, but it will need to be tracked for confirmation.


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## Vic99 (Jun 24, 2013)

begreen said:


> We just added to our electric bill. Sold the Prius and traded for a Volt. It's on the charger now. The solar panel input should balance this out, but it will need to be tracked for confirmation.



Begreen, please update on this as time goes on. I'm thinking of getting a volt as well, maybe next year. We also have a PVC system.


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## Ashful (Jun 24, 2013)

A buddy at work got a Volt last year, and loves it.  When I started pressing him about how much his electric bill must have gone up, he said it really didn't have much of an impact.  He's driving about 20 mi./day for work, and said the hit to his electric bill is surely under $30/mo.

16 kWh / 35 miles range = 0.457 kWh/mi = 7.3 cents/mile @ 16 cents / kWh, so the math supports his claim.


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## Highbeam (Jun 24, 2013)

begreen said:


> We just added to our electric bill. Sold the Prius and traded for a Volt. It's on the charger now. The solar panel input should balance this out, but it will need to be tracked for confirmation.


 
Cool! I admit that this would be a fun experimental car to test out. Seems the smartest way to go.

I have been having excellent luck with my 100$ efergy energy monitor which would alllow you to log consumption on any one circuit as well as the home.

Did you have to install a new charger circuit to the panel? What type of plug/circuit is the new one?


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## begreen (Jun 24, 2013)

Range varies a lot with terrain, temperature and the driver. On the Volt forum I'm reading that careful drivers are blowing away the 40 mile range. We have lots of steep hills that are part of our normal roundtrips so I don't expect to see that happen. But my first trip with the car showed that if you know how to use regen well you can definitely extend range. With electric drive, by shifting into low you don't affect any engine speed, but it really ups the deceleration and regen braking when you let up on the gas. It takes a little getting used to  but works well. I went downhill on a curvy road and never hit the brakes until the stop sign at the bottom. All you do is let up on the gas and it feels like someone popped a chute out behind the car. You control the degree of 'drag' by the accelerator position. Our electric is at .10/kwh so I am not expecting a big hit at the meter, we'll see. Today I take a longer journey that will push the range limit.


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## begreen (Jun 24, 2013)

Highbeam said:


> Cool! I admit that this would be a fun experimental car to test out. Seems the smartest way to go.
> 
> I have been having excellent luck with my 100$ efergy energy monitor which would alllow you to log consumption on any one circuit as well as the home.
> 
> Did you have to install a new charger circuit to the panel? What type of plug/circuit is the new one?


 
No 240v charger yet. I'm using the provided 120v charger. I have to wire a new circuit for the 240v charger. I'm not sure which one I am going to get yet, there are several choices. The least expensive will charge at the Volt's limit of 16 amps. But I may get a 30 amp unit for future prep. The cost is a couple hundred more. I'll plug the charger into the Kill A Watt to track consumption for tonight's charge.


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## Highbeam (Jun 24, 2013)

begreen said:


> No 240v charger yet. I'm using the provided 120v charger. I have to wire a new circuit for the 240v charger. I'm not sure which one I am going to get yet, there are several choices. The least expensive will charge at the Volt's limit of 16 amps. But I may get a 30 amp unit for future prep. The cost is a couple hundred more. I'll plug the charger into the Kill A Watt to track consumption for tonight's charge.


 
I've been pulling hundreds of feet of wire in the shop over the last few weekends putting in everything from 50 amp welder and boiler circuits, 30 amp 240 air compresor circuits, and 30 amp 120 RV circuits to many 20 amp outlets. I've learned that a 30 amp circuit using 10 gauge romex is very cheap and easy to install. No more difficult than a 20 amp outlet circuit and the wire is only slightly more expensive. I've got an extra 50 feet if you want to come and get it!

The current 16 amp inlet limit means it is designed for a 20 amp circuit using the 80% rule.


