Heatwave - how much did it cost you?

[Guest Guest12727]

[h=3]From New Daily, Monday 20th Jan 2014, * Calculations were made using the costs estimated by the South Australian government.

 

Aircon

A ducted evaporative air conditioning system running for an average size house, running 18 hours a day over five days, would add about $48 to the next power bill.*

A split refrigerative system in a room up to 36 square metres could add an extra $42 to your next power bill, while a ducted refrigerative system cooling an entire house over five days could add as much as $225 to an electricity bill.

By contrast, running a ceiling fan for 24 hours a day over five days would add less than $4 to your next bill.[/h]Water

Vast amounts of water were also guzzled in the heat, with water consumption per Melburnian up by 70 per cent in the past week, according to the Water Services Association of Australia (WSAA).

 

By contrast, Adelaide’s average water consumption so far this month has been modest, only increasing an average of 53 megalitres per day in comparison to past years, which executive director of WSAA Adam Lovell attributed to “permanent water wise rules”.

 

Given the anticipated electricity bill pain, consumers will be thankful to hear that water bills are unlikely to see a similar spike. This is because prices are low and usually over half of the cost per household is fixed regardless of use.

 

“Around Australia the price of water is around $2 to $4 for a thousand litres. This means that even significantly higher use during the heatwave is unlikely to materially affect a family’s annual water bill,” said Mr Lovell.

 

Icecream (the important stuff)

“For ice-cream manufacturers it is not helpful as sales have dropped,” said Ms Barelds. “Ideal temperatures for them are in the low 30s.”

[coolerking]

Only having ceiling fans I reckon we will hardly notice the difference. May have to get some air conditioning, one day though

 

Cheers

Cooler

:0)

[Guest Guest75]

Having a good solar system that puts us way in credit it was no problem for us at all. The pain of initial investment was sweetened by fact we could have the aircon on as much as we wanted to without fear of big bills. We have ceiling fans as well.

 

Just highlighting the benefits of solar............

 

I could not understand why there are still so many power cuts when so many homes and businesses have gone solar - surely the load is lightened??

 

Our problem was our 3 Bedlington Terriers - far too hot to take them out for a walk.

They were going stir crazy (not funny with 3 of these fellas )

Edited January 20, 2014 by Guest75

[Rachiegarlo]

Invest in some doggy treadmills for next time Tyke

[Toni]

Thanks for posting this. At home we have evaporative. I like it. It's not like refrigerated aircon but it did the trick last week when it was hot. We had it on though for about 23 hours of every day. We also have fans in the living areas because it gets hotter in there due to the big windows. We don't get a huge bill in summer but it is a larger electricity bill than winter (we have gas heating). In humid weather though the evaporative isn't good but luckily we don't get that many humid days. I have friends who have the refrigerated ducted aircon and they hardly turn it on because of the "bill". They always say that they are comfortable because they do the right thing and shut the blinds, doors etc but it does feel stuffy and after a few days the house does get warm. They also have solar now but I haven't noticed a difference in their aircon habits.

 

I don't think that you can really compare "apples to apples" though as we always have "something" going wrong with our evaporative aircon costing us about $300 average every year and I think that those with refrigerated don't get so much trouble.....but perhaps that is because they are not using it as much as us. One to ponder.....or NOT.....

[Blossom]

Having refrigerated which trips whenever it gets hot helped keep my bills low. :-D

[clarkes]

It cost a bloody fortune and theres more to come. Don't know about the water but our electricty use was 4 times higher than normal

[adelaidenow]

Tyke, you moved a couple of years ago, are you already in credit for the outlay of solar? I don't have solar and wonder what the ROI is.

 

Also (not at Tyke in particular), I pay approx $110 a month in electricity, is there really a need for solar? Remembering the rebates aren't that great these days.

 

As for why could we run out, apparently most our electricity comes from Tasmania, and it was unusually hot there and there was a worry something would break and we would lose the supply.

[Guest Guest75]

Tyke, you moved a couple of years ago, are you already in credit for the outlay of solar? I don't have solar and wonder what the ROI is.

 

Also (not at Tyke in particular), I pay approx $110 a month in electricity, is there really a need for solar? Remembering the rebates aren't that great these days.

 

As for why could we run out, apparently most our electricity comes from Tasmania, and it was unusually hot there and there was a worry something would break and we would lose the supply.

