2 Bedroom Electric only flat - 54kWh average daily usage over 8 weeks - very high?

Renwaldo

Hi all,

Firstly, thanks for reading this, it's been a nightmare and I'm not sure what else to do. Here's the scenario:

According to our meter (electricty digial dual readings), we're using an average of 54kWh per day over the last 8 weeks. I'm with Scottish Power, on a discounted online rate of something like 15p first 900 kwh p.a, 8p p/kwh after and then 5p per kwh at night, and apparently it's a good rate?

The flat is incredibly well insulated (it's a converted church so the outer walls are about 3ft thick, and the one main window in the place is double glazed and also thick, the bedroom windows are also double glazed)

In the flat I have, fan assisted oven (don't usually use the fan), 42" lcd, sky HD (leave it on standby all night), 2 computers (laptop on pretty much all day, other one on for about 8 hours per day), 7 radiators (including 2 towel rails), 60W halogen lights (about 20 or so, but I'm careful to remember to turn them off), small dishwasher (use about twice every 3 days), fridge freezer, washing machine (once every 2 days), home cinema system, ps3 (not left on standby, used about an hour a day on average) no outdoor lighting of any kind. Don't have a dryer, I use a clothes rack in the boiler room.

Can't think of anything else, have I missed anything obvious? the boiler is electric (model is either an imstor Complus model 9 or a ThermTec Industrial immersion heater 2x3kw - both are written on the side of the boiler)

I work from home, so I do expect the electricity usage to be higher, but 54 kWh seems very high. Anybody got any tips? I'm going to swap the bulbs foor more efficient ones, and turn the tv/skybox off whenever they're not in use (from the wall). I don't really understand how Economy 7 (or 10?) works, and I don't even know if I'm on it - doesn't mention it on my bills but it does calculate the energy usage seperately (2 different sections) on my bill, so I guess it's economy 7.

Oh, and the breakdown on each meter is: night meter used 605 units, day meter used 2204 units over the same period of time (i think 6 weeks or so).

If anyone can help me, I'd be extremely appreciative - I'm at my wits end. If you need any more info, please let me know.

Thanks,.
Renwaldo

Renwaldo

Oh and to add - there is a thermostat in the house that I've set to 21, and I also lower the radiators with their indivdual valves on each one so that the temperature seems to stay pleasent all the time.

Magentasue

It is high but you use a lot of electricity!. Electric heating is expensive and it doesn't sound as if you have storage heaters that use cheap rate energy. Running all those radiators and halogen bulbs on daytime electricity will make for an expensive winter.

Renwaldo

No I don't think we do have storage heaters, what would they look like if we did? I don't run halogen bulbs in the day obv, and at night there's only a max of 3-4 on at any one time. Should I switch some radiators off, would that save electric, or does the boiler still work anyway, even if they are turned off?

Magentasue

Storage heaters are metal cases filled with bricks that look like heaters. They draw electricity at night (they have an input dial you turn up) and they leach out the heat during the day (you have an output dial). They are expensive to run and inefficient but at least they use cheap night time power. That's why you have Economy 7 with them - you get seven hours of cheap power at night while they're 'storing'.
Your heaters are almost certainly using dytime electricity. Much more expensive. You should certainly only use the radiators you need but it might be worth doing some meter reading to work out how much or little it will save you. The fewer radiators being heated, the less electricity you will use.

If you had your 20 bulbs on for an hour, that's 20 x 60 = 1200watts or 1.2kwh (units). 3 hours a day will be about 5units. Immersion heaters and electric showers can use a lot of electricity if you're heating a lot of water.

tomstickland

They are expensive to run and inefficient but at least they use cheap night time power.

They've very efficient. 100% in fact.
They're not expensive to run. I live in a 1 bed flat and I use £30 of electricity per month (average over the year) for everything including heating.

About 4 daytime units.
In the summer about 3 night units per 24 hours.
In the winter about 15-20 night units per 24 hours.


Are the usage figures of the OP based on real meter readings?

Cardew

You can really forget about all other consumption except your heating and Hot water as that undoubtedly will be the major consumption.

Your tariff is amazing cheap! to only be paying 8p for daytime electricity on economy 7 is almost unbelievable.

Do you live in Scotland? as they have some 'strange' historical tariffs.

Electrical heating is the most expensive form of heating.

According to my calculations for your 605/2204kWh your bill is approx £220 - (not certain if this is for 6 weeks or 8 weeks as you give both periods)

£200 for 6 or 8 weeks in winter is excellent IMO for an all electric flat, with someone working at home with the thermostat set to 21C.

