So what are you doing to conserve energy during this heat wave????

[seeitrun2006]

Heat wave

Our heatwave here in the south is still going full force. Turn High today 97+ heat index is 100~104.

A/C up to 78 daytime, 77 at night. Don't wash anything in hot water right now. Don't cook a lot during the summer. Ceiling fans on to circulate air.

Don't use the A/C in my Nissan Frontier truck in the morning driving to work. But run the A/C in the afternoon on the way home or bake like a biscuit in an oven. I drive 64 miles round trip M-F.

 

[bajaespuma]

What I do to conserve energy:

Whenever George W(ithout a Clue) Bush's stupid simian face comes on the television, I switch it off.

 

[jasonl]

77degrees?

ACK! How do yall live like that? I'd be sweating and not to mention sneezing because of the high humidity. I run the house at 73 during the day and 70 at night. Poor Helen buries herself under the covers and I can only see the top of her head. Yes, I like it cold.

 

[toggleswitch]

84*F when I am out, 77*F when I am in, for the central air-conditioner.

A medium-sized (10,000 BTU/h) unit in the wall runs in the upper attic/soffit/pethouse suite to keep it cool during the day. It can get to 104*f (+/- 40*c) in there in summer, being right under the roof. As this unit runs constantly, with the cool air tumbling down the stairs to the main level, it dehumidifies quite well. My relative humidity is between 43 to 50% whcih is quite good. This humidity level enables the high temperature I maintain to be quite comfortable.

 

[veg-o-matic]

In order to conserve energy

I'm taking lots of naps.

I'm amazed at the temperatures youall keep. My AC is set at 80 and I wouldn't want it any cooler than that. As it is, Mom wears a sweater all the time. Honey still snuggles under her blanket, but she would do that on the equator in the middle of summer.

I've already switched most of my lamps over to compact fluorescent bulbs, and I think that really helped with the electric bill.

I use the Crock Pot as much as possible and try not to heat the oven. I haven't turned on the TV in probably two months.

veg

 

[jasonl]

That's what it is, HUMIDITY! I have to run my AC hard to keep humidity down. In areas where it's not such a problem, settings of 77 can be quite comfortable. Not so in he land of rust.

 

[geoffdelp]

Well Jason, maybe you should be living up here in Minnesota in January/February! Actually, if you do things like skate, ski, walk ... it's not too bad.

We had the heat wave that the East coast is having now last weekend. 100 degree temps with indices around 104-105. We kept our AC at 78 during the day and night.

We awoke this morning to 58 degrees in Foley; it was wonderful! I love the smell of the morning air. Last night around 10:00 it was already about 65 degrees and the night was beautiful! We have had the AC turned off for the last few days. Might have to use it this weekend ... temps in the 90's again.

I love Minnesota ...

 

[gadgetgary]

BTW....

I leave my thermostat at a C@@L 74 degress night and day....have to keep it nice and cool for the kids.........

 

[seamusuk]

A quick question on US power charges .....

Hey Guys

In the UK its pretty common to have "Economy 7"- basically for a total of 7 hours(or thereabouts) overnight the unit rate drops to under half of what it is normally. This was designed for night storage heaters and water heating but obviously anything that goes on overnight/early morning gets cheaper power. I normally get up a couple of hours before I leave for work and so the dishwasher and dryer normally run on it as well .

Does the US have anything similar????

Seamus

 

[jasonl]

74 won't cut it. At least 73 for me and that's with fans going. The thermostat in my office is showing 74, I have a fan running and it's quite stuffy. The AC is very underpowered so it barely keeps up. The tstat is a honeywell and it's pretty accurate.

 

[seeitrun2006]

jasonl,

Man I would hate to see your utilty bills!

77 at night is great along with a ceiling fan running. A sheet and a lite blanket is all my wife and I keep on the bed all summer. Mostly cover up with the sheet. Our bedroom is on the east side of our house away from the afternoon sun. By the time we hit the sheets at 10:00~11:00 p.m. our bedroom has cooled down a good bit.

 

[jasonl]

My parents pay $159 a month for running their AC at 71. Being this is my first elec. bill, it's $200 for setup and everything, but the actually energy usage was $59 with running the air at 73 or 72 by day and 70 at bedtime.

 

[toggleswitch]

Seamus:

New York City has what we call demand metering~ Mostly commerical users. There is a "*Fine/Penalty* for the greatest continuous usage over a 15 minute stretch of time. This is to encourge load-staggering.

New York City also has optional time-of-day metering to reward customers for off-peak (night and weeked) usage.

We do not have a national or even state-wide set of utilites that is uniformly the same throughout. We are too big!

