Electric bill.

[Ldychef2k]

Last year, I was fortunate enough to receive an energy audit for low income household. A number of repairs were made as a result.

As well, a month or so ago I had my house insulated. It went from an R2 to R30.

I just received my electric bill. Last year's April/May usage was 21 kWh. This year: 7. My bill is $16.13. Last year's was over $50.

You live a certain way, oblivious to what is going on around you until it changes either for the better or the worse. I had absolutely no idea how much difference it would make to make such simple changes as sealing a couple of leaky doors and replacing a cracked window. And then the big one which was the insulation. I mean, I knew it would make some kind of difference, but I had no idea how much.

 

[mayberrygal73]

Congratulations on the energy save. I am trying to help in that area also, I now can use the clothes line now that the pollen isn't quite so bad.

 

[valmom]

Wow, what a difference!

(my household electric runs $130 a month, and the barn- now that the water trough heater isn't running- is about $20 for the well pump every other day and lights for about 30 minutes a day. Our rates must be higher than yours!)

 

[tortoise]

Wow! Very cool! What are you going to do with the extra $30 per month?

 

[Ldychef2k]

Well, since Jan 1 I have been living on $12.50 a week. There has been no $12.50 a week for the past couple of months, so I guess I will up my gasoline ration to $5 a week. The Lord will show me where it will go.

 

[rebecca100]

Sheesh, we hang our clothes out, don't have an a/c and don't really run anything other than the computer and tv and a deep freeze(small and new energy efficient) and our bill is always around $100 a month. I think the taxes and cost of energy charges and other assorted charges they can think of equal to more than $20 alone. When my dad lived here alone not turning on lights and refusing to turn on the a/c his bill was always around $50 and most of the time he was at my house with everything here turned off.

 

[Ldychef2k]

Energy costs seem to be quite different everywhere you go. But through this process I have come to realize that every tiny little crack or hole makes a giant difference, especially cumulatively. You might try calling your utility and asking if they have a program where they come out and check your house for efficiency. The one we had here, if they found a problem, and you were income qualified, they fixed it for free.

 

[lupinfarm]

Woah, thats really low. Our usage is like... 29kwh, maybe even more...

And we pay a higher rate for being a farm too...

Now we have no insulation really on the main floor, and the tuck pointing needs to be redone and we need new windows because despite being double pane, they are old and broken.

Hmm, I wonder how much ours will go down. We also feed power to a barn, 2 wells, garage/kennel, and all that too so I bet it won't go down much.

We don't have AC, and we line dry our clothes most of the time as well however most of our large appliances are NOT energy efficient. We just bought a new stove over the winter which is obviously much more energy efficient than the one we had before but our fridge is older and not as efficient as it should be, our deep freece is ancient and definitely doesn't have a very good energy star rating, same with the washer and dryer.