Had you been on a normal Economy 7 tariff the prices would be more like 30p for the 900 Tier 1 units and 15p for daytime - so your bill would be close to double.

To reduce your bill significantly you need to reduce the temperature in the flat(1C reduction saves about 10% on your heating element)

Whatever you do hang on to that tariff!!

tomstickland

My £30 per month must be good then.

Renwaldo

Hi all,

There's no storage heaters in this flat, and on average the shower is used once a day (as I'm not here on some days, that's about an average figure - we do shower daily though!!). The hot water in the shower generally lasts around 25 minutes with quite a high flow (wanted to test it once to see how long - I know it's not energy efficient!)

Thanks for replies already. I've done some calcuations based on actual meter readings over a set period of time and I've got these figures:

Day amount in kWh: 16370
Night amount in kWh : 4490

Both of these are yearly amounts.

My current rates with Scottish Power are: (apologies for wrong rates before, I was taking a guess at them)

Unit prices
17.28p per kWh (day)
9.87p per kWh (day) above 900 kWh p.a
4.62p per kWh (night)

I will replace bulbs as already mentioned (although the energy efficient bulbs I need for my lights - GU10 - are pretty expensive and will be around 70-80 to replace all 20 I think), but as mentioned already, I know it's my heating and hot water that's causing the expense.

Does anyone have any good ideas how to reduce the amount of electric - I'll turn the thermostat to 20 - especially the best way to use more of this 4.62kWh rate without waking up in bed boiling hot because the heating has been on at night!

Thanks,

Renwaldo

Supreme_2

Get one of these:
http://www.maplin.co.uk/Module.aspx?ModuleNo=38343

and test stuff

54kw/day is insanely high.

I have a 1 bed all electric flat and use 11kw/day and think that's WAY too high. Though i don't need heating, so i guess i am lucky there!

Those halogen bulbs are terrible for power consumption and really need replacing ASAP.

If you were paying what i have to pay for electricity it would be over £7/day, which would be about £230/month!

All my toys (desktop computer, laptop, tv, hifi, etc... use less than 1.5kw/day, so unless yours are horrendously inefficient then they will more than likely be irrelevant.

If i was in your position i would be aiming to half that electricity usage.

chiman

Renwaldo wrote: »

Hi all,

Firstly, thanks for reading this, it's been a nightmare and I'm not sure what else to do. Here's the scenario:

According to our meter (electricty digial dual readings), we're using an average of 54kWh per day over the last 8 weeks. I'm with Scottish Power, on a discounted online rate of something like 15p first 900 kwh p.a, 8p p/kwh after and then 5p per kwh at night, and apparently it's a good rate?

The flat is incredibly well insulated (it's a converted church so the outer walls are about 3ft thick, and the one main window in the place is double glazed and also thick, the bedroom windows are also double glazed)

In the flat I have, fan assisted oven (don't usually use the fan), 42" lcd, sky HD (leave it on standby all night), 2 computers (laptop on pretty much all day, other one on for about 8 hours per day), 7 radiators (including 2 towel rails), 60W halogen lights (about 20 or so, but I'm careful to remember to turn them off), small dishwasher (use about twice every 3 days), fridge freezer, washing machine (once every 2 days), home cinema system, ps3 (not left on standby, used about an hour a day on average) no outdoor lighting of any kind. Don't have a dryer, I use a clothes rack in the boiler room.

Can't think of anything else, have I missed anything obvious? the boiler is electric (model is either an imstor Complus model 9 or a ThermTec Industrial immersion heater 2x3kw - both are written on the side of the boiler)

I work from home, so I do expect the electricity usage to be higher, but 54 kWh seems very high. Anybody got any tips? I'm going to swap the bulbs foor more efficient ones, and turn the tv/skybox off whenever they're not in use (from the wall). I don't really understand how Economy 7 (or 10?) works, and I don't even know if I'm on it - doesn't mention it on my bills but it does calculate the energy usage seperately (2 different sections) on my bill, so I guess it's economy 7.

Oh, and the breakdown on each meter is: night meter used 605 units, day meter used 2204 units over the same period of time (i think 6 weeks or so).

If anyone can help me, I'd be extremely appreciative - I'm at my wits end. If you need any more info, please let me know.

Thanks,.
Renwaldo

thats normal. i live in a 2 bed all electric flat and my underfloor heating is 60kwh a day alone. all electric is very expensive contrary to what other pople say.