There is also a great range of energy prices depending on location and source of electricity/gas/oil.

 

[DADoES]

Both electric retailers that I've used have fixed-rates for residential. The bottom-line per-KWH cost may vary from month to month according to seasonal changes but there are no daily economy periods vs. demand periods, or direct demand billing (demand is factored into the base rate for residential). Commercial service does include a line-item demand factor, or has in the past.

Warm-natured as I am, I don't think I could deal with 70°F air conditioning in heat of the summer. 70°F in the winter is my standard, however. I don't like humidity, and 77°F typically keeps it low enough except when the weather is milder between seasons. I really, really liked the 2-speed A/C in the old house. It was excellent at humidity control. Even during the daytime "setback" to 82°F the humidity was kept reasonable.

 

[DADoES]

ARRRGGHHH!!! Latest bill is $202. Highest ever. 1,756 KWH. At least a couple weeks of the period includes when a PCB for the A/C blower was busted and it was temporary re-wired to run continuously.

 

[chad_hauris]

This last month (July) the electric bill was $360 or so...in June it was only about $198. Will have to see if the rate per KWH increased.

I used to have a system to power my household electrical needs off of an inverter...I used 2 car batteries in the trunk of the Grand Marquis with a range cord connected to them. While driving, they would be plugged into an outlet which connected them in parallel and they were connected to the car alternator to charge.

Then to run the inverter (a computer UPS which ran off 24 volt gel cells originally) the battery cord was plugged into an outlet mounted to the UPS which connected the batteries in series. This setup would power the lights and TV all evening and would usually power the fan all night, through an extension cord run through the window and plugged into the car trunk. There was no connection to the house power system.

The inverter bit the dust when it was hooked up to a solar charging system which accidentally gave it too much voltage. I got another junk UPS and hope to get the system running again.

 

[westtexman]

Lovin' My Electric Bill . . .

I just received my highest electric bill of the summer. I used 661 KWH for the month of June, for a total bill of $82.37. I live in an newly annexed area of town, which still falls in COOP territory. If this same house were a bit further into town, I could expect my bill to be about double what it is here. I LOVE the COOP.

I like to keep my house at 74 during the day and 72 at night. I'm about to install a digital thermostat, and will program it to about 80*F, clooling down gradually to about 72 by the time I go to bed. I'm very warm natured, and really like to have it cool at night. Othewise I just can't sleep.

My water bill is a different story. It was $76.59, which included sewer, garbage and "stormwater drainage". Not like we need that as it never rains here. LOL. I have been watering every morning trying to green up the yard, but Lubbock has just implemented some very strict water restrictions, so I'm sure my bill will cut down quite a bit. We are now allowed to water only 2 times per week. UGH.

Bryan

 

[tomturbomatic]

During air conditioning weather, electricity rates go up, so I use my 3 gas dryers outside under my deck. I normally do not run the central AC and get by cooling the kitchen and bedroom with efficient 8K BTU window units, but during this intense heat,I turned the central on and kept it at 78. Along with the window units, the house was livable. I wait until after normal office hours to do laundry or dishes to lessen the impact of my appliances coming on line.

Gary, the load did not look dirty enough for Soak & Scrub. What soil was hiding in the photo?
Tom

 

[scott55405]

Jason, in Minnesota we always had the air on 69 or 70, with the fan running continuously. I think the bill was like $150 or some such thing. That was the only way I could deal with that weather. I'm just agape when I hear people with their a/cs on 78 or whatever, but it's usually in drier places and I'm sure that does make a big difference.

 

[sudsmaster]

I line dry year round, so that saves gas and some electricity. I insulated the heck out of the house over the past five years, and plan on extending the insulation under the floor to cover nearly the whole area.

My electricity averages about 500 kWH/mo. I have two relatively energy efficient friges (two kitchens) plus a 15 cu ft chest freezer. That, and the pond filter pump uses an estimated 150 to 200 watts 24 hours a day, 7 days a week. It all adds up. I turn off the computer(s) and UPS system when they are not in use, as well as unplugging the entertainment center etc. when it's not in use. I even put the Neptune washer/dryer pair on a switched outlet, otherwise the set uses 10 watts when not in use. Those measures help a lot, I figure it's equal to at least one fridge's worth of electricity saved by doing that. There is also a well pump; I use the well water to irrigate the front lawn and garden areas in the back. That uses some electricity, but I don't think it's as much as the pond pump, which is lower power but does run continously.

When I moved in here in '97, the energy usage was over 1,000 kWH/mo. Replacing both fridges with more energy efficient models helped a lot, as did turning off the phantom loads on electronics/computers/battery chargers etc.