Insane Electric Rate Increase $508.68/1522 kWh

Ok, so where they are building our house, the community has Stand up LP tanks. It's done nicely as far as being above ground anyway. They build a wall around them with the same material and color as the home so can n to be seen from the street.

I just did a quick search and it seems the largest stand up Vertical tank is a 120 gallon 4'6" high and 30" wide. That pretty much matches up what I remember seeing around the community, I assume that is the largest residential VERTICAL tank.
I hear, unconfirmed that it may be filled up once or twice a year. The heat is a heat pump and doesnt use the LP.

Only a living rm fireplace, oven and stove and I think the tankless water heater.
I assume I will over time get a plumber to hook up our gas grill but from what I understand from @Cujet it might be cheaper for me to just use a 20 gallon portable for the outdoor gas grill?

The tank is supplied by the builder so we are not held to buying from any one company. I used to play that game up in NY with oil and we paid much below retail price.

Just found this, I assume LP is reasonably priced in NC? (feel free to comment we never had LP before and I am clueless)


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Pretty darn straightforward response! I'd simply add that people are going to suffer due to excessive energy costs. And, yes they are excessive. Energy is abundant and in the aggregate, really cheap. But as we all know, there are many other factors in play now. Income is lagging, and falling in some areas.
Remember, you'll own nothing and be happy 🤔

What blows my mind is that Ontario did the GEA boondoggle, ratepayers tolerated it for so long until they didn't and then backlash was severe. All future contracts for VRE were scrapped and now we are doubling down on refurbishing our nuke fleet and new nukes. But of course rates increased considerably during the GEA years. However, Ontario rates are now CHEAP compared to what I'm seeing happening elsewhere :oops: which is readily apparent in this thread.

When the VRE contract cancellation happened, rate increases stopped. In fact, supply cost has actually gone DOWN since then.
 
Couple things Propane is about 4.5-8x more expensive than natural gas (at my rates) that was back before propane was 4$/gal too.

Why do you need 3 dehumidifiers in winter.. the outside air has very low moisture below 32f.
Relative humidity is very relative. 60% at 40f is the same amount of moisture in the air as 30% at 60f or 15% at 80f

You would be better off heating the space to 55-60f and not worrying about the humidity.. typically its rare one needs dehumidification when its below freezing outside.

OTOH if you got a heat pump water heater you would save 20-30$ or more on hot water and provide dehumidification when needed (ie spring-summer-fall)

you could then get a couple mini splits to keep your whole house warmer for cheaper.

They have 1ton mini splits for under $1000 or SUPER efficient ones for slightly more.

Your dehumidifiers for all intents and purposes might as well be electric heaters for all the good they do (in the winter)

Fact of the day: some of the minisplits can produce(move) 11btus of heat for 1 watt. resistive heating is 3.4btu per watt.

You could also go with one of the fancy heat pump european dryers(ventless) but the ROI isnt quite there yet.

This! You explained the relative humidity much better than I could have. 3 dehumidifiers in the winter in a smaller home is crazy. I’m assuming they are drained into a floor drain? I’d love to see how much moisture even comes out of the tank in a day, probably next to none.
 
I live in a very old and average sized house, northern cold climate, but it has all brand new wiring and panel. I have gas heat, costing around $30 a month. I keep that around 60 for 12 hours daily, kick it off at night. I have good insulation so it drops about 1/2 degree per hour at night on the coldest days, so I awaken to around low 50s. My electric bill runs between $30-60 per month, depending on seemingly random billing. My energy use seems, from my perspective, relatively constant. I think it's about 10 cents per kwh here. But my bill usage shows a swing of between 11kwh - 30kwh daily, average about 18-20kwh. Not an obvious rhythm there, as my days are almost identical in my view. Some days, my window AC unit clearly has a bigger draw, some days my electric space heaters draw more. Not significant. But I do simply unplug everything not in active use to reduce any draw. I spent, about $1-2 daily on electricity, basic observation is about $1.5 per day. Not bad, not bad at all. Very manageable.

My house stays cool, not cold. I bundle up. I only use electricity as needed, everything else unplugged as much as possible.

