Electricity Consumption

[Rod Ogle]

 Our electricity use seems to be on the high side or at least the cost, should I be looking for some sort of a problem or is this normal?

  We just checked out of a RV park in Yuma after a month long stay (30 Days).  The electricity was billed separately at the moderately high rate of $.179 per KWh.  I personally read the meter at the start and end of our visit. Total usage for the 30 days was 866KWh resulting in a bill of $155.01. Average daily cost for electricity of $5.17 and 28.86 KWh.

Day time temperatures were in the low 90’s most days.  We would run the two ACs for about 4 hours each day and set at 76 degrees.  At sundown we opened the windows and turned on two of the fantastic fans to circulate air.  I let the fans run most of the night, they automatically shut down when the coach cooled.

We let the Aquahot run on the electric side only, so it was providing all hot water for dishes, showers and the like.  We used our washer/dryer once. The fridge was on the AC side and the cooling fans would run for several hours each day.

Does our electricity use seem about right given our habits?

[Mike Groves]

I can give you a comparison which was 739kwh for the month of August at Pacific Shores Motorcoach Resort in Newport Oregon.  There would not have been the reason to use much air conditioning but more reason to use heat so our renter may have had heatpumps.  I believe he had a 2004 high end country coach. The heating using the electric is probably a great source of the problem.  You would probably have been better served to use "fire" versus electricity in the Aquahot.  Anyway 739 is a number you can use for comparison.

Mike

[Joel Ashley]

That's about what our house uses in a month, Ron, as averaged over the year. 

But we aren't running an electric furnace nor two air conditioners the whole time.  AC and refrigeration account for the most electric use in a home, followed by ovens and electric water heaters, so there's no reason to think it's not the 2 AC units and the hydronics driving your numbers.  At least you don't have a residential fridge adding to it.  Do long winter evenings add to your lighting and to your TV time too?

That per kWh rate is steeper than what we're used to seeing here in BPA water-power country, and certainly your winter ambient temps are too  .   Last month our 2400s.f. home used 553 kWh at 12 cents per.  That's no AC use, but furnace fan circulating/filtering air even when the burner is off, and a gas water heater;  we are night owls, so that includes more wintertime lighting than most people, and more TV, including an adult night owl daughter's room lighting and TV.

You might have run a test each day by checking the meter at the same time and getting an average daily kW use, then leaving 1 AC off all of one day, and another day switch to diesel hydronics, etc., and get some idea of what's really driving the numbers.  Your inverter has to keep any 12v battery use compensated, and the one dryer use does add a bit also.

Joel

[Karl Welhart]

Rod,

The amount of electricity you consumed seems reasonable.  The cost per unit seems very high compared to what we have paid in parks on a monthly basis.

 

[Keith Moffett Co-Admin]

I think what we are talking here is the cost of a Kw.  At home in Wa. We pay .08 Kw.  I find 18 cents a Kw so onerous that not only would I not go there but would disuede as many people from doing so as I could.
Last I heard the cost of a Kw by a gen set was about .05.  Even allowing .10 from a gen set you would have saved about $70.

[Dick Simonis]

I did find out that the Aqua Hot electric heater almost never shuts off during the day.  I can tell by my home usage when it's on for a few days.

[Edward Buker]

There is just very thin fiberglass insulation with a lot of air leak locations so there is a lot of heat loss. Beyond that the compartment that the unit is contained in is also vented and not insulated well. It is not a surprise that these units consume a lot of electricity to maintain temperature if it is cold out.

Later Ed

[David T. Richelderfer]

This winter (mid Nov to mid Dec) while in the Forest Retreat RV Park in New Caney, TX (a suburb of Houston) we paid $147 for 31 days of power usage on top of the monthly spot rental of $590.  The per KW cost there was 13c.  In Quartzsite we stayed for two weeks in February at the Rose RV park.  The weekly rate there was $80 plus power at 16c or 18c per KW, I forget which.  But I thought it was pretty dear for power.  My power bill for two weeks was $75.60.  We did not use the air conditioners at either RV park but did use the AquaHot's electric water heater full time and may have used the roof heat pumps' function some, but very little.  The bottom line is compared to our experience your usage and cost is about equal with ours.

