OK - the most recent electric bill came in from PG&E. And the winner is ...
$967.81
That is correct, sports fans. I came "this close" to cracking the $1000 mark. (Insert swear words here!)
To be fair, we have had an unusually cold winter here in Northern California. And it was holiday season, so we had lots of friends and relatives. But still ...
According to PG&E, my baseline (the amount of electricity I should be using) is 294 Kwh.
The amount I actually used? 2,683! That's 89.4 a day. That means a few hours into the fourth day of each month, I've used up my baseline. Even worse, that means the majority of my electricity use is being billed at 36 cents per Kwh, rather than 11 cents (the more you go over your baseline, the more PG&E charges.) It breaks down like this:
11% of my electricity is billed at $0.11
3% is billed at $0.13
8% is billed at $0.23
11% is billed at $0.32
67% is billed at $0.36
Holy crap! I need to get a cheaper hobby - like buying small countries.
Seriously, I think it is time to stop adding any more livestock and take down the 46 gallon fish QT and the 10 gallon coral QT. Then I seriously need to look at ways of reducing electricity useage without compromising the livestock in the 180 or 240.
Yikes!
__________________ 240 gallon Mixed Reef + 46 gallon Mixed Reef + 40 gallon coral prop tank - 180 gallon FOWLR = a little more time and money!
Hey Dana, is there a way to check your appliances in your house and narrow down the heavy culprits? Are you having to use a cooler in your garage? Maybe it would be more energy efficient to have a ventilation installed directly in that room that blows the humid air outside?
geez...that's a lot of kW for the San Fran area....good luck Mate!
I am planning on looking at everything. All of our appliances are fairly new and fairly energy efficient. I am in the process of changing all our incandescent bulbs to fluorescent bulbs. But I do believe that the tanks account for somewhere around 40 - 50% of my electric bill. I will guess that my audio / video system accounts for another 15 - 20% (yes - it's that big!) We also recently added a new deck, and it has about 350 watts of low voltage lighting that is on for about 7 hours a night.
It will be interesting to figure out where the electricity is going. I will report back my findings.
__________________ 240 gallon Mixed Reef + 46 gallon Mixed Reef + 40 gallon coral prop tank - 180 gallon FOWLR = a little more time and money!
The perfect movie for you to watch that will get your mind off the 36c/hr cost factor would be American pie the naked mile. The act of dropping a turd in your girlfriends drier gets me every time!
The perfect movie for you to watch that will get your mind off the 36c/hr cost factor would be American pie the naked mile. The act of dropping a turd in your girlfriends drier gets me every time!
I must have missed that one, though i loved the first two. Of course, now I'll just think about how much it's costing to watch the drier scene. It better be funny!
__________________ 240 gallon Mixed Reef + 46 gallon Mixed Reef + 40 gallon coral prop tank - 180 gallon FOWLR = a little more time and money!
Fantastic idea, actually. Except that our house is surround by giant live oak trees on three sides. So we get very little sunlight. That's the main reason we dug up our back yard and built a brand new deck. Decks don't need sunlight. Plants and grass do.
__________________ 240 gallon Mixed Reef + 46 gallon Mixed Reef + 40 gallon coral prop tank - 180 gallon FOWLR = a little more time and money!
Dana, I've been enjoying your thread along with others. I hope to set a 180-280 gal in-wall tank later this year. I also live in northern california and experienced the blackout as well. Thank god I own a vortech battery backup & drilled 1/8 " holes in my return lines. I was home at the time and everything kicked in like it was suppose to.
Dana, I've been enjoying your thread along with others. I hope to set a 180-280 gal in-wall tank later this year. I also live in northern california and experienced the blackout as well. Thank god I own a vortech battery backup & drilled 1/8 " holes in my return lines. I was home at the time and everything kicked in like it was suppose to.
That's awesome. How long were you without power? What size is your current tank?
