Electricity usage - is my meter ok?

theboakster

I use Ecotricity (primarily because I want a green company) and I got a helpful statement about our usage. My OH has always said our electricity bill is big, and when we got the statement it kind of showed that.

Statement says we used 8,950 units in a year, averaging 24 units a day.

That seems a lot! We have 2 economy 7 storage heaters. We turn off our water heater when we're not using it (we have an electric shower). We don't watch telly. We do have a dishwasher (used daily) and a tumble dryer (used 2-3 times a week but not in summer).

I'm now keeping a record. The fridge and one storage heater are the only things I have on constantly. This morning there was a period when we used 4 units. I had the dishwasher on, had a shower, used the washer and had one light on, plus the router was switched on (though I wasn't using it).
Is that about right? 4 units for that lot?

theboakster

ps I now turn everything off at the plug that isn't being used, though this is something I've only done in the last couple of months. We don't even use the oven any more for the clock!

molerat

Storage heater capacity is usually between 6 and 24 kWh, depending on the number of bricks / elements, and can use that amount of electricity each night to charge up.

Electric showers can use 2 kWh for a 15 min shower. Tumble driers can use 2 kWh per cycle.

9000 is not too hefty for an all electric property. Hopefully you can put some of the heavy loads on during off peak.

Take meter reads daily so you can see what you use and what affects that use.

Turning off oven clocks will have very little effect on electric use.

theboakster

Thanks molerat - that's helpful. We've actually just got mains gas installed (we're in a rural property which didn't have it before) so once we have a gas cooker and possibly gas central heating then we'll see what happens!