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## begreen (Jun 24, 2013)

Highbeam said:


> I've been pulling hundreds of feet of wire in the shop over the last few weekends putting in everything from 50 amp welder and boiler circuits, 30 amp 240 air compresor circuits, and 30 amp 120 RV circuits to many 20 amp outlets. I've learned that a 30 amp circuit using 10 gauge romex is very cheap and easy to install. No more difficult than a 20 amp outlet circuit and the wire is only slightly more expensive. I've got an extra 50 feet if you want to come and get it!
> 
> The current 16 amp inlet limit means it is designed for a 20 amp circuit using the 80% rule.


 
Correct. Pulling some 12/2 for a 20A/240v circuit is no big deal. It would definitely be the cheapest route. I think a full level 2 charge is 32A, so I would need a 40A breaker and to pull 8/2 for this circuit if I wanted to do it proper. The run would be about 64 ft.


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## semipro (Jun 24, 2013)

You might want to consider what it would take to run the Volt as a backup generator for the house.


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## Ashful (Jun 24, 2013)

begreen said:


> ...if you know how to use regen well you can definitely extend range. With electric drive, by shifting into low you don't affect any engine speed, but it really ups the deceleration and regen braking when you let up on the gas. It takes a little getting used to but works well.


 

Wait, playing off my recent thread about manual transmissions... shouldn't the auto trans be programmed to optimize this, automatically?


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## begreen (Jun 24, 2013)

There is no revving of the engine as one uses regen braking, just more EMF applied toward recharging. As an electric vehicle the transmission (1 speed) is unconventional and unique in how it couples with the generator.  It does it magically and beautifully. http://gm-volt.com/2010/09/27/gm-patent-application-may-be-for-the-chevrolet-volts-transmission/


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## begreen (Jun 24, 2013)

semipro said:


> You might want to consider what it would take to run the Volt as a backup generator for the house.


It's been done with the Prius. Not sure how to do this on the Volt, but it has a whopping big generator (80-90Kw?). Given the cost of the car I am not going to hack it. I have a nice new inverter genset for the house emergency power. Runs on propane and is ready to go. That said I suppose one could hook up a 1KW inverter to the Volt's 12V system safely.


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## Highbeam (Jun 24, 2013)

begreen said:


> Correct. Pulling some 12/2 for a 20A/240v circuit is no big deal. It would definitely be the cheapest route. I think a full level 2 charge is 32A, so I would need a 40A breaker and to pull 8/2 for this circuit if I wanted to do it proper. The run would be about 64 ft.


 
My electric boiler to feed the radiant slab heat is fed with 8 gauge copper. Since I pulled it in conduit I was able to use a 50 amp breaker. They downrate 8/2 romex to 40 amps and it is very expensive to buy per foot. I was able to buy the two 8 gauge wires, plus one 10 gauge for ground, 70 feet long for 75$. Conduit is cheap and makes me feel better than stapling 8/2 romex to the wall.

So give us the details. Was the volt new? Cost? how about the incentives from various governments? Do you anticipate a new road tax to make up for the fact that you and many others are not paying your "fair" share? 
Might be time for a new thread.


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## begreen (Jun 24, 2013)

Yes, it probably is time for a new thread. This one is getting badly hijacked.  90 miles on her so far, all electric.


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## goldfishcastle (Jun 25, 2013)

Grisu said:


> I wish I could convince my wife of that.  Right now, it is usually me rushing to get the clothes out of the washer and on the drying rack before my wife gets her hands on them.



My husband suggests that the money saved for a few months goes to flowers or lattes or whatever will pique you wife's interest.  

(And to think I thought I was cooperative and he generous).


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## Where2 (Jun 25, 2013)

Grisu said:


> I wish I could convince my wife of that.  Right now, it is usually me rushing to get the clothes out of the washer and on the drying rack before my wife gets her hands on them.


 
Can't wait to get my grid-tie PV array completed, so I can go back to tinkering with the automated PV drying system. I've got a 20W PV panel, and three 130CFM 5" muffin fans (6W each @ 12V). The setup has a collection of 12V 5Ah batteries, and a Morningstar charge controller, so I am not limited to drying only during daylight hours.


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