Our little friends boosting our electricity bills?

[greggles91]

Hey every one,

Parents just got the latest quarterly electricity bill and its pretty high due to all the reptiles. So I had a look at all the previous bills and worked out that's my share for all the reps are an extra 250 dollars.

How's every one else going with there electricity bills? Any tricks of the trade to reduce it?

Cheers

 

[Skelhorn]

$250 extra for a 1/4...Doubt it...unless you have a monster amount of reptiles and running rediculous amount of power sucking devices.
We actually monitor with our little meter thingy (QLD government initiative). My reptiles use less than 1kw a day (22c) over a 1/4 thats a max of $40. I have thermostat, 2 heat bulbs, 3 heat mats, two lights being utilised. The heat mats are always on and one heat bulb gets turned off over night....
Might be another issue...or like i previously said you may have a decent size collection (which in your case...lucky )

 

[borntobnude]

Buy them some solar pannels for christmas Greg !!!

 

[caliherp]

Am I reading this wrong, do you guys only pay 4 times a year? I pay over 300$ a month to to keep my scaley money pits worm.

 

[Renenet]

That's a pretty impressive bill, Caliherp - ouch! Our bills generally come out quarterly.

 

[Kah.]

Yep Caliherp most have quarterly electricity bills.

Now that it's summer you're bill should drop as you won't need as much heating? (well here in QLD anyway! my god it's getting hot here)

 

[caliherp]

Yep Caliherp most have quarterly electricity bills.

Now that it's summer you're bill should drop as you won't need as much heating? (well here in QLD anyway! my god it's getting hot here)

You all are lucky I wish I only had to pay 4 times a year. It's winter here. So my bill is at a all time high. I had to pay over 500 last month.(I could have bought a nice c.b GTP for that much) you'd think I'd have to pay less in the summer, but not by much. I have to run my a/c for some of my geckos that need cooler conditions.

 

[greggles91]

Wow some incredible bills.. I'm running 7 heat lamps, 4 UVB, one radiant heat panel and 4 stats.

Buy them some solar pannels for christmas Greg !!!

I've been considering this for a while and every time I look into it I get confused and not sure if its worth it. Although I'm sure it will pay itself off after x amount of years

 

[Grogshla]

I am moving all my snakes and geckos into one rack system. Then I will have a thermostat controlling the whole rack instead of a thermostat, basking light, heatmat and viewing light for every enclosure.
Can't wait for the extra space and cheaper bills.

 

[disintegratus]

Ours are ridiculous, I think the last one (for a quarter) was around $700, and that wasn't too bad!

I'm in the process of replacing most of the globes/heat emitters with heat cord, but so far I've only done a few. Of course some of the problem is that we had 3 people basically living in their bedrooms, with electronics running almost 24/7, and there was almost always someone home, so we didn't really have any time of the day when there was no one running anything.
Our housemate's moved out now, and hopefully within a month or two I'll be done putting heat cords in, so hopefully that will help with the bills. I'm getting solar panels on my next place, but because we're going to be here for less than a year, it's not worth it, though it would have been if we'd gotten them installed as soon as we moved in like I wanted to.

 

[chase77]

I got angry last month cause my bill for the qtr was $400. I can't believe some people have bills over or near $1000

 

[FAY]

Everyone was well aware that electricity has gone up...heaps...

 

[Hindy]

I have 3 heat lights and 3 uv lights running. I will soon have a heat mat and an incubator running next year..
Currently our bill is around $480 :/

 

[No-two]

I don't know what the average household uses in electricity but I'm not too upset when I get a quaterly bill, its generally pretty high but I do keep a lot of reptiles, noting a few hatchies wouldn't pay for though...

 

[dangles]

Last bill was 700 for me. With mrs home all day with little ones. Plasma in lounge room pretty much runs 18 hrs a day which is where most of ours comes from. I run approx 700w in heating/lighting for 13 hrs ATM. So that's 9100w or 9.1kw a day. All thermos are dimming so would be using less than quoted

 

[Skelhorn]

Hot water systems are the killer with power bills. Our system is small and S*&^ cause we are in a unit. The difference between winter and summer bills just from hotwater is around $140 a quarter! Reptile products (lights, heatmats) don't actually use as much as we think)

 

[sharky]

Thanks to the "GENIOUS IDEA" of the carbon tax our electricity bill has gone up ALOT! My parents last one was near $1,200 thanks to all of my little herp friends and my brother's monstorous-energy-burning-55inch plasma that runs almost 24/7!!!! Have 4 heatlights, 2 heat mats, 2 UBV lights, 3 filter thingies, aquarium heater and will be getting more soon :O
We are getting solar pannels though to help save the costs as my collection is growing and my dad is starting to get into the hobby as well

 

[greggles91]

Yeah mine was 900 for the quarter. And my collection is only expanding :s

 

[Snowman]

Make sure you dont heat more than 12 hours a day. Some people supply 24/7 and there is no need for it.

 

[greggles91]

Nah I only do 12 hours. Been working good for me.