The Price of Power

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Reply # 862412 19-Jul-2013 22:44

timmmay:
That's pretty cheap. We keep our old but relatively well insulated and retrofit double glazed house at 20-22 degrees from 5pm until 9pm, then 18 degrees until 7am.

Do you find it cheaper to keep "heating" during the night rather than letting the house cool off and do a short 1-2 hour warm up in the morning?

i.e. I run 22c from 4:30 (sun still out so a bit more heat to extract easily) to around 9pm.

Then turn it off at night. Then have it run from 5:30 am-7:30am during the week at 20c

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Reply # 862463 20-Jul-2013 07:58

mentalinc:
timmmay:
That's pretty cheap. We keep our old but relatively well insulated and retrofit double glazed house at 20-22 degrees from 5pm until 9pm, then 18 degrees until 7am.

Do you find it cheaper to keep "heating" during the night rather than letting the house cool off and do a short 1-2 hour warm up in the morning?

i.e. I run 22c from 4:30 (sun still out so a bit more heat to extract easily) to around 9pm.

Then turn it off at night. Then have it run from 5:30 am-7:30am during the week at 20c

I've never really tested it. I doubt the difference is that big, since it's set low, and comfort is more important to me than cost. I do know that if it's 22 degrees at night then it's still 18 degrees in the morning even on a cold night, so it's probably unnecessary, and isn't even on that much.

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webwat

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Reply # 862634 20-Jul-2013 15:59

myfullflavour:
Dratsab:
garbonzai: I have just had another power increase from GENESIS ENERGY ... But what can one do.

Give your Council the finger and start burning some wood?

Invest in a solar power setup? This makes most $$ sense when building a new place so.....option 2....get hot water & cooking switched over to gas?

I moved to Bosco and saved a bit. Now I moved to another place and use more power :(

Your idea about prices going up to compensate for more efficient appliances makes no sense, did you just imagine that? Power prices go up (every day on the spot market) with demand, so your power supplier has to pay more if you use more than they have contracted for. Generators now have the right incentives to produce more power at peak times because of the prices, so they will burn gas when their hydro stations cant produce enough. Unfortunately at certain times of year NZ's over-reliance on hydro power does bite, especially when theres been a drought. Perhaps you heard of the drought this year.

Unfortunately the resource management act creates a lot of hurdles when they want to build a new power station, so the country's generation capacity tends to only just keep up with demand and we will likely never see enough over-supply to would push down the power prices. At least we also shouldn't see too many rolling brown-outs anymore when the hydro dams get low.

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Lazarui

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Reply # 863805 22-Jul-2013 19:52

It's more to do with the time you run it for.... First find out it's wattage, or KW. depending. Lets say a device is 1kw and you run it for 4-5 hours a day, and your unit price (which is measured in kw/h) is $0.20 (this can be cheap or expensive depending where you are).

so we're looking a forumla like this:

1*5*20/100=1.25*30 = $30.00 This is a nice figure lets change the numbers!

Let's say your unit price is $0.28 (I think this'll be about a averge unit prices vary from round 24c to 32c) suddenly this happens!
1*5*28/100=1.5*30 = $42.00

But wait theres more! A Heating solution is hardly ever going to be 1Kw! they start at 2.5Kw and go upto around 14Kw so this is how much 4-5 hours of your Heatpump is going to cost you.

2.5 kilo watts * 5 hours * 28 cents / 100 cents * 30 Days = $105.00

Imagine if you will a 14kilo watt monster.

14Kilo Watts * 5 hours * 28 cents / 100 cents * 30 Days = $588.00

So your Heatpump/Heating solution can cost if run on average 5 hours a day anywhere from $100.00 too $600.00 Dollars, and that is if theres nothing wrong with the thermastat/Heating Elements etc.

Most people don't know how much thier appicances actually use and half the time the wattage guide on them is completely incorrect or the device is so old the thermastat doesnt work properly so the device works overtime 24/7, wat you really want to do is hook them up to a energy monitor to figure out what thier real draw is.

Number 1 tip to save power. IF YOUR NOT HOME TURN IT OFF

jonherries

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Reply # 863867 22-Jul-2013 20:49

Number two tip put some more insulation in the ceiling.

Jon

Shoes2468

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Reply # 866189 25-Jul-2013 21:33

So I went to the power switch website tonight and had a look, they now have the updated prices for Genesis energy and now contact is the cheapest, based on the online ontime discounts. However you need to be careful because if you missed out on one of the bonuses you would be worse off on contact.

garbonzai

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Reply # 866233 25-Jul-2013 22:19

Shoes2468: So I went to the power switch website tonight and had a look, they now have the updated prices for Genesis energy and now contact is the cheapest, based on the online ontime discounts. However you need to be careful because if you missed out on one of the bonuses you would be worse off on contact.