My advice.
* Unplug everything not needed.
* Insulate everything as well as possible.
* Use electric at off-peak times if possible. Usually nighttime is cheaper, so run your dishwasher and laundry at night. Etc.)
* For the OP, the dehumidifiers are puzzling and highly inefficient. Figure out something else. Perhaps a wood stove with a pot of water atop it. Seems far more cost effective. Or, a bottle of lotion and just lotion up. It cannot be that dry.
(*Extra credit, vote smarter)
 
I live in a very old and average sized house, northern cold climate, but it has all brand new wiring and panel. I have gas heat, costing around $30 a month. I keep that around 60 for 12 hours daily, kick it off at night. I have good insulation so it drops about 1/2 degree per hour at night on the coldest days, so I awaken to around low 50s. My electric bill runs between $30-60 per month, depending on seemingly random billing. My energy use seems, from my perspective, relatively constant. I think it's about 10 cents per kwh here. But my bill usage shows a swing of between 11kwh - 30kwh daily, average about 18-20kwh. Not an obvious rhythm there, as my days are almost identical in my view. Some days, my window AC unit clearly has a bigger draw, some days my electric space heaters draw more. Not significant. But I do simply unplug everything not in active use to reduce any draw. I spent, about $1-2 daily on electricity, basic observation is about $1.5 per day. Not bad, not bad at all. Very manageable.

My house stays cool, not cold. I bundle up. I only use electricity as needed, everything else unplugged as much as possible.

My advice.
* Unplug everything not needed.
* Insulate everything as well as possible.
* Use electric at off-peak times if possible. Usually nighttime is cheaper, so run your dishwasher and laundry at night. Etc.)
* For the OP, the dehumidifiers are puzzling and highly inefficient. Figure out something else. Perhaps a wood stove with a pot of water atop it. Seems far more cost effective. Or, a bottle of lotion and just lotion up. It cannot be that dry.
(*Extra credit, vote smarter)
He’s running DEhumidifiers for what he believes is excess moisture in the air. I still don’t believe there’s a humidity problem in the house unless he has a spring below the basement or very poor drainage.
 
He’s running DEhumidifiers for what he believes is excess moisture in the air. I still don’t believe there’s a humidity problem in the house unless he has a spring below the basement or very poor drainage.
Yes, I re-read what I wrote. Consider, I've had 4 bourbons tonight. Cut me a break! :ROFLMAO:
Yeah, the dehumidifiers in winter are, well, odd. Maybe in the jungles of Vietnam... Not New England winters. I dunno. I'm puzzled. 🤔

I'd spend the money, as I said, on a wood stove. It's very dry heat, and pays for itself quickly. Tax credit is currently 30% too.
 
I’ll reply to some posts tomorrow.

As a quick data point:

Chest freezer: 0.47 kWh for 24 hrs. That’s less than $5/ month at my current rate. That’s less than 1% of my bill. Extrapolate that out to two fridges and one freezer and that’s 3% of my bill. Double it and that’s 6%of my bill if you want to be conservative.

I just got a notification today that our supplier has changed. The cost for the freezer, for instance, will be even lower, based on the lower supply rate.

I‘ll be using the smart receptacle on the other fridges to determine energy use.
 
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He’s running DEhumidifiers for what he believes is excess moisture in the air. I still don’t believe there’s a humidity problem in the house unless he has a spring below the basement or very poor drainage.
Yeah humidifiers aren't necessarily the ticket as they an cause too much moisture on windows in the winter, but it seems odd even a basement would need it. I run a dehum all winter in my garage but it gets a lot of moisture with snow melt off the vehicles that otherwise has nowhere to go. Cooler ambient temps like he states his house is at also means the dehumidifiers aren't able to be as efficient because they'll need to run defrost cycles much more often.
 
My electric supplier, which is my utility, has had 4 or 5 rate increases in the past 1.5 years. Gen cost went from about $.048/kwh in 06/21 to about $.10/kwh now. Another increase is likely in March. The bottom line on use bill is now near $.20/kwh. For the first time, the cheapest alternative supplier's rate is only about $.003 more than them.

I've used a hand-fired solid fuel stove for the bulk of my heat during the 5 core Winter months. That has also saved me during a couple of very extended power outages. I dry at least half of our laundry on a rack nearby. I still use a good bit of heating oil firing the boiler for the indirect WH.

I'm amazed at both how low and how high some of the rates you folks are paying are. The people with at least partial hydro seem to be doing the best. I have read of some really astronomical rates in Mass. Also, of very low rates in some NY state local co-ops.
 
I'm amazed at both how low and how high some of the rates you folks are paying are. The people with at least partial hydro seem to be doing the best. I have read of some really astronomical rates in Mass. Also, of very low rates in some NY state local co-ops.
I'm also cheap at $0.12 per kWh including delivery, fees, etc. with no hydro which makes me wonder if population density has anything to do with it. ND produces more than double the power that is consumed by the state, so most is sold to surrounding states and even Canada I believe. Primary source is coal fired followed by wind.