 

 

The ROI for our setup and use is around 4 years max I reckon. We have the same company for both of our furnished rentals as well - we are well in excess - this goes towards the use at the rentals.

 

We have the 25.6 ? rebate and produce most days 30KW, it definitely seems worth it. Nice to switch on and not worry about bills.

 

We and many others feel the need for solar,especially as rates are only going upwards.

[adelaidenow]

Thanks, 4 years is what I thought. But had never worked out more than basic maths in my head.

Yes, those rebates are very good. They are not like that for new sign ups now, sadly.

[Guest Guest75]

Thanks, 4 years is what I thought. But had never worked out more than basic maths in my head.

Yes, those rebates are very good. They are not like that for new sign ups now, sadly.

 

Yep,we just got in last year. We have friends who are on the 66c rebate!

 

Just over the road a house has a 10KW system by counting the panels - that's enough "free" power for two family houses!!!!

[coolerking]

Thanks for posting this. At home we have evaporative. I like it. It's not like refrigerated aircon but it did the trick last week when it was hot. We had it on though for about 23 hours of every day. We also have fans in the living areas because it gets hotter in there due to the big windows. We don't get a huge bill in summer but it is a larger electricity bill than winter (we have gas heating). In humid weather though the evaporative isn't good but luckily we don't get that many humid days. I have friends who have the refrigerated ducted aircon and they hardly turn it on because of the "bill". They always say that they are comfortable because they do the right thing and shut the blinds, doors etc but it does feel stuffy and after a few days the house does get warm. They also have solar now but I haven't noticed a difference in their aircon habits.

 

I don't think that you can really compare "apples to apples" though as we always have "something" going wrong with our evaporative aircon costing us about $300 average every year and I think that those with refrigerated don't get so much trouble.....but perhaps that is because they are not using it as much as us. One to ponder.....or NOT.....

 

Did it really cope? I have plenty of friends who say that evaporative cannot cope when it's high 30's and 40's. We had it in our rental and it was cheap and lovely but it was not as hot as it was last week.

 

Cheers,

Cooler

[Guest Claire-n-tel]

Did it really cope? I have plenty of friends who say that evaporative cannot cope when it's high 30's and 40's. We had it in our rental and it was cheap and lovely but it was not as hot as it was last week.

 

Cheers,

Cooler

 

Hi Cooler

 

We used to live in Alice Springs where probably half of our friends had evaprotive systems, we had ducted tho' The temps are often high 30s or into 40s, but it is very seldom humid and therefore they seem to cope fine. Mind you when it rains (luckly onle about once a year!) they are buggered.....40c and humid as you can get......yuc!......strangely we always had lots of visitors then!

[Guest Guest12727]

Did it really cope? I have plenty of friends who say that evaporative cannot cope when it's high 30's and 40's. We had it in our rental and it was cheap and lovely but it was not as hot as it was last week.

 

Cheers,

Cooler

 

The thread called Aircon, goes into this quite a bit, and brings up the point of how cold do you need to be?

http://www.pomsinadelaide.com/forum/barbie/40896-air-con.html

[Blossom]

Hi Cooler

 

We used to live in Alice Springs where probably half of our friends had evaprotive systems, we had ducted tho' The temps are often high 30s or into 40s, but it is very seldom humid and therefore they seem to cope fine. Mind you when it rains (luckly onle about once a year!) they are buggered.....40c and humid as you can get......yuc!......strangely we always had lots of visitors then!

When I visited Alice in 1999 it was bloody hot and every single place we looked at staying said their air con wasn't working as it was too hot. It was TERRIBLE! There were many people trying to sleep outside just to cool down. It didn't work. Whenever I hear people say it gets cold in Alice at night I shudder at the thought of those sweltering nights.

[Toni]

Did it really cope? I have plenty of friends who say that evaporative cannot cope when it's high 30's and 40's. We had it in our rental and it was cheap and lovely but it was not as hot as it was last week.

