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well, 2 months if you factor in the $5 bill they so graciously estimated us at the month prior....yep. 711 bucks to come up with on laughable paychecks. I work full time, my husband works the hours they give him because no one seems to give hours in the wintertime here (one week he got 8 hours. Seriously, WTH are you supposed to do with 8 hours?!?) and we have to sell my car because with the electric so high, we cant afford the payment...and thats with NO mortgage (when we moved here, we bought our house in full)-we still cant afford living here in WV. Unreal.
Oh, and to add, we're not light workers. Before moving here, my husband was the store manager for a major mechanic shop (fortune 500 company) and I was the store manager of a 2.3 million dollar per year retail location....we moved here hoping for a little less stress, having no house payment and all...and instead, combined we're still well below poverty level and cant even afford groceries with the horrid pay and crazy electric bills.
As you can imagine, we're in serious talks of relocating and just walking away from here....even with no house payment, it's just not seeming worth the battle.
Sorry, blaine, but something sounds seriously OFF here. A bill of $711 at a rate of 6.88 cents per kwh residential means you used 10,334 kwh??? Either someone made a huge mistake reading your meter, your baseboard heaters are outside the house, or someone tapped into your electric line and you're feeding the neighborhood.
Time to break out your store manager skills and get to the bottom of this exorbitant overhead.
Part of the hidden surcharges on our electric bill is to help people pay those bills in the winter if they get into trouble. The power company will pay one bill for you because every customer has unwittedly chipped in for everyone else. I think its handled at the Health and Human Recources office. I would go there without delay and explain the situation.
I would also get ready for a more efficient heat source...anything other than electric baseboard.
See all that smoke from your neighbors?...Wood is a renewable source of heat...West Virginia is 30% wood, 60% dirt, 10% water.
You have gotten caught in the squeeze here...no previous rate of consumption could give the power company a verifiable estimate of pervious useage. I'm sure when you saw the $5 power bill, you thought it was a gift from Santa Claus.
The power company pulled some great shenanigans when they went to one month billing...now the power can be cut off from those who have the hardest time in the winter.
Now those poor can freeze to death and next year will not be a problem for them at all.
It's called 'thinning the herd'. And somehow with that trick, their service took a steep increase in cost.
We do not have the cheapest power in the country...that situation still exists in Oregon and Tennesee where the power is generated with water and co-op's keep it under control.
We have so much added-on costs, with new 400 million dollar pollution scrubbers and new 2 billion dollar transmission lines that our costs are very high.
The stock holders want a 7% return (or more) on their money and they are going to get it...
Where's that check book....
Last edited by David Kennedy; 02-12-2008 at 04:01 AM..
Power companies really don't want to disconnect their customers. Contact the Billing Dept and 1) ask to have the meter read again, and 2) see if you can make arrangements to pay only a portion of the bill now, and the rest later.
I think they also have "level-payment" plans, where you pay your average monthly bill every month, and it doesn't fluctuate up and down with usage.
Could there be some kind of mix-up, where you're paying the commercial rate, perhaps a carryover from the previous owner?
nope, no carry over, because the house was uninhabited for 5 years prior to us buying it. (We knew the owner)
Its been a rehab, and in the spring when we moved, there was no heat source...so we had the baseboards put in (didnt have the 10k needed to go with central air and heat duct work and system, because all those funds went to putting in a kitchen, bathroom, plumbing, etc..there was none, with it being a rehab)
There was no way of knowing the baseboards would be insufficient until winter itself actually hit (all we had spoken to previously said the baseboards would be suitable)
Now because theyre not, and with all the space heaters running just to keep it livable (barely) costs 350+ per month.
Next year, if we stay, we're getting a wood burning stove, and we're crossing our fingers we'll be at about 200 per month.
We've already contacted the power company, had the bill verified, and are set for budget billing/set rate beginning next month.
As far as arrangements with the current bill, we tried. They wont even discuss options until we recieve a turn off notice for this current one. We've done everything we possibly can at this point.
DK would probably know the answer to this- would electric radiant floor heat work better than the baseboard heaters? Yes, as secondary to the wood burning.
An energy audit is screaming here- DOE sponsors these based on need, but theres always a waiting list. Any improvements they recommend should be tax deductible. 10,000 kw is seriously out of whack considering the average residence american uses about 550kwh per month without conservation in mind. If your usuage were normal, your bill should be more like $37 plus misc taxes and charges.
Price adjustments and payment arrangements really need to come after you figure out where the hemmorage is happening. Stop the bleeding first or its only going to lessen your ability to patch the holes.
Solutions off my head:
Cheapest and most effective: at least 12" of fiberglass in the ceiling...blow cellulose over this to fill in the nooks and crannies. If 6" of fiberglass already exists crisscross this with a new bed of 6".
If the house has vermiculite or rockwool, carryfully cover this with sheet plastic and do not disturb it in any way...wear a filter mask when doing this.