That said no one uses electric as primary heat here due to the cold temps we get and gas is even cheaper.
 
I’ll reply to some posts tomorrow.

As a quick data point:

Chest freezer: 0.47 kWh for 24 hrs. That’s less than $5/ month at my current rate. That’s less than 1% of my bill. Extrapolate that out to two fridges and one freezer and that’s 3% of my bill. Double it and that’s 6%of my bill if you want to be conservative.

I just got a notification today that our supplier has changed. The cost for the freezer, for instance, will be even lower, based on the lower supply rate.

I‘ll be using the smart receptacle on the other fridges to determine energy use.
I would put the smart meter on the 3 dehumidifiers and get those readings. Make sure to leave them on long enough to measure a few defrost cycles.

It sounds like you have squeezed all of the savings possible from your usage. Is it possible that the electric meter is faulty. I would complain to the utility and have them change out the meter and recalibrate the present meter. Maybe you are due a credit for overpaying. :) It’s not common but electric meters do go bad.
 
I'm assuming you're talking dual 40Lb tanks? Like RVs have on the tongue? You can also buy 100lb tanks at tractor supply/lowes etc. If you can muscle the full ones around can have a way to transport them vertically oriented.
I use 30 pound tanks for portable needs, as they are still easy to carry, and really do contain about twice what a rental 20 pound tank contains.

I also have 2ea, 60 pound tanks, outside the house on a concrete pad, with retaining straps. This feeds the cooktop/oven and dryer. 1 tank lasts 8 months. But remember, I travel.
 
But are you sure at heat pump set at 60-65 degrees would require more energy than the dehumidifier combined with resistively heated mattresses?

I live in leaky home in the damp southeast and I understand what you're saying about homes becoming too dry. The winter rain is a welcome occurrence because our indoor humidity will rise to around 50 percent at 60-65 degrees.

If it's an affordability thing I get it. Nobody wants to drop a few thousand if they don't need to regardless of how long they intent on remaining in the home.

That's a great question. I have not done the math yet, but 60 would be more comfortable; 65 is a bit too warm for the living spaces, but I'm sure my wife would prefer somewhere between 60 and 65 in the bedroom, lower at night because that would be too hot for me. Now that I've got some instant snap-shot data I need to leave the smart plug on overnight for the heating pads, and consider other options, such as putting heat pump units in the basement, since the temp very rarely approaches close to freezing, above the 70s in the summer, and it's not an occupied space.

The instant snapshot for the twin mattresses is around 100W each, on HIGH, laid out in the open. I did this check as soon as I received them to test the max power draw and how warm they got. The actual energy use will be lower, considering the kiddos and their blankets will result in less duty cycle, and the pads are used on a 5 out of 10 setting for around 12 hrs (2000-0800), usually.

The queen pad draws more, but probably not much. I was cold enough to put on a second light blanket and I also turned my side of the heating pad on at 3 out of 10. I quickly got too warm and turned my side off.

I'm scheduled for a home energy audit, which I did once before in our old condo. They gave us a coupon book with discounts that seemed in addition to what I found online. That was a long time ago, though, so I may be misremembering. Anyway, I need to get a better picture of how much stuff like installing mini-splits throughout the house will cost. I may even need to enlist someone who can help me calculate what I actually need and ROI for my use.
 
How does a dehumidifier go into a defrost cycle? It has no reversing valve and no electric heater.

Seems to me that a dehumidifier would be designed to cycle the compressor off if the evaporator coil temp gets too close to freezing, so that it doesn't freeze up and need a defrost.

Most if not all dehumidifiers also pass the air through the condenser first, so the air is warmed by the condenser, then passes through the evaporator, which would reduce the chance of the evaporator freezing up.
 
Buy yourself a "Kill-A-Watt" meter and check those de-humidifiers, I've seen larger ones pull over 1000 watts, but the watt meter will let you know where your surprise consumption devices are. Anything with a resistive heat element is extremely inefficient but I wouldn't say you have a consumption problem since you use half the Kwh an average household does.

Good advice. I have two watt-meters, one of which is dumb (instantaneous indication only) and a smart plug that will show instantaneous, as well as daily and weekly use in kWh.

