Erica Pozzey, a graduate student from the Queensland University of Technology in Australia, has developed a new, super sleek and stylish way to monitor your home’s energy consumption. The system, called Triad Energy, combines an award-winning design with captivating real-time infographics to keep you engaged and motivated enough to monitor your home’s energy use on an ongoing basis. It even allows you to see the energy usage of other Triad Energy users near you. That way, you can know how efficient you have to be to become the most energy-efficient household in the neighborhood.

The system’s wall mounted display, called Triad Wall, looks like a piece of triangular technology from the future. The three truncated points each represent a separate energy consumption measurement: how much energy you are using, how close your energy use is to the target you set for yourself and how your energy use compares with homes in your area that also have Triad Energy monitors. The display uses a smooth, organic triangle graphic to visually communicate your energy use, with each point indicating one of the three categories. It even comes with pleasing ambient backlighting that changes color, presumably to signify the amount of energy you’re using.

If you’re not a visual person, however, there’s no need to worry. The system comes with a sophisticated web-based interface that gives you plenty of detailed data to look through to better understand your energy habits. The web interface also allows communication to and from Triad Wall, tracks and provides detailed reports of your energy use and can be set up to send alerts to your mobile device to make sure you’re always in the loop.

On the one hand, the system encourages self-monitoring with its futuristic Triad Wall and well-featured web platform. On the other, it works as a kind of social media device, allowing you to share energy information with other users so you know who your neighborhood queen or king of energy efficiency is. With everyone competing for the top spot by using less energy, we all win.

Whether or not you decide to vie for the crown of “most energy efficient” in your neighborhood, (we suspect you’ll be able to shut off the social feature if you prefer) we love the idea of a simple, at-a-glance way to check our energy consumption. If Pozzey is right, it may be just the thing that motivates us to use less energy. And that’s something that's good for everyone.

Sources

“Futuristic Wall Display Shows Real-Time Energy Usage,” Physorg, Feb. 27, 2012.

If you live in Texas, now might be a good time to start thinking about locking in your electricity price.

In February, both the Public Utility Commission of Texas (PUCT) and the Electric Reliability Council of Texas (ERCOT) told state lawmakers that there is likely not going to be enough electricity supply to meet demand this summer. It’s a problem that can hurt electricity customers in the state who wait to sign up for fixed-price plans.

“Basically, what ERCOT and the PUCT told lawmakers was that falling natural gas prices are hurting the construction of new power plants that are desperately needed to meet the electricity demand in Texas,” said Jim Head, Spark Energy Vice President of Marketing and Sales. “And whenever supply fails to meet demand, the price of electricity usually increases.”

“Once electricity prices rise, the only thing that electricity customers can do to help offset the increase is to use less electricity or spend money on energy efficiency improvements,” Head said. “What people should really consider doing is looking at their options for locking in their electricity price before prices have a chance to increase.”

Sources

“Top Texas Officials Warn of Power Plant Shortages,” Fort Worth Star-Telegram, Feb. 9, 2012.

If you’ve made your way here after reading part one of our post on reasons your electricity bill might be so high, then you’re already familiar with how to determine if your bill is abnormal and figure out if you simply used more electricity or paid more for it than you did during your previous billing cycle.

For part two, we take a closer look at some other reasons why your electricity bill might be high, including changes to utility charges, changes to your electricity usage that you might not have considered and technical problems with your meter.

Did your utility charges increase?

Sometimes the public utility that delivers electricity to your home increases the amount it charges for delivery, which could be the reason for a sudden spike in your electricity bill. But there are also a lot of other utility charges that can go up, too. Just go through your bill line by line and see if any of these other charges have gone up. Some are related to the amount of kilowatt-hours (kWh) of electricity you use, such as sales taxes, so if you used more electricity on your new bill, some of these charges will likely reflect that.

For a full explanation of utility charges, visit your utility’s website. It should have a detailed breakdown and explanation of each charge and how it relates to the amount of electricity you use.

Are There Reasons You Used More Electricity That You Haven’t Considered?