Cover with 6" of fiberglass and blow cellulose over the new insulation bed.
If you are not able to do this, have the workmen do it this way.
If the floor has no insulation at all...cut 8' insulation batts in half and install from the outside perimeter in...
If the house is on a crawlspace, cover the soil with sheet plastic.
A house will wick the dampness and cold up from the crawlspace.
Seal the windows...If they are older but still servicable, remove the inner casing and shoot non-expanding foam around the jams and reinstall the casings.
If the windows are needing replaced, do that with an energy efficient thermopane vinyl window.
The best rated window is Simonton and they have a factory on Rt 50 near Parkersburg.
2nd's can be bought there and any lumber vendor can supply their windows as they deliver to the entire state.
Their cost is about $75 to $120 per brand new window..2nds are cheaper.. They are easy to self install...read the directions and seal with foam...
The radiant baseboards are already in and have been paid for.
Electric central forced air is the cheapest...10 grand should have bought a system with all the whistles and bells.
How about doing it in stages.
(In actually, the cheapest heat is...are you ready for this..heating oil forced air...yep...it is...the high efficiency technology is used in these systems and they use 1/2 the oil of the old systems...but they are very expensive and carry the danger of high vent heat...900*...so everything must be in order fo these...
My neighbor uses a new system, 3 yrs old, his cost per year is about $600 for the winter.)
What I would suggest is installing most of the heating system. Ductwork, Air-handler and A/C "A coil...Then next year add on the heat pump to do the AC. Very nice system and cost effective.
If I were being creative, I would install a second A-coil in tandem and hook it into a woodburning device...much like the Mahoning exterior stoves...but with a little creativity the woodburner could be in the house...and easier for the little woman to fire and load.
Harborlady: $37 is a bill in July or August with the very minimum usage...
10,334 kwh= 18 months worth of electricity used in 2 months.
172kwh daily when the average consumption is 18kwh daily. Thats 9 homes.
There's something seriously wrong even if everything were electric, had the least energy efficiency and left running continuously for 2 months straight. see my meaning? the math just doesnt add up.
You are accepting these statistics as true...they are a minimum standard. Electric baseboards are a drain...His usage is correct for the type of heat.
The coal burning electric companies have watched the Rockefeller gas companies hose people for years. They have suffered low profits because of the government restrictions imposed...Now they are going to make money...its about the money..Coal prices are in the $40 per ton range not $7/8 as it was for years...and we thought the air polution scrubbers were going to last forever...as soon as they were paid off, new ones were needed..in the future the waste will be frozen...that shouls make our bills at least double from what we pay now..
We will pay these bills and go on with our lives...a little more restricted as it is a type of imposed economic slavery...but go on non the less.
One son lives in Savannah...nuke power is less expensive...relatives in Portland, Ore...Columbia River generated...same story.
What is happening is a return to the old days..what we call 3rd world...West Virginia is still there in many areas so it does not seem too remote...people here remember the 'Hard Times...Many are returning to wood heat and wood cooking...letting the fire die at night and finding out that they are in better health for it. MillersAngel is in an area of Wv that I consider has never left these techniques of survival. Perhaps she has a comment...If the country becomes disabled or attacked, we, here in Wv will be able to 'make do...I advise everyone to stock extra food and clothing and create auxillary heating sources...we have wood everywhere...It worked before when our people were pioneers and it will work again when we become reduced to a planet of the apes...
Last edited by David Kennedy; 02-13-2008 at 05:22 AM..
I agree that it's the baseboard units that are the problem.
The chart you linked to, HarborLady, shows that a single 6ft baseboard unit consumes 250W, or 1.5KWHr per hour of usage. Let's assume a 50% duty cycle (and since Blaine's house is in rehab, it could be higher) for 12hrs a day in use. That would be 12 x 1.5KWHr = 18 KWHr per day, per unit. Ten baseboard units (not unreasonable for a 2BR house) would be 180 KWHr/Day. At $0.06/KWHr, thats $10.80 per day, or about $325/month just for the baseboard units.
My values are just assumptions, and maybe Blaine can provide more specific numbers. But $325/month seems pretty much in line with the $711 for two months bill that they got.
Our consumption with the same new electric furnace in the same house with the same living practices was running at $3.65 per day in the winter months (Jan/Feb) two years ago.
That consumption cost is now bordering $6.50 per day.
My guess this is this the cost of the new pollution scrubbers and the proposed 'TRail' (what a joke on us)
The providing of an electric power supply to Northern Virginia with the cost of it and its ugliness brought upon our backs.
If I was a stock holder now I would applaude their effort...
I feel like one (in absentia)...its the same as during the revolution...taxation without representation.
I would pay a little extra if they would just cut back the right-of-ways...we have many old people nearby and they really suffer when the power is out....enought of this b***hing...get back to work!
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