I need to drill holes in my 2 return lines. At the moment, I just make sure the sump and refugium can handle the overflow, which they can without a problem. But when the power starts back up again, the water level is so high in the sump that the skimmer goes a little crazy for a few seconds. I guess you could call it my alarm system that alerts me when the power has gone out during the day.
I also want to get a pair of Vortech power heads w/ a battery back up. I plan on putting one on each end of the tank and have them alternate being on every minute or so. Gotta get that $1000 approved by the boss first. maybe if i can get the electric bill down to something that's merely outrageous ...
__________________ 240 gallon Mixed Reef + 46 gallon Mixed Reef + 40 gallon coral prop tank - 180 gallon FOWLR = a little more time and money!
OK. Only I will ever know, as the number of the posts you make updates on every post you've made (is that English?) but ...
THS IS MY 500th POST!
I just had to make sure it happened in my tank thread. And, of course, like most of my posts, I have nothing meaningful to say! Now I realize 500 is no big deal (you know who you are ... you people who have thousands of posts!) but it is a mini-milestone to me, and I will celebrate by: .
__________________ 240 gallon Mixed Reef + 46 gallon Mixed Reef + 40 gallon coral prop tank - 180 gallon FOWLR = a little more time and money!
So, I've been thinking about ways to simplify the tanks. And one of the daily chores that I used to think was no big deal was topping off the water. But with the 240 needing 3 gallons a day and the 180 needing 2, it was getting to be a real pain. Being the cheap bast ... I mean person ... that I am, I bought a Kent Marine 5 gallon drip system and used it for topping off. Problem was, I was refilling it every other day. And the drip rate always needed constant adjustment. So I went back to 1 gallon milk jugs.
Now I had read the pros and cons of auto top off systems, but decided enough was enough. Drs. Foster & Smith were having a sale on the JBJ ATO, so I picked one up. I went to my LFS and purchased a new 29 gallon glass tank as the sump. And I already had an extra MaxiJet 1200 lying around, which would be a perfect pump for this application.
After about 20 minutes of set up, lo and behold I was in business. I can not believe I took this long to set this up. It works like a charm, and I love the fact it uses 2 float sensors, so you dramatically lessen the chances of burning up a pump should the sump float sensor get stuck in the on position. Now I only need to fill the 29 gallon tank once a week.
Jeez ... us "old school" fish keepers really are a little slow sometimes!
__________________ 240 gallon Mixed Reef + 46 gallon Mixed Reef + 40 gallon coral prop tank - 180 gallon FOWLR = a little more time and money!
That's awesome. How long were you without power? What size is your current tank?
I need to drill holes in my 2 return lines. At the moment, I just make sure the sump and refugium can handle the overflow, which they can without a problem. But when the power starts back up again, the water level is so high in the sump that the skimmer goes a little crazy for a few seconds. I guess you could call it my alarm system that alerts me when the power has gone out during the day.
I also want to get a pair of Vortech power heads w/ a battery back up. I plan on putting one on each end of the tank and have them alternate being on every minute or so. Gotta get that $1000 approved by the boss first. maybe if i can get the electric bill down to something that's merely outrageous ...
Dana, I was without power for the better part of the morning. I remember listening to melev over at reefcast and he mentioned drilling the two 1/8" holes in each return line to avoid a potential disaster.
You can't go wrong with the vortechs.
300-3,000 "adjustable" gph
no interior heat
energy efficient (every bit helps)
wireless drivers (crest mode, lagoon mode, pulse mode...serious random flow !)
backup battery (a tank saver !)
backed by icecap (great service)
A friend of mine owns a lfs and got me a good deal.
That fish place just had a 20% off sale...that's 200 bucks off !
I know about getting approval from "the boss," I just upgraded to T5's & bought a used aqua controller pro w/ probes. That's 9 bills I won't see again !
I have a 75 aga w/ a 40 sump w/ fuge. Here's a pic'.
Even worse, that means the majority of my electricity use is being billed at 36 cents per Kwh, rather than 11 cents (the more you go over your baseline, the more PG&E charges.) It breaks down like this:
icon under their name to add to their reputation. 
V-series Productions 
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