Sometimes you can use more electricity without realizing it. If your electricity consumption is up, here are some things that you might not have considered that could cause you to use more electricity:

• Has the weather been unseasonably warm or cold? Check last year’s bill during the same billing period. Don’t look at the price per kWh (because the price may have increased). Instead, look at the amount of kWh you used. If you used more electricity during the same period this year, it’s likely that the weather may have been unseasonably warm or cold and caused you to run your air conditioner or heater more to maintain the same level of comfort.
• Did you have out of town guests? When you have more people in your house, especially for extended periods, the extra body heat actually makes your air conditioner work harder to maintain the same temperature.
• Did you add appliances? If you bought any new appliances during the last billing cycle, you can probably attribute some of your increased electricity use to simply having more devices in the house that consume electricity.
• Did you have any trouble with existing appliances? If you had some trouble with an appliance that uses a lot of electricity, like your air conditioner, for example, it’s likely that the appliance used more electricity than normal, which would drive up your electricity consumption from the previous billing cycle.
• Is your usage based on an actual read or estimated usage? In some instances, utilities may estimate your usage for a particular billing period, rather than come out to actually read the meter. The estimates are normally based on things like historical usage or normal average usage for a particular month, and would be clearly indicated as “estimate” rather than “actual” on your bill. If this is the case, the difference will be made up in a subsequent bill once your actual usage is read by the meter-reader.

Is there something wrong with your meter?

Like any piece of equipment, electricity meters can break or otherwise develop problems. If you suspect you might have a problem with your meter, you should consider performing the following checks:

• To verify your meter is running properly, shut off all the breakers in your home’s breaker box. If the meter is still spinning or the electronic indicators are still ticking away, the meter might be broken. This is extremely rare, but not impossible. You should hire an electrician to check this out. If the electrician confirms your meter is broken, have the electrician sign a statement to that effect so you have proof when you work with the utility on reimbursement. For extra documentation, you can videotape the electrician’s explanation or take photographs.
• If you live in a duplex or a multi-family dwelling and you shut off all the breakers but the meter still runs, chances are one of your neighbor’s circuits is wired into your meter. Hire an electrician to confirm the problem and fix it.

If you shut off all the breakers and your meter stops cold, you’re probably okay. However, if you’re convinced the meter is improperly recording your electricity use, you should consider checking to make sure you don’t have an electricity leak somewhere, which means one or more of your appliances or electronic devices is drawing power when it’s plugged in but turned off. This is usually due to a problem with your wiring. You can try to check this yourself by unplugging everything in the house and then plugging items back in one by one and checking your meter to see if it starts running, but you’re better off hiring an electrician to do this work for you.

Have You Exhausted All the Possibilities?

If you’ve followed our advice and exhausted all the possibilities for why your electricity use may have increased and you still think there’s been an overcharge, you can, as a last resort, contact your utility company and request a meter re-read or a further review of the month’s electricity use. However, some utility companies will charge you a fee if the re-read comes back normal, so be sure to ask what that amount is before they come out for a re-read.

Sources

Saving Electricity, “Why Is My Electric Bill So High?”

If your natural gas bill is high, there are several things you can do to help control your energy costs, including simply using less natural gas. One of the ways you can use less natural gas is to replace old and inefficient appliances with new, more efficient appliances. This guide will show you how much energy common natural gas appliances consume over the course of a year and how much, on average, it costs to operate them. You can use this information to make informed decisions about upgrading the natural gas appliances in your home that have the greatest effect on your natural gas bill.

A few Notes on Appliance Costs

Furnace, Pool Heater and Gas Fireplace

The average gas costs associated with a furnace, pool heater and gas fireplace are skewed somewhat heavily toward the cold winter months, resulting in high usage for a certain period of time followed by little usage the rest of the year. Therefore, while we’ve provided average monthly costs for using these appliances, these numbers will almost certainly be much higher during the winter and much lower during the summer, depending on your climate. The important figure to note regarding these appliances is average cost per year.

Furnace numbers are based on an average gas furnace with a 92 percent efficiency rating. Pool heater numbers are based on using 300,000 Btu/hr over 120 hours of annual operation. Gas fireplace numbers are based on burning gas logs (as opposed to using a gas-starter fireplace) at 60,000 Btu/hr over 120 hours of annual operation.

To increase the energy efficiency of your furnace without investing in a new furnace, try changing out the furnace filters on a regular basis. You can save money when operating your furnace setting back your programmable thermostat least 10 degrees for eight hours a day.

To save money on pool heating costs, consider using a pool cover to prevent heat from escaping or turning down the pool temperature a degree or two (each degree of setback will save 10 to 30 percent off pool heating costs).

Outdoor Yard Light

Outdoor yard light numbers are based on using a triple mantle gas light that burns 3.451 Btu/hr and operates 24 hours a day, 365 days a year.

Water Heater

Water heater numbers are based on 40-gallon models with a 0.63 EF rating using 40,000 Btu/hr and based on the U.S. Department of Energy’s (DOE) national average of 64 gallons of hot water use daily.