 

Cheers,

Cooler

 

Don't get me wrong it wasn't as cool as the refrigerated. We have the evaporative which is ducted throughout the house and a temperature gauge in two areas - one is in the hottest area which is where all the windows are and we cook in the kitchen area and it got to 27c there. Once it go to that we went into the front family area where it is shadier due to trees and the windows aren't as large - it was 25c there. With the fan on it was quite comfortable. We left it on for 23 hours though, throughout the night and the house got cooler. In the morning the temperature was down to 22c again. With the evaporative aircon you are meant to have some windows open (otherwise it gets moist and sticky) and I like that because it doesn't feel like you are all closed in. The refrigerated aircon works better with the windows closed.

[Guest Guest12727]

I really do think technology has changed since 1999 and newer evaps seem to work pretty well. My experience is the same as Toni's above. However, we only needed to run ours for about 12hrs per day, turned it off when we went to bed, just used bedroom ceiling fans and didn't need it on again until late morning and that was more to stop the house getting hot, rather than to cool an already hot house. We do have slate floors, and they were cold to walk on. I think the design of the house makes a difference too. I don't expect it would work as well if it were humid and hot, rather than dry and hot, but that doesn't happen much in Adelaide. Having said that, it was fairly humid Sat morning and we felt uncomfortable, so I turned it on for an hour and we were fine.

[ajford]

We didn't bother with ours at all never have done people said we were mad not to use it however being from Yorkshire says a lot how I spend a $$$, We did have a couple of extra Ice blocks/Zoopers that were on offer at both Foodland and Coles so I guess $7 for 2 bags was well spent and spent a lot of time at the beach and used the sea to cool down in

lol

[Guest Chris Grist]

Yep,we just got in last year. We have friends who are on the 66c rebate!

 

Just over the road a house has a 10KW system by counting the panels - that's enough "free" power for two family houses!!!!

 

my 5kwh system is still playing catch up after the heatwave, i reckon i was about 150kwh behind after being just ahead before the heatwave..

[Toni]

I really do think technology has changed since 1999 and newer evaps seem to work pretty well. My experience is the same as Toni's above. However, we only needed to run ours for about 12hrs per day, turned it off when we went to bed, just used bedroom ceiling fans and didn't need it on again until late morning and that was more to stop the house getting hot, rather than to cool an already hot house. We do have slate floors, and they were cold to walk on. I think the design of the house makes a difference too. I don't expect it would work as well if it were humid and hot, rather than dry and hot, but that doesn't happen much in Adelaide. Having said that, it was fairly humid Sat morning and we felt uncomfortable, so I turned it on for an hour and we were fine.

 

We bought ours in 1998 so it's probably not as effective as yours so probably that's why we had to have it on for 23 hours I think that they do have a limited life. I think we paid $4,000 for ours back in 1998 and I've seen something similar advertised now for $2,500 for a 5 outlet one. We kept to the 5 outlet but we could have got more vents it's just it was a big jump in price and they thought we would get by with it which I think we have. If I was in the market for cooling I would buy it again.

[Jessica Berry]

We received our electricity 'bill' for the period Nov/Dec/Jan this week and it made me think of this thread. We have a 3kw solar system. Out of interest with the heatwave we have had I thought I would compare this periods bill with the same period last year. We were in credit both periods in both years, although this year we were $16 down from last year in credit. Considering this year we were home more over the Christmas/NY period and with the heatwave, it is swings and roundabouts and we were pleasantly surprised there wasn't really much difference. We have a reverse cycle system that is very effective and we don't really consider the cost, if we are hot we put it on.

 

We have a ceiling fan only in our bedroom which we find effective and we don't have our air con system running overnight as we can sleep fine, once we are getting ready to go to bed, we switch the air con off. We live in an old (by Aussie standards) double brick house, which we find tends to keep a lot cooler than the modern houses (or cardboard houses as my boss that lives in one refers to them!). Our neighbours live in a new build house the same size as ours and when we go outside we can hear their air con going. We would estimate they have their air con on more than 50% of the time when we don't need ours on.

 

We have had our windows tinted and have secondary glazing fitted which we find makes a big difference keeping the heat out as well.

Edited February 15, 2014 by Jessica Berry

[Guest Guest12727]

That is interesting Jessica. Do you have details on how much kWh you supplied to the grid each period?

[Jessica Berry]

That is interesting Jessica. Do you have details on how much kWh you supplied to the grid each period?

 

31 Oct 2012 to 30 Jan 2013 - 92 bill days - 1294.00 KWH

30 Oct 2013 to 3 Feb 2014 - 97 bill days - 1369.00 KWH