Electricity Costs

[Bigpig]

Forget that post

It is more expenice to run keypad in NIE
http/www.nieenergy.co.uk/pdf/latest_prices.pdf

 

[Rick A]

One more thing to consider...

Water changes; you do them (20% - 30%) every week don't you?

When you fill your container / bucket with fresh water for your tank, run a bit of hot water into it so it is tedip. That way your not burning up electricity while your tank heater struggles to get the tank back up to the correct temp. Silly thing really, but think about it. The cost of running a hot water tap for a few seconds has got to be a lot cheaper than running the tank heater for an extra hour or two. Also, will reduce the stress on the fish too.

 

[Gazoo]

Heaters do use a lot of electricity. Put a thin sheet of styrofoam behind the background. Make sure the top is sealed as tightly as possible. Anything you can do to insulate the tank to reduce heat loss will help.

This is an excellent tip.

 

[Rooster]

One more thing to consider...

Water changes; you do them (20% - 30%) every week don't you?

When you fill your container / bucket with fresh water for your tank, run a bit of hot water into it so it is tedip. That way your not burning up electricity while your tank heater struggles to get the tank back up to the correct temp. Silly thing really, but think about it. The cost of running a hot water tap for a few seconds has got to be a lot cheaper than running the tank heater for an extra hour or two. Also, will reduce the stress on the fish too.

MMMMmmmm, you are still paying to heat the water in the hot tap !!!!!!!!!!!
But I agree on adding some hot water to the bucket, but I would suggest a kettle rather than hot tap (water may have stood in the hot water system and collected some unwanted minerals etc)

 

[CFC]

top tip for saving money on your energy bills..... buy a new fridge freezer...... your fridge uses around one quarter of the total energy consumption in your house, an old fridge/freezer can make a massive difference to your bills, obviously it's a speculate to accumulate thing but if you get a new one that's super energy efficient it will make a difference on your household bills.

Unless your tank has a swimming pool pump to circulate the water that is

 

[three-fingers]

Depending on what fish you have, cant you turn the temperature down a few degrees over the winter?

I would imagine that during different seasons in the wild for various species, the water temperature would vary quite a bit due to melt water from glaciers or even just an overall drop in ambient temperature.

Turning the heater to 18-22* celcius as opposed to the usual 26-30* could probably save some money, especially if room temperature is no lower than that.

Researching the location of where your species come from would probably be a good idea.

 

[smudger123]

We get huge amount of limescale in our kettle - not sure if that would be harmful. Our hot water tap smells like rotting eggs sometimes as well so thats out! I'd maybe purchase a filter kettle, its certainly a fantastic idea with the water changes.

Prepay is an absolute rip off no doubt about it but we cant afford monthly and were threatened with cut off. I remember when it first started to get hard for us a few months ago - our fortnightly online Tesco shopping cart was the same every week at £90 and had been for years. Then one week the same cart was coming to £130 and we couldnt get it below £100 even with everything switched to the value version. From that day on everything seemed to go up in price and we had no choice but to obsess over our budget. This country is winding me up at the moment

Bizarrely my parents rang me today to tell me the electricity has been put up 30% and to watch the tanks, it was quite a spooky coincidence. We have no choice and will be sharing the 240 once its cycled. Another lesson learned the hard way.

 

[andywg]

I love the FW people worrying about electricity costs.

Wait until you are running a fair size reef with over 500W of light alone on it, then you can really worry about the electric cost of keeping fish

 

[5teady_2012]

I love the FW people worrying about electricity costs.

Wait until you are running a fair size reef with over 500W of light alone on it, then you can really worry about the electric cost of keeping fish

Wait until i finish my LHC in my back garden, will use more watts than all this forums tanks put together

 

[waterdrop]

I love the FW people worrying about electricity costs.

Wait until you are running a fair size reef with over 500W of light alone on it, then you can really worry about the electric cost of keeping fish

Wait until i finish my LHC in my back garden, will use more watts than all this forums tanks put together

I wonder if the wattage goes up when it creates those micro-black-holes?

 

[5teady_2012]

I love the FW people worrying about electricity costs.

Wait until you are running a fair size reef with over 500W of light alone on it, then you can really worry about the electric cost of keeping fish

Wait until i finish my LHC in my back garden, will use more watts than all this forums tanks put together

I wonder if the wattage goes up when it creates those micro-black-holes?

They wont be bothered lol when they suck us all up

 

[themissingelf]

I have a spreadsheet I used to calculate electricity costs. Enter the rate/s you pay, the components you're running and their wattage. Add the length of time they run for, and it'll tell you what it costs to run. I have another spreadsheet that will estimate the heat loss of tank based on it's dimensions and your room temperature, and tell you how long any given wattage of heater will run for (you then put this value in the aforementioned spreadsheet).

PM your email address if you'd like a copies. Bear in mind they're in Open Office so you'll need a copy of the software to use them (good news is that it's free).
Also bear in mind that I take no responsibility for any errors in the calcs ( I don't want someone sending me a bill!)

 

[Miss Wiggle]

top tip for saving money on your energy bills..... buy a new fridge freezer...... your fridge uses around one quarter of the total energy consumption in your house, an old fridge/freezer can make a massive difference to your bills, obviously it's a speculate to accumulate thing but if you get a new one that's super energy efficient it will make a difference on your household bills.

Unless your tank has a swimming pool pump to circulate the water that is

as always you're a special case.......

i'll rephrase, in the average household the fridge freezer is the highest single energy consumer using around one quarter of the energy consumption. ...... better?!

 

[Rick A]

Kettles DO collect a lot of limescale - at least where I live - and the water from my hot tap is fine. Its no different that the cold, except its hot.... Although it does use some energy (mine runs off a combi heater) its probably nowhere near as much as running a 300 watt tank heater for an extra hour.

 

[raptorrex]

this might help work out your costs:
Here