To save money on water heating, the DOE suggests shortening your showers and washing your clothes in cold water. Besides simply using less hot water, you can also set your water heater as low as 120 degrees. Every 10 degree reduction in water heater temperature can save three to five percent in monthly energy costs, according to the U.S. Department of Energy. Other energy-saving options include insulating your water heater tank and hot water pipes and installing heat traps on your water heater tank.

Clothes Dryer

Clothes dryer numbers are based on a 5.8 cu. ft. model using 20,000 Btu/hr over 275 hours of annual operation. The most direct way to save money when it comes to drying clothes is to hang your clothes to air dry, which will also increase the lifespan of your clothes. Other energy-saving options include using moisture sensors instead of timers, cleaning the lint filter after every load and drying towels and heavy cottons in a separate load from lighter-weight clothes.

* Therm (th) is a measure of natural gas equivalent to 100,000 British thermal units (Btu) or one CCF. You may be billed for natural gas by the MCF (thousands of cubic feet), CCF (hundreds of cubic feet), or therm, depending on how your natural gas delivery utility records your natural gas use.

** Based on an average monthly gas price of $1.059 per therm.

Sources

Metropolitan Utilities District, “Annual Operating Costs for Gas Appliances,” April 2010.

U.S. Department of Energy, Energy Efficiency & Renewable Energy, “Energy-Efficient Water Heating.”

U.S. Department of Energy, Energy Efficiency & Renewable Energy, “How to Read Residential Electric and Natural Gas Meters.”

U.S. Department of Energy, Energy Efficiency & Renewable Energy, “Laundry.”

U.S. Department of Energy, Energy Efficiency & Renewable Energy, “Managing Swimming Pool Water Temperature for Energy Efficiency.”

U.S. Department of Energy, Energy Efficiency & Renewable Energy, “Swimming Pool Covers.”

U.S. Energy Information Administration, “Natural Gas Prices (Release Date: Jan. 30, 2012).”

Ever since we wrote a post about our dream home theater system, we’ve been wondering exactly how much electricity our mind-blowing mega-theater would consume to show a movie and how much that electricity might actually cost us. That got us curious about how much electricity the modest home theater of one of our staff writers uses when he watches a movie and how much he might actually be spending on electricity to indulge his inner movie lover.

In order to run this little experiment, we examined the electricity consumption of our movie-buff staff writer’s 65-inch Samsung flat-panel TV, Sony home theater in a box (HTIB) and XBOX 360 game console, since that’s what he uses to play DVDs. Then we compared his setup to the absurdly-awesome dream home theater we recently explored, which included a Ronco 103” plasma TV, Goldman Blu-ray player, and separate Anthem preamp and amplifier.

To compare the two systems, we made a few assumptions, including the number of movies our staff writer watches on average each week (which turns out to be about three), the average length of a movie (two hours) and the price of electricity (which we set at 10 cents/kWh for the sake of easy math). Just in case you’re wondering, our staff writer’s setup cost about $2,200, while our dream home theater’s price tag is a little north of $160,000.

Our Staff Writer’s System:

Samsung UN65D6000 65-inch LCD TV: 160 W

Sony STR-K850P HTIB: 330 W

Microsoft XBOX 360: 126 W

Total: 616 W

The Math:

(616 W x 2 hours) ÷ 1,000 = 1.232 kWh

1.232 kWh x 10 cents/kWh = 12.32 cents per movie

12.32 cents x 3 movies per week = $19.20 per year

Our Dream System:

Runco PlasmaWall XP-103DHD 103-inch Plasma TV: 1,500 W

Goldmund Eidos 20BD Blu-ray Player: 35 W

Anthem AVM 50v Preamp: 150 W

Anthem MCA 50 Amplifier: 530 W

Total: 2,215 W

The Math:

(2,215 W x 2 hours) ÷ 1,000 = 4.43 kWh

4.43 kWh x 10 cents/kWh = 44.3 cents per movie

44.3 cents x 3 movies per week = $69.10 per year

Our Conclusion

Watching movies at home requires little in the way of electricity expense, but we had no idea exactly how cheap it was until we crunched the numbers. Even watching a movie on the Ferrari of home theater systems still costs less than a trip to the local Redbox.

Sources

Anthem, “AVM 50v.”

Anthem, “MCA 50.”

Goldmund, “Eidos 20BD.”

Hardcoreware, “Power Usage in Movies.”

Runco, “Runco PlasmaWall XP-103DHD Display.”

U.S. Department of Energy, Energy Efficiency & Renewable Energy, “Estimating Appliance and Home Electronic Energy Use.”

Whenever I get a new electricity bill, I make sure to look at it carefully. Call me crazy, but I’m not one to just get a bill and pay it without checking it out first. Sometimes I get a bill that’s higher than the one I got the month before. When that happens, I usually grumble to myself for a minute or two and then focus on finding out why.

