How much electricity do you use?? (Am I mad)

[413x]

15100kwh/year... that's almost 2kw/hour 24/7...

Maybe turn off your bitcoin miners and stop growing cannabis in the attic?

Has to be something on continously for that usage. And you'd know it too.

I'd genuinely check if one of your kids is crypto mining

 

[Haggisman]

Yeah, that's got to be some kind of heating - OP do you have a pool/hot tub? Or an immersion heater which is on 24/7 rather than a timer?

Even when we had our pool heater on for most of the day during the summer we peaked at 900kWh during August - even if that were year round is still only 2/3 of your usage

 

[sovietspybob]

Worth checking you're not actually suppling your neighbours house or something?

that happed to my parents, a new house was built next door (owned by the same people at the time) and they'd forgotten to put the new house on it's own supply so when my parents bought it they were paying for both houses for a few months 'till they figured out what was happening.

 

[pepp77]

3 bed house, single occupant, working from home - about 4000KWh a year

 

[MassiveJim]

moved into a 5bed in August last year, usage has gone up every day we have been here.
December is up to £172 usage, August was £100 for comparison.

We are gas central heating though and our usage being £20 in August its £138 for December
Time to get some smart radiator valves and new double glazing fitted.

 

[bainbridge]

We pay over £200 per month. We're all electric and heating is a killer. Looking at replacing the old Dimplex storage heaters with oil filled or ceramic.

 

[UTmaniac]

If electric immersion heater, check it's not on 24/7. If using Economy7 stroage heaters, check if they've been wired incorrectly and are using day rate electric instead of just cheaper night rate.

Also remove the cannabis plant factory from the loft.

 

[vanandjuanunited]

2 bed apartment £30pm
Gas heating

 

[Jez]

Use similar, around 40KWH/day on average over the year, biased to winter for heating.

I don't think that this is too bad, we don't have many other bills. My largest worry with ours is the limitation of the 100A feed to be honest, it just isn't enough for a large property with electric heating.

 

[katie279]

Thanks all, really helpful - I have been wondering if the meter is wonky. To make it worse and answer a few sensible points, no we're not on electric heating...! (Oil boiler).

I mean we are heavy users - eg two fridges, four freezers - probably 6-7 PCs in the house, 2 NAS, 3d printers etc, but hard to get to these numbers....

 

[katie279]

I assume with such a large house and power consumption you have solar?

No - but thinking of it!!

 

[katie279]

Has to be something on continously for that usage. And you'd know it too.

I'd genuinely check if one of your kids is crypto mining

Well one is five and the other is three, so if they are, then I'm delighted as I'm clearly going to have a Nobel laureate...

I agree though, I have wondered if there's something running daft, just pinning it down is the problem.

LEDs throughout the house new devices generally everywhere etc...

 

[psd99]

Well i created that other thread on here a few days back
Yer i know crazy prices int it!

 

[cheesyboy]

Thanks all, really helpful - I have been wondering if the meter is wonky. To make it worse and answer a few sensible points, no we're not on electric heating...! (Oil boiler).

I mean we are heavy users - eg two fridges, four freezers - probably 6-7 PCs in the house, 2 NAS, 3d printers etc, but hard to get to these numbers....

Are the 7 PCs always on? It sounds a bit excessive to have so many, as well as four freezers, for (presumably) 2 adults plus the two young kids.

If the 7PCs are idling 24/7, then they could be drawing 100w each and would account for maybe half your annual usage. (though I might be misremembering idle power draw, it's been a while since I paid attention to such things)

 

[katie279]

PCs - no, two are always on (one with three monitors and one with four monitors). The others are just as used. Two NAS are always on.

Freezers - what can I say, we enjoy our grub.... . Yes, we have lots of frozen berries etc from the garden that I like to freeze.

Have two robot Hoovers, electric car (not huge mileage - maybe 10k a year max), just hard to put my finger on something triggering huge usage....!

I think I'll start testing sockets - have a few smart plugs that'll do this and that might give me a clue...!

 

[Jez]

electric car (not huge mileage - maybe 10k a year max), just hard to put my finger on something triggering huge usage

That must be around 3500kwh there on its own. So remove that from your usage, that’s road fuel not domestic…

 

[katie279]

That must be around 3500kwh there on its own. So remove that from your usage, that’s road fuel not domestic…

Yes, that's fair - although I don't recall it rising that steeply after buying it - maybe from 14000 or so.

I think I might build a spreadsheet of devices and load up their average costs and see how close I can get to 15k and also use to benchmark as I manually test.

Link above was great, but I don't know if anyone's seen anything more comprehensive? ie with more appliances/devices

 

[b0rn2sk8]

That usage seems excessive.

Fridges and freezer don’t use much unless you leave the door open. Neither do consumer electronics.

This is one of those instances where the smart meter in home display comes in handy. Use to to determine what’s causing lots of power draw. Turn stuff off and measure it’s impact.

Have you checked if you have an immersion heater running? Even with an oil boiler you may have an immersion in your hot water tank, if that’s on, it will have heated any hot water used before the boiler ever kicks in.

As the above person said, the electric car will account for at least 3500kwh on its own.

Also posters, please stop posting your direct debit amounts, it’s utterly irrelevant information. You could be paying as little as 13p/kWh or as much as 30p/kWh based on tariffs available in just the last year.

 

[Semple]

Fridges and freezer don’t use much unless you leave the door open. Neither do consumer electronics.

Actually they are pretty thirsty.

I can see last month our fridge/freezer used 26.5kWh which works out to be around £8 a month / £96 a year. If the OP has 2 fridges and 4 freezers, then that could easily be running up £500-600 a year.

 

[Journey]

That must be around 3500kwh there on its own. So remove that from your usage, that’s road fuel not domestic…

Whut, that would work out at about 2.8mpkWh, I mean I suppose they could be driving a fat eTron.