Huge electricity bill

[renormalised (Carl)]

We're paying for the inability of the Gov't to plan...full stop. They haven't got a clue at what they're doing and all these price hikes are just another tax/money grab to cover their backsides for gross financial mismanagement. You'd think people would wake up to these jokers, but they keep on voting them into office. They never learn.

[multiweb (Marc)]

Originally Posted by renormalised

all these price hikes are just another tax/money grab

That's all it is Carl. Not as bad as back home though. I was running two small electric heaters in winter only where I was and I remember not beign able to afford the power bills so I had them on timers and only used what I could afford. (2h each per day)

At the time electricity bills were taxed at 80% [15 yrs ago]. Then on top there was another 60% tax on the taxed consumption itself. The whole bill was horrendous. Almost unaffordable so we're still pretty good here.

And the price wasn't linked to supply and demand or any shortage of power. France has a nuclear plant every 30 square km or so and they probably export twice as much electricity as they use. Just plain good old tax

[renormalised (Carl)]

I'd have resorted to using firewood, but they'd probably tax you for that too!!!!

I'll bet, as per usual, that none of the pollies paid the taxes, or were "exempted" from paying them, or had huge "extras" added to their already obscene pay packets to pay for the charges.

[hotspur (Chris)]

Great work Dean,where did you get 'energy cost meter',they sound like a great device.

yes,turning off appliances when not in use,such a simple thing-We have done that for many years-a T.V uses almost as much in 'stand by mode' as when one is viewing (not that I view it much),also those little clocks in micro-wave ovens chew up a bit of power too.

Sounds like I have nothing to complain about at $300 a quarter.

Back to the OP, I do hope we hear from the poor chap again-re this issue,it does sound like a mistake,

Chris

[joeallen (Joe)]

$1300? Adopt a nudist lifestyle at home during the summer and watch your power bill drop by half. Here in vic. we now pay $.21/kwh. 6 months ago it was $.13. So I complained to my local rep about the new smart meters we have to pay for but don't own. Here's what he told me:

Power co. will start charging more for peak hours. Peak hours will be in morning when you get up, and in evening when you are cooking your meals. He also said power will go much much higher. Here in Vic they are going to shut down coal fired plants and replace them with gas fired plants. I said, "Why are we replacing a several hundred year supply of cheap power to use a resource that will run out in 30 years?" He said, by then we will have all our power coming by renewable sources. And at rates in excess of $.60 per kwh.

BTW, my local rep is a labour man, and a greenie as there is no difference between the two.

So people, expect much more of this madness coming from our governments in the future. And watch as your power bill exceeds your mortgage payments, and food bills combined.

I however did not vote for these pollies we now have. The rest of you who did, enjoy your powerless future. You have gotten what you voted for. And deregulation has nothing to do with this as the government sets the rates the utilities charge. All this of course will hurt the low and middle income people, and the rich will not notice the much higher bills. True Labor justice for one and all.

[GrahamL]

You won't have to worry about bills going higher for a while yet as the power companies will drop the billing to every two months

power coming by renewable sources

The local co gen plant at the sugar mill (australias largest) is an eye
openner to see how it operates outside the crushing season.

A large supply of green timber is found and bought
bulldozed flat ..the skidders
http://www.tigercat.com/skidder.htm
take it to the grinder
http://www.morbark.com/Video/7600%20wood%20hog.html
the loader fills the trucks that take it to the plant to be burnt

A friends comment ,," The only thing green about it is the top of the tree before you cut it down ".. I can see 60c kwh in generateing power this way as its so costly opposed to building a power station beside a coal filed..

[Kal (Andrew)]

Originally Posted by joeallen

Here in Vic they are going to shut down coal fired plants and replace them with gas fired plants.

Currently Victoria has a mix of Gas/Coal/Green (wind etc) power plants planned. You can see all planned power stations for Victoria & Australia here

[multiweb (Marc)]

Originally Posted by renormalised

I'd have resorted to using firewood, but they'd probably tax you for that too!!!!

Not sure about that. But I heard of one person who installed a small turbine in a stream nearby and got caught generating his own juice. He got fined and was forced to sell all the electricity he generated to the the EDF then was re-billed with taxes and all. What a rot. Of course it was all on paper, he didn't connect his tranformer to the grid but they did stuck a meter on his outfit and charged him for what he used.

[renormalised (Carl)]

Originally Posted by multiweb

Not sure about that. But I heard of one person who installed a small turbine in a stream nearby and got caught generating his own juice. He got fined and was forced to sell all the electricity he generated to the the EDF then was re-billed with taxes and all. What a rot. Of course it was all on paper, he didn't connect his tranformer to the grid but they did stuck a meter on his outfit and charged him for what he used.