Here are a few things to look at if you think your electricity bill is too high. For part one of our discussion, we’ll take a look at determining if your bill really is high and whether or not you used more electricity or paid more for the electricity you used.

Make sure to check out part two for a few words on increased utility charges, damaged meters and more.

Is your electricity bill really all that high?

So you get your electricity bill for the month and it says you owe $400. If you’re taken aback by the amount and you think it’s abnormally high, the first thing you need to determine is whether you’re right. You can do that by figuring out what’s normal for your home. If you go back and look at some old electricity bills and they’re all right around $400, then you know that your new bill, while seemingly high, is actually pretty much the same as your previous bills and everything’s fine.

However, if your bill has gone up, then you need to take a look at two other areas of your bill: how much electricity you used during the month and how much you paid for electricity.

Did you use more electricity?

This one’s easy. When you compare your new electricity bill with your previous bill, find out how much electricity you used. Just look at the number of kilowatt-hours, or kWh, you used. If that number increased from the month before, then you have your answer. Your electricity bill is higher because you used more electricity.

In this case, the only thing you can do is cut the amount of electricity you use. At Spark Energy, we offer all sorts of energy-saving tips that can help you cut energy costs, from behavioral changes like setting your thermostat back to home improvements like upgrading to modern electrical outlets and installing energy efficient windows and doors.

If the amount of electricity you used was close to or the same as the previous month, then you need to take a look at how much you paid for electricity.

Did you pay more for electricity?

If you’re on a fixed-price plan, then the amount you pay for each kWh you use should be the same. You can check this by comparing the amount you paid per kWh on your new bill with you last bill. If you’re on a fixed-price plan and there’s a difference, then chances are your contract expired and you were placed on a different plan. That’s one of the reasons I look at my electricity bills closely. Your electricity supplier will give you at least a month’s notice when your plan is about to expire, which is plenty of time to renew or explore what other options are available to match your needs.

Many utilities have their customers on fixed-price plans that fluctuate twice a year so that you’ll have one price for the six months surrounding winter and one price for the six months surrounding summer. If you buy your electricity from your supplier and your price jumps, then you could be getting the new seasonal rate. For example, Illinois residents who buy their electricity from ComEd pay one price from October through May and a different price from June through September.

If you’re on a variable-price plan, it’s possible your bill is higher because you paid more for electricity during your most recent billing cycle. Just compare the amount you paid per kWh on you new bill to the amount you paid on your last bill. If the number is higher, you paid more. The only thing you can do to prevent electricity prices from climbing higher each month is to learn more about the fixed-price plan options – which essentially lock in your electricity price for six months or a year or even two years at a time – and determine what best meets your home or business’ needs and budget.

If you’ve gone through these questions and you still think there’s a problem with your electricity bill, click on over to part two for some information about utility charges and other possible drivers of high bills.

Sources

Saving Electricity, “Why Is My Electric Bill So High?”

As a building owner or commercial energy manager, you’re probably more than interested in figuring out a way to make a lighting upgrade work for your building or portfolio of buildings. Not only will you save money in the long-term, but upgrading to more efficient lighting will save on energy costs right now. If you want hard data that might make your decision easier, just check out what Johnson Space Center in Houston, Texas — the folks behind the lunar landings — was able to accomplish with its lighting upgrade.

In 2011, JSC decided to install HID high bay lighting in 24 buildings and re-retrofit over 18,000 office lighting fixtures (that were originally retrofit in 1999) with 28-watt T8 lamps and high-efficiency ballasts. Overall, the high bay lighting upgrade cut electricity costs by 50 percent and the office lighting upgrade cut costs by and additional 25 percent:

• Total Facility Size all areas retrofit: 1,250,000 square feet
• Facility Type: Manufacturing, Warehouse & Office
• Location: Houston, TX
• Annual Savings: $216,911
• Demand Savings: 359 kW
• Energy Savings: 2,078,504 kWh
• Project Size: $925,456
• EPACT Tax Deductions: NA
• Utility Rebates: $121,039
• Return on Investment: 27%
• Environmental Benefits: CO2 reduction: 3,117,756 lbs. annually

Sources

Maneri-Agraz, “Johnson Space Center Case Study.”

Whether you’re the energy manager of a large commercial building operator or the owner of a small commercial property, you probably know that retrofitting older buildings with simple energy-efficient technologies can help save money off utility bills. After all, the practice has been around for years.