The instantaneous readings for each of my dehumidifiers are:

1. Living room: 44/233W (Fan on low / compressor on)
- This one is used the least
2. Main Bedroom Bathroom: 20/201 (Fan on high / compressor on)
- This one is used often since it runs to dehumidify after showers and when it's humid, but not warm enough for AC
3. Basement: 51/236 (Fan on high / compressor on)
- This one runs for most of the year. It's currently off because RH in the basement is < 50% everywhere at the moment. It runs often in the summer

I think you're right that our usage is relatively low. This post was more to vent about the high cost of energy here, to provide some data that I find interesting and which may be helpful to someone, and to solicit advice. I don't claim to be an expert. I've made guesstimates on how to best use what I have, but I could be wrong. It warrant further investigation.
 
How does a dehumidifier go into a defrost cycle? It has no reversing valve and no electric heater.

Seems to me that a dehumidifier would be designed to cycle the compressor off if the evaporator coil temp gets too close to freezing, so that it doesn't freeze up and need a defrost.

I do check the dehumidifier often when it's cold. The only one I've had freeze up is an older one. I noticed that it was running every time I walked by it and the RH was staying high. I pulled the filter and the coils were all frozen. My current ones haven't had an issue with freezing.
 
I'm having trouble understanding why a refrigerator would be using 68W with the compressor off. I would think that it would be a lot less, like something close to nothing unless a fan or light bulb was on inside it (which I have my doubts should ever be the case). Now if it were a freezer, I could see a use case for the defrost timer, but this is supposedly a refrigerator.

I'm not sure. It's too low to be the defroster, right?

It may be the fan running. It does drop to zero watts when OFF and stays at zero.
 
I do check the dehumidifier often when it's cold. The only one I've had freeze up is an older one. I noticed that it was running every time I walked by it and the RH was staying high. I pulled the filter and the coils were all frozen. My current ones haven't had an issue with freezing.

Older ones definitely don't have the smarts the newer ones have.
 
I do check the dehumidifier often when it's cold. The only one I've had freeze up is an older one. I noticed that it was running every time I walked by it and the RH was staying high. I pulled the filter and the coils were all frozen. My current ones haven't had an issue with freezing.


I would inquire if a properly sized mini split could take care of the dehumidification using less electricity. Many split systems use inverters and have a dry mode which is what you are looking for.

In the Philippines the humidity is very high. In cooler days around 80 degrees I would run the system on dry mode. I had one of those Oregon Scientific weather thingamajigs and it would read in the upper 80’s to over 90 % humidity. After a couple of hours or so it would read 55-60%. It was cheaper than running on AC mode.
 
I get quite a bit of my firewood from my more urban family and friends who don't burn wood when they get a tree taken down. Some arborists seem to charge a lot for "disposal". They grind the little stuff up and take it away but not the firewood size stuff. So I'll take it away for free in my little trailer just doing a trip a day after work so I'm not wasting much extra time or gas to get it. My trailer does about 800-1000 lbs at once so its an easy tow behind my Focus, and then my atv to the backyard, but still a good pile of wood.
Also I've had an arborist come and flop a couple really big trees and its pretty cheap way to get a couple cords "delivered".
I did buy a good large saw 20 years ago now so its easy to dice up almost any size wood with it, and I like splitting wood with a maul. The real tough chunks get split by the saw.
I think the real advantage of the woodstove and your own wood supply is that you can have whatever temperature you want, whenever you want, and it just costs you some exercise, and you're independent of the utilities.

That's a great post. I was able to fit more than I thought in the Forester when a neighbor was trying to get rid of it, but that's not sustainable or even a smart thing to do often with just the Forester. I should invest in a small trailer to do what you do and haul some wood. I have the ability to cut and split the wood here. I would need to install a hitch, though, as well.

You bring up another good point. I have a Husqvarna 455 Rancher 20". I'm not sure if that's large enough to fell the larger trees that probably need to be felled to make way for the rest of the smaller trees to thrive. I do have friends who love to help out with stuff like this. I should have them come teach me how to do it, since, as I said, I'm inexperienced. Cutting down an apple tree isn't the same as a larger oak.

Finally, I need to find an arborist. I booked an appointment soon after we moved in, but there was a death in the family and the appointment was canceled. He never called back and I didn't want to bother him. Then I pretty much forgot about the whole thing. I need to get help with confirming that the trees I think need to be felled will actually help my relatively small woods (about an acre). I also have some berry trees that I haven't been able to identify. The berries are red, but they and the leaves don't look exactly like what I'm seeing online and there are obviously consequences if I eat the wrong berries.
 
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