If they did that to me, I'd cause such a stir they'd be looking for ways to emigrate to get away from me I'd take that to court, for a start. That basically means that anyone in France that used a generator to power something, not even necessarily their house, could be charged and taxed on the electricity they made!!!!.

This is just the sort of nonsense that needs to be stomped on...governments have gotten away with too much for too long.

[multiweb (Marc)]

Originally Posted by renormalised

If they did that to me, I'd cause such a stir they'd be looking for ways to emigrate to get away from me I'd take that to court, for a start. That basically means that anyone in France that used a generator to power something, not even necessarily their house, could be charged and taxed on the electricity they made!!!!.

This is just the sort of nonsense that needs to be stomped on...governments have gotten away with too much for too long.

Well the argument at the time was that he was using a portion of the of the stream that was powering a bigger hydro-plant down the river so in essence the plant was getting less of it. I know it's BS but it's the law. EDF is a massive govt subsidised corporation. Would be like a Windows end user suing Microsoft. Now I can see something like this happening here in the future with everyone who got a gvt rebate (or not) for installing a water tank. I can garantee you that one day we will be taxed for water consumption coming from our own water collection arguing that it didn't make it to the storm water network to the catchment or storage area therefore we're using it and should (will) pay for it.

[renormalised (Carl)]

Originally Posted by multiweb

Well the argument at the time was that he was using a portion of the of the stream that was powering a bigger hydro-plant down the river so in essence the plant was getting less of it. I know it's BS but it's the law. EDF is a massive govt subsidised corporation. Would be like a Windows end user suing Microsoft. Now I can see something like this happening here in the future with everyone who got a gvt rebate (or not) for installing a water tank. I can garantee you that one day we will be taxed for water consumption coming from our own water collection arguing that it didn't make it to the storm water network to the catchment or storage area therefore we're using it and should (will) pay for it.

You could easily beat that...what about all the other users of the stream. They'd degrade the performance of the plant as well, why not charge them too. The laws can be changed, all the people have to do is make the government change them. Complain loud and long enough, add a few "threats" in the mix and they'll come around to seeing it your way.

They do that here with water already, in QLD. They charge farmers for the water use out of their own dams on their properties. It's basically like they have a meter on every rain cloud in the state that empties into a private dam. They even charge for surface runoff into dams!!!. It'll only be a matter of time before they do it to individuals in towns and cities.

This is precisely why people need to get educated and a lot wiser to what these jokers are doing. It's also why people need to become a lot more active in the running of their communities and not sit back hoping someone else is going to do all the hard work first. It's precisely because the pollies know they can get away with doing what they do because people won't do anything about it, that things likes this happen.

[goober (Doug)]

Check your meter ... if it's spinning like a top, something has gone feral. This happened to us a few years back. We started turning off appliances and watching the meter ... it was the fridge.

[Astrod00d]

I live alone in Sydney metro, and as an engineer I'm power-wise, but my power bill was $275 last quarter... down from $303 the previous quarter.
I have one of those 'smart' meters, 3 tariffs ranging from about 7c/kwH off-peak to 35c/KwH peak. I run my dishwasher and washing machine, even the vacuum cleaner (2kW) off-peak when possible.
I got a power meter from Jaycar for $20. My washing machine uses about 0.2kWh, my dishwasher about 0.8kWh, per cycle.
Now... NSW are offering up to 66c/KwH bulk feed-in payment if I install solar power. Sounds like a good way to offset my power bill. However... The tax dept may decide that the feed-in tariff is taxable income... and tax me on it! That'd be a rip-off and an insult to say the least... But why am I not surprised?
Oh yes... Compulsory water tanks... Only a matter of time until city dwellers are hit with a new 'environmental levy' based on the surface area of our roof, 'cos we're denying water to the catchment. As mentioned already, our rural landowners already get hit based on their dams and catchment area. My local council already charges a 'drainage' (or is it stormwater) levy based on hard surface area... Taxed on the runoff we put into the system now, ultimately we'll be taxed on the runoff we gather in our freshwater tanks...
Just expect more and more environmental and 'green' levies as time goes on... it's just an excuse for a tax grab by incompetent, fiscally irresponsible government.
...end rant

[Shaun]

I seen a program on TV where the power company wanted to install pay as you go systems in some homes so people didn't run up huge bills and not pay them.

If they have that ability why not just install a system so you can how much you are spending?

Because then they would not be able to just charge you anything they want.