However, the problem with savings estimates on retrofits is that they offer more of an idea of savings than actual numbers. The fact is, there isn’t much research out there that shows how much energy you can actually save by upgrading your properties with straightforward improvements like energy-efficient boilers, high-quality windows and compact fluorescent light bulbs.

The good news, however, is that a new study aims to supply commercial building owners and operators with just that kind of hard data.

The 18-month study was commissioned by the Deutsche Bank Americas Foundation, a philanthropic arm of the German bank, and Living Cities, a nonprofit partnership of foundations and financial institutions. The study involved the creation of a database of several hundred retrofitted residential buildings in New York City. The study examined energy efficiency upgrades at each building and quantified the energy savings of each type of improvement.

The study found that overall, the residential building retrofits resulted in a 19 percent savings on fuel bills and a 10 percent savings on electricity across the portfolio of properties. Although the study focused on residential buildings, data produced by the study could also be valuable to owners and operators of other types of commercial buildings such as restaurants, hotels, hospitals, schools and storage and distribution warehouses. The full details of the study will be released in a corresponding report later this month.

Gary Hattem, president of the Deutsche Bank Americas Foundation, said he hoped the study would help convince both building owners and lenders to pursue energy-efficient building retrofits. “The largest obstacle to making these practices go mainstream is data that will convince building owners to retrofit their properties and at the same time increase underwriters’ willingness to finance the projects,” Hattem said in an interview.

Marc Zuluaga, a vice president at New York building consultancy Steven Winter Associates, said that many of the buildings in the study were some of the least energy-efficient properties in New York City prior to receiving simple retrofits. After the retrofits, however, Zuluaga said those same buildings had become some of the best-performing buildings in the city.

According to Jeffery I. Brodsky, president of Related Management, one of the property owners involved in the study, the study “proves that the assumption that you can’t rely on savings when doing a retrofit isn’t true. It may not be perfect or exact, but you will see savings.”

Sources

“Study Clarifies the Energy Savings in Retrofitted Buildings,” The New York Times, Nov. 8, 2011.

“Showing the Benefits of ‘Green’ Retrofits,” The New York Times, June 1, 2010.

If you need to create an energy use profile for a commercial building without relying on things like meters to gather data or an actual person to perform an energy audit, there’s now an app for that.

FirstFuel, a building energy analytics startup formerly called iblogix, has developed software that commercial building owners can use to find out how their buildings use energy and what kinds of energy efficiency improvements they can make to cut energy consumption and save money on monthly utility bills.

The app remotely evaluates and measures commercial building efficiency by collecting data on hourly energy consumption. It combines that data with weather information to create a unique energy profile for each building analyzed. The software analytics sift through 128 variables, including hourly utility data and outside temperature, and can show building owners how their energy use is split between things like air conditioning and lighting.

FirstFuel CEO Swapnil Shah said that the remote “zero touch” method of evaluating buildings makes it more scalable than traditional approaches — which often use human energy auditors to visually inspect buildings and manually collect data.

The app is designed to help energy utilities improve their efficiency programs and meet state goals by decreasing the energy consumption of commercial buildings, which represent one of the biggest consumers — and wasters — of energy.

The startup announced last week that it had raised $2.4 million to commercialize the software.

Sources

Texas Education Agency commissioner Robert Scott sent a letter last month to school administrators answering questions about the effect that the state’s lingering heat wave would have on their schools’ electricity usage. The letter also offered tips for how administrators could help decrease energy consumption and save money off monthly electric bills.

Scott eased some concerns among administrators by telling them that the Electric Reliability Council of Texas (ERCOT), the agency responsible for the state’s electric grid, had factored the start of the school year into its forecast of electricity needs and that ERCOT doesn’t anticipate a strain on the grid as a result of schools opening their doors.

However, Scott wrote that ERCOT would continue to closely monitor the situation to determine if further conservation measures, already enacted in many cities and towns throughout the state, are necessary.

The letter noted that peak electricity use generally occurs between 3 p.m. and 7 p.m. — after many schools have dismissed students for the day — but that ERCOT and the Public Utility Commission of Texas offered several tips for helping administrators save energy and money while easing demand from the grid:

• Set the thermostat 2 degrees to 4 degrees warmer than usual and close blinds and curtains on windows that get direct sunlight.
• Turn off all lights and electrical equipment when not in use.
• Unplug hallway water fountains after 3 p.m.
• Avoid non-essential activities involving electricity during peak hours, including running large copy jobs and charging cell phones and laptops.

Sources

Texas Education Agency energy conservation letter to administrators, Aug. 11, 2011.

“State Officials Ask Schools to Conserve Energy as Extreme Heat Expected to Continue,” Fort Worth Star-Telegram, Aug. 11, 2011.