Yea, it's been updated for a few days now, that's what put me off with Contact, was for the 22% discount (there unit price is very high though) all is done online, so can't go to post office etc, if net is down and miss out then will be penalized %22, Meridian with it's $150 discount works out cheapest for low user (up to 9000kw I think).

There's an article on Stuff today "Auckland power savings not passed on" about power companies rorting there Auckland customers, only a small amount though, but that's nothing to the 10%-15% power increases year after year from power companies with inflation around 2% (currently .7%)

For those that missed this link in my previous post->

Here's a link to an article years ago on GZ and it looks like nothing has changed.

http://www.geekzone.co.nz/Jama/3069

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Hammerer

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Reply # 866246 25-Jul-2013 22:55

garbonzai: Yea, it's been updated for a few days now, that's what put me off with Contact, was for the 22% discount (there unit price is very high though) all is done online, so can't go to post office etc, if net is down and miss out then will be penalized %22, Meridian with it's $150 discount works out cheapest for low user (up to 9000kw I think).

For several years I've used Internet-only electricity services like PowerShop and I wouldn't factor in concerns about loss of Internet service unless you always do everything at the last moment. You will still get a bill at least 10 days before it has to be paid. There are other payment options: use vendor-initiated payments like direct debits or credit card payments, use flat-rate payments with an automatic payment, schedule a bill payment to cover a larger value then amend it when the actual bill arrives, or pay in advance. Finally, even if there is a widespread loss of Internet service, none of the power companies I've been with have charged penalties if the Internet is down for everyone in town.

Lazarui: ... this is how much 4-5 hours of your Heatpump is going to cost you.

2.5 kilo watts * 5 hours * 28 cents / 100 cents * 30 Days = $105.00

Imagine if you will a 14kilo watt monster.

14Kilo Watts * 5 hours * 28 cents / 100 cents * 30 Days = $588.00

So your Heatpump/Heating solution can cost if run on average 5 hours a day anywhere from $100.00 too $600.00 Dollars, and that is if theres nothing wrong with the thermastat/Heating Elements etc.

Most people don't know how much thier appicances actually use and half the time the wattage guide on them is completely incorrect or the device is so old the thermastat doesnt work properly so the device works overtime 24/7, wat you really want to do is hook them up to a energy monitor to figure out what thier real draw is.

...

Yes, monitoring the actual energy used is important both for the reasons you gave but also because heat pumps have the greatest difference between power used and power output and their efficiency can vary widely depending how they are run.

Heat pumps can output more heat than the power used whereas most other heaters output no more heat than the power they use. A household heat pump running efficiently produces 3 or more kW of heat for every kW of electricity used. That is considerably better than a radiant heater which produces 1kW of heat for every kW of electricity used. Gas heaters are less efficient than that.

However a heat pump does work less efficiently closer to its maximum capacity which can occur:
- when the exterior temperature gets cold enough as in winter or at night.
- when the difference between the interior temperature and the desired temperature is large enough.
- when the unit is underpowered for the space it has to heat.

I've saved at least 30% on heat pump electricity by using them as efficiently as possible.

garbonzai

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Reply # 1022371 9-Apr-2014 18:43

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Just got latest bill, and yes it's gone up again,

So, since September 2012 (18 months ago) the total electricity increase to me is now at 29.6%, the latest being line companies I think, and according to Consumer Power Switch web site, all the Power Cartel Companies are "price increase pending" comment for most of the power co's, looks like another 10-15% from the power co's any time soon, not good.

Should be a law for exploitation, so some of these people making decisions to continually put up prices would be put in prison.

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old3eyes

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Reply # 1022387 9-Apr-2014 19:14

garbonzai: Just got latest bill, and yes it's gone up again,

So, since September 2012 (18 months ago) the total electricity increase to me is now at 29.6%, the latest being line companies I think, and according to Consumer Power Switch web site, all the Power Cartel Companies are "price increase pending" comment for most of the power co's, looks like another 10-15% from the power co's any time soon, not good.

Should be a law for exploitation, so some of these people making decisions to continually put up prices would be put in prison.

If it were a telco doing this the Com Com would down on them fast but power companies get away with it.

Regards,

Old3eyes

k14

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Reply # 1022420 9-Apr-2014 19:33

old3eyes:If it were a telco doing this the Com Com would down on them fast but power companies get away with it.

Sometimes I don't know if people are being ignorant or just need something to complain about.