[mldee (Mike)]

Originally Posted by taxman

Just got my bill for the quarter - $1300 .

Just after I wiped myself out getting a brand-new EM11, too

Apparently I use an average of just under 3kWH per hour. Even averageing back over the previous quarter (assuming they took an estimate last time), it still comes to ~1.7kWH per hour.

Not quite sure how this is happening unless my tiny (150L) hot water system is attempting cold fusion. I also have 10 power points and an electric stove, but even at the lower estimate of hourly usage, it still seems high.

Any sparkies that may have an opinion on the normalcy or otherwise of this (apparent) level of electricity usage?

If it's of any use for comparison, I'm also in SEQ, got climate smart.
It's 6.30, 42" LCD TV on, light (All low energy), fridge running, this desktop on and two lappies out running in the obs on NGC 1850 at the moment , and my total consumption according to the climate smart meter is 570W @ 9c per hour. Add another 150W for when the fridge cuts in. We use little heating yet, (split AC reverse), but our quarterly bills run around $280-350 on average. We use gas to cook but off peak HW. Computers are all 24/7.

That climate smart deal is great. Totally free after the BCC $50 rebate.

Maybe I'll get an open fire if I can get pollies for fuel....Privatisation has been a disaster in most cases. Try airports.....

Commiserations and good luck.

[mldee (Mike)]

Originally Posted by multiweb

That's all it is Carl. Not as bad as back home though. I was running two small electric heaters in winter only where I was and I remember not beign able to afford the power bills so I had them on timers and only used what I could afford. (2h each per day)

At the time electricity bills were taxed at 80% [15 yrs ago]. Then on top there was another 60% tax on the taxed consumption itself. The whole bill was horrendous. Almost unaffordable so we're still pretty good here.

And the price wasn't linked to supply and demand or any shortage of power. France has a nuclear plant every 30 square km or so and they probably export twice as much electricity as they use. Just plain good old tax

Hey, how else can you afford nuclear aircraft carriers? ..

[blindman]

You forgot to turn off your powerful laser probably.

[andreabennet (Andrea)]

we've had a shocker this time around as well and our electricity usage hasn't changed much at all. We don't own an air con so we're baffled as to where its coming from.

[Tandum (Robin)]

Originally Posted by AdrianF

Robin let us know how you go. I wonder if I can get mymeters checked?
Adrian

Adrian,
My latestest readings show the energex meters are +30% on my meter. I contacted Origin and requested a meter check and was told 8 times that if the meters tested ok I would be charged for the check. They told me that 8 times as I asked 8 times what if the meters where out, they never answered that question. I was told that testing was up to energex and I have no way of finding out when or if it has been done. All very cloak and dagger. I'd say they are covering their back end

The wife has contacted the omnibudsman and asked why we can't have a comparative electricity usage graph according to the area we live in like the water bill. A second front

They did say there would be an outage during the check which hasn't happened yet and we are 2 weeks on from the request. More to come on this one. I guess my biggest fear is them saying, 'Yes they were faulty but are now fixed' without compensation. We are talking 10 years worth of error here .... but how do I prove that?

[AdrianF (Adrian)]

Originally Posted by Tandum

We got climate smart in for a $50 checkup (Refundable from the BCC). They replaced most of the old light bulbs with the new ones, checked the hot water and put a wireless meter on the electricity supply. That meter has shown me that the energex meters are out by a mile. So far this week (4days) the energex meters say we have used 187Kwh and the Climate Smart meter says 110Kwh. ....

I am going away for a few days to Charleville for work but when I come back I will investigate this and see if I can get a wireless meter installed.
There is only 2 of us at home + dog so I cant see how we are using this much power. We do have a dryer (used only when we get the washing off the line to make sure clothes are dry on a 20 min cycle once a day) we dont use the oven, we use the gas BBQ 3-4 times a week, lights are kept to a minimum at night time. We used to use 5 reverse cycle aircons in Mt Isa 7 days a week and the power bill didnt come to this much.

Robin
The power co is not going to admit they are wrong at any time. A little while ago in Gracemere we had problems with the power to our house fluctuating by a fair amount Ergon came out and checked and couldnt find anything wrong (Ergon Engineer lived next door) this went on for about 6 months with many complaints, eventually they agreed that something was wrong after we lost a fridge and 2 PC's and a bit of other electrical equipment and they sent out a crew. When they looked at the power line the inside of the power cable was virtually burnt out. The replaced the line and a rep came out to see the damage and agreed as a public gesture to replace the equipment that had been damaged and in their own words "not that we admit the damage was caused by any fault in the power distribution system".

Adrian

Adrian