High electricity usage

DS197

Hi, we've recently moved home and have switched energy providers which means we've had to check meter readings and bills. It has come to light through looking at this that our electricity usage is ridiculously high! As in, 29 kWh average per day, which would equate to 10585 for the year. I can see an average should be around 4500!
We've not got any new appliances in the new house, other than an extra fridge which is built into the kitchen, and our usage in our previous property was quite low. The house is larger, but not to the extent that we should have such a high usage.
Are there any obvious things we should check? I'll contact our provider to ask for a smart meter to keep an eye on what the issue might be, but what else can we do? The house has one of the very old dial readings, but I assume it must still be correct.
Thanks!

Raxiel

You don't mention if the heating is electric or gas?

DS197

Sorry, gas heating - combi boiler

Raxiel

DS197 wrote: »

Sorry, gas heating - combi boiler

Right, if it had been electric, it wouldn't seem all that unreasonable, if it's gas then it does seem high.

Heating is generally the biggest use of energy, so if you do have gas heating, are there any supplementary electric heaters being used? Electric showers can use a surprising amount too.

Is the lighting similar? Any rooms with halogen downlights? Or Halogen security lights? They can add quite a bit too.

If you take a reading last thing at night before bed, and again first thing in the morning does it go up by much, or is it only when people are up, using stuff?

You can use a kettle to test the meter, if you know how many kW it is. When usage should be otherwise 'quiet' and as much other stuff is off as possible, take a reading and then boil the kettle, timing how long it takes, then take a reading after. The meter should have gone up by a predictable amount (ie a 3kw kettle running for 2 minutes should consume about 0.1 units on the meter). Not 100% accurate but should show up any significant errors.

savemoney

If your using 29kWh per day yes that is high. I take weekly meter readings and my usage per day is around 10-11kWh per day with 3 adults at home on a evening. I use pc quite a bit during the day too

Pincher

Smart meter makes no difference to your consumption.

You need to monitor daily and see what is going on.

You can switch off the circuit breakers at the consumer unit (fuse box) and use appliances individually to see the usage.

Obviously don't leave the freezer off too long.

notbritishgas

You say you have the very old dial meter.
If I am correct in what you mean they are notoriously difficult to read so are you sure the readings are correct.

[Deleted User]

@DS197
A tip is always to take a photo of the meter on your smartphone or digital camera. Make sure you get a clear picture of the dials and the meter serial number in case you use the picture in a complaint against a supplier in the future.
You can then go and read from the photo in comfort. Check carefully where the decimal point is on your meter as this can be confusing and will make for erroneous readings.

There is a good guide to reading meters at https://www.edfenergy.com/sites/default/files/sme_how_to_read_your_meter_1211.pdf

dogshome

You don't say what the Elec consumption was in the old house, but put a family into another house with the same appliances, the useage will be about the same as the family will still follow the lifestyle they lived in the previous house - A bigger house will have more lights, but they should not make a HUGE difference.

Suspect No 1 is that old dial meter, difficult to read correctly and even meter readers get it wrong - Check the web to get a proper understanding.

Suspect 2 is the built-in fridge that came with the house - All too often kitchen design is all about it being pretty, with no thought to the vital ventilation that the fridge motor & compressor must have to work efficiently - How old is this fridge? - If you can get easy access to it's power socket, buy a Watt meter (£10 ) and use it see the fridges consumption over a day

sk240

Do you have an electric shower? as some of them are upto 10Kw, so that in itself can soon rack up if you like long showers, or there are multiple people in the house.

matelodave

Start reading the meter daily to see when and how much you are using and try turning stuff on and off to see how it affects your consumption.

When you measure and make a record you can see what happens and you can then do something about it.

Have you got an electric shower - standing under one for twenty minutes or so will ramp up the bill.

As said, a kitchen full of halogen downlighters can ramp up 500 watts every hour if you are lazy about leaving them on, swapping them for LEDs would save 90% of that.