Read these:
http://www.comcom.govt.nz/regulated-industries/electricity/
http://www.comcom.govt.nz/regulated-industries/input-methodologies-2/electricity-distribution
http://www.stuff.co.nz/the-press/business/9040430/Orion-curtailed-by-Commerce-Commission
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/business/news/article.cfm?c_id=3&objectid=10828450
http://www.nbr.co.nz/article/vector-loses-key-elements-challenge-commerce-commission-pricing-dc-149922

Plenty more where that came from if you want to keep searching. You will notice all of the regulation (or stick wielding) is being done at the lines companies, the generation/retail companies (Contact, Genesis, Mighty River etc) are all very conscious of regulation and really are doing everything within their powers to cut overheads to avoid power price rises. The market for the generation of the power is incredibly competitive. Where it falls down is the monopoly the lines and transmission companies have and thus the com com has stepped in there. Believe it or not, for a retail company to make money off the fringe customer (the well informed person who will change power companies to get a better deal) costs the retailer upwards of $250 to get them to change. To recoup that outlay it can take from 12-18 months for the power company to get back to even. Just take a look at the dividends Contact (the longest privatised company) has been paying to their shareholders. I think this year it was around the 5.5-6% mark. Hardly daylight robbery!

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Reply # 1022424 9-Apr-2014 19:38

k14:
old3eyes:If it were a telco doing this the Com Com would down on them fast but power companies get away with it.
Sometimes I don't know if people are being ignorant or just need something to complain about. Read these: http://www.comcom.govt.nz/regulated-industries/electricity/ http://www.comcom.govt.nz/regulated-industries/input-methodologies-2/electricity-distribution/ http://www.stuff.co.nz/the-press/business/9040430/Orion-curtailed-by-Commerce-Commission http://www.nzherald.co.nz/business/news/article.cfm?c_id=3&objectid=10828450 http://www.nbr.co.nz/article/vector-loses-key-elements-challenge-commerce-commission-pricing-dc-149922 Plenty more where that came from if you want to keep searching. You will notice all of the regulation (or stick wielding) is being done at the lines companies, the generation/retail companies (Contact, Genesis, Mighty River etc) are all very conscious of regulation and really are doing everything within their powers to cut overheads to avoid power price rises. The market for the generation of the power is incredibly competitive. Where it falls down is the monopoly the lines and transmission companies have and thus the com com has stepped in there. Believe it or not, for a retail company to make money off the fringe customer (the well informed person who will change power companies to get a better deal) costs the retailer upwards of $250 to get them to change. To recoup that outlay it can take from 12-18 months for the power company to get back to even. Just take a look at the dividends Contact (the longest privatised company) has been paying to their shareholders. I think this year it was around the 5.5-6% mark. Hardly daylight robbery! Edit: Unable to get the formatting in this post to look even remotely readable, wtf?? Won't even keep the paragraphs??

unreadable.

Sideface

DarthKermit

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Reply # 1022428 9-Apr-2014 19:44

It's not much good blaming your power retailer, as they are forced to pass on any price increases from the power wholesalers.

Whatifthespacekeyhadneverbeeninvented?

k14

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Reply # 1022436 9-Apr-2014 20:04

Sideface:
k14:
old3eyes:If it were a telco doing this the Com Com would down on them fast but power companies get away with it.
Sometimes I don't know if people are being ignorant or just need something to complain about. Read these: http://www.comcom.govt.nz/regulated-industries/electricity/ http://www.comcom.govt.nz/regulated-industries/input-methodologies-2/electricity-distribution/ http://www.stuff.co.nz/the-press/business/9040430/Orion-curtailed-by-Commerce-Commission http://www.nzherald.co.nz/business/news/article.cfm?c_id=3&objectid=10828450 http://www.nbr.co.nz/article/vector-loses-key-elements-challenge-commerce-commission-pricing-dc-149922 Plenty more where that came from if you want to keep searching. You will notice all of the regulation (or stick wielding) is being done at the lines companies, the generation/retail companies (Contact, Genesis, Mighty River etc) are all very conscious of regulation and really are doing everything within their powers to cut overheads to avoid power price rises. The market for the generation of the power is incredibly competitive. Where it falls down is the monopoly the lines and transmission companies have and thus the com com has stepped in there. Believe it or not, for a retail company to make money off the fringe customer (the well informed person who will change power companies to get a better deal) costs the retailer upwards of $250 to get them to change. To recoup that outlay it can take from 12-18 months for the power company to get back to even. Just take a look at the dividends Contact (the longest privatised company) has been paying to their shareholders. I think this year it was around the 5.5-6% mark. Hardly daylight robbery! Edit: Unable to get the formatting in this post to look even remotely readable, wtf?? Won't even keep the paragraphs??

unreadable.

Totally agree, I tried editing it 4 times but this stupid forum software is useless. Wouldn't even let me format the paragraphs apart by pressing enter!

timmmay

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Reply # 1022439 9-Apr-2014 20:11

Gee.

It.

Works.

Fine.

For.

Me.

Try a different browser, or ask a mod to format it for you.

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