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pinching pennies?

It is a nice product, but for $150... :eek:
I have a Kill-A-Watt and my APC displays wattage.
 
oraldlight said:
I have so got to get me one of these for the big picture of saving electricity.

http://www.bluelineinnovations.com/default.asp?mn=1.274.285

At $150, it ain't cheap. Maybe I could get a few friends to pitch in and share it...

That and a Kill-A-Watt, I could know where all my electricity is used in detail.



Click to expand...

What you are looking at is little more than a very fancy Kilowatt. You could simply go read your meter a few times a day or get a Kilowatt which will allow you to monitor power usage of anything you plug into it.

The down side of real time monitoring is pretty much like watching the stock market all day, it will drive you nuts.

All any meter can do is show you how much power you are using at any given time however we all know the only cure for high electric bills it very simple; Turn stuff off.

The other thing you have to do is essential. Compare KWH used each month to last year’s bill month per month. In my case I average just over 1860 KWH per month per year. The problem is the utility companies have been raising rates across the country on a very regular basis in spite of the fact that most states instituted “Caps” on electric bills. Now many of those Caps are being lifted and even though you might have seen as I have a 50% increase in my bills next year I am promised if not guaranteed a 50% hit on top of that. No doubt your local friendly power company has already sent you a letter or at least a notification of everyone’s impending financial doom.

Now, back to the meter. I borrowed a graphing KWH meter from a local company and allowed it to run three months. Basically it is a high tech device to graph power usage once every 10 minutes and record it on a paper graph. My readings were about 20% lower than the meter provided by my power company so I invited them over to have a look. Long story short, they don’t care. I went to the PUC with my findings and guess what, they don’t care either.
I was left with the following option. Pay a 25.00 fee to have my meter replaced, BUT, if it read higher that was my problem with no recourse, however, if the power company decided it was reading too low they reserved the right to replace it and charge me another 25.00 fee.

My favorite piece of info can be found here:
http://www.pplelectric.com/phase-in+option/

PPL will allow me to prepay my future power bill because they are aware nobody will have the money when the cap is lifted. How sweet of them.
Now add to this my fuel oil bills to heat my modest home. In three years it has jumped from about 1200.00 per year to this year to a staggering 5000.00 dollars per year.

Add it up, 200.00 currently for electricity or 2400.00 to 2500.00 per year plus the 5000.00 per year to heat my home and hot water and we have about 7500.00 per year just to see and have heat.

Yes, I have gone down the road to all CFL bulbs, more efficient Air conditioning, and replacement triple pane windows all to no avail, my KWH usage remains the same but that hasn’t dropped my power bill one cent.

I turned off all computers in my house a while back for 2 full months. Did I save any money; of course not the power company simply adjusted my rates to make up the difference. One I had plugged the computers back in and started folding again wonder of wonders, my power bill remained the same.

The end result is no matter what you fit a profile and based on that regardless of any scientific proof to the contrary the Public Utilities are under no control so why spend more money to confirm what you already know; you are being screwed by the best and you don’t even qualify for a reach around.

Luck man, but this is a no win situation.:rolleyes:;)




 
BillR said:
What you are looking at is little more than a very fancy Kilowatt. You could simply go read your meter a few times a day or get a Kilowatt which will allow you to monitor power usage of anything you plug into it.

The down side of real time monitoring is pretty much like watching the stock market all day, it will drive you nuts.

All any meter can do is show you how much power you are using at any given time however we all know the only cure for high electric bills it very simple; Turn stuff off.

The other thing you have to do is essential. Compare KWH used each month to last year’s bill month per month. In my case I average just over 1860 KWH per month per year. The problem is the utility companies have been raising rates across the country on a very regular basis in spite of the fact that most states instituted “Caps” on electric bills. Now many of those Caps are being lifted and even though you might have seen as I have a 50% increase in my bills next year I am promised if not guaranteed a 50% hit on top of that. No doubt your local friendly power company has already sent you a letter or at least a notification of everyone’s impending financial doom.

Now, back to the meter. I borrowed a graphing KWH meter from a local company and allowed it to run three months. Basically it is a high tech device to graph power usage once every 10 minutes and record it on a paper graph. My readings were about 20% lower than the meter provided by my power company so I invited them over to have a look. Long story short, they don’t care. I went to the PUC with my findings and guess what, they don’t care either.
I was left with the following option. Pay a 25.00 fee to have my meter replaced, BUT, if it read higher that was my problem with no recourse, however, if the power company decided it was reading too low they reserved the right to replace it and charge me another 25.00 fee.

My favorite piece of info can be found here:
http://www.pplelectric.com/phase-in+option/

PPL will allow me to prepay my future power bill because they are aware nobody will have the money when the cap is lifted. How sweet of them.
Now add to this my fuel oil bills to heat my modest home. In three years it has jumped from about 1200.00 per year to this year to a staggering 5000.00 dollars per year.

Add it up, 200.00 currently for electricity or 2400.00 to 2500.00 per year plus the 5000.00 per year to heat my home and hot water and we have about 7500.00 per year just to see and have heat.

Yes, I have gone down the road to all CFL bulbs, more efficient Air conditioning, and replacement triple pane windows all to no avail, my KWH usage remains the same but that hasn’t dropped my power bill one cent.

I turned off all computers in my house a while back for 2 full months. Did I save any money; of course not the power company simply adjusted my rates to make up the difference. One I had plugged the computers back in and started folding again wonder of wonders, my power bill remained the same.

The end result is no matter what you fit a profile and based on that regardless of any scientific proof to the contrary the Public Utilities are under no control so why spend more money to confirm what you already know; you are being screwed by the best and you don’t even qualify for a reach around.

Luck man, but this is a no win situation.:rolleyes:;)

Click to expand...

How true it is. There is a lot of wisdom here guys. "The Man" will have his pound of flesh!

 
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