When dry camping we use a portable 3KW generator from late afternoon overnight to mid morning.  It will run about 4 hours per gallon on $1.75 per gallon gasoline, or about $8 per day.  At this gasoline price we figure we should not use a RV park unless we need to freshen tanks every week or two.  The convenience of a RV park's power, washers, water and dumps, etc., is worth something but not much over $15 per day, IMO.  Thus, we dry camp at least half our days while on trips.

[Rod Ogle]

Thanks to all for your comments.  Since no one has suggested any potential mechanical/electrical problems that would cause such a high electric use, I will assume our power usage is normal given our equipment and habits.

Joel makes a great suggestion to check the meter readings when eliminating the power users one at a time.  Next time we are in a park with a meter I will do some testing. 

Note:  When we first got our Beaver in November of 2014 we stored it inside our shop and hooked to 30A service.  My home power bill jumped about $60 a month.  I had not turned off any of the breakers inside the coach, so the Aqua Hot was running.  Since then, with only the inverter breaker on, our home bill is still up about $40 higher than normal.  I understand parasitic loads and the draw for battery charging but it still seems high, especially compared to previous coaches.  Our home rate per KWh is just over $.04.

It may be that our coach is simply a “power hog” and we will have to adjust our habits accordingly. 

[Edward Buker]

Rod,

Unless you have a bad battery it would seem like very high cost and usage. Is the refrigerator off? You should check the house charger current flow and it should settle out with charged batteries an amp or two or less at 12 V which is trivial current flow on the 120V side of things. If the 12V charger is meeting current demand and it is higher than this then something is left on, on the 12V side or you have a bad 12V battery pulling current. Not sure if you have electrical heating for freeze prevention somewhere or a small reservoir instant water heater built into the kitchen or an icemaker left on.

Later Ed

[Rod Ogle]

Ed.

  While stored at our home the switch on the refrigerator is in the off position and the breaker is off also. The only breaker I leave on is for the inverter.  I have checked the 6V house batteries with hydrometer and all test good.  The 12V chassis batteries are sealed and normally  read about 13.7V or a bit more.  We do not have any spot hot water devices but we do have heat tapes to assist in freezing weather along with a 12V heater in the water bay.  Since our shop is heated I unplug the heat tapes and have not ever heard the fan run for the 12V bay heater.

  We are at the RV Park at Davis Monthan AFB in Tucson, here is a picture of our Magnum charger at 1:00 PM today, no TV or other appliances on.

  Your ideas are much appreciated.

 

 

[Edward Buker]

That reading would indicate that the batteries are good and all is normal on the 12V side....so far no explanation. Do you have an AC readout capability in the coach. If so read that value and if it is a few amps, turn the breakers off one at a time to see where the current is going. If it is very low there is no explanation....probably not costing you as much as you think it is.

Later Ed

[Rod Ogle]

Ed.

  Here are a couple of pictures of our Silverleaf display that shows power use.   Bottom photo was taken as my wife was finishing up the morning dishes, the Aqua Hot was on the electric side, only one 12V LED light was on over the sink.  The top photo was taken AFTER I turned the Aqua Hot breaker to the OFF position.  Not much electricity draw with the Aqua Hot off, but 16A off the AC side with it on. 

 I will try and keep track of just how long it takes the electric side of the Aqua Hot to recover and quit using current.


 

[Margaret Cook]

Rod,

It looks like that Yuma RV Park charged you the Summer Rate (May - October) AND the highest usage rate for over 3600 kWh per month. Over the past two years, during the winter months, our RV Lot electricity charges have averaged $.13 per kWh, which includes all the taxes and fees.

I agree with a previous post, don't go back there... Come here where you have more honest landlords!! 

Margaret