On Mon, 21 Jan 2008 16:34:20 -0600, Steve IA wrote:
I'll try to cover this as clearly as possible, answering as many of the
questions that where raised as I can. I spoke at length with 2 reps of
the REC this morning. They were both sympathetic and helpful.
1. They do not estimate. They don't even physically read anymore. Every
27 hours or so each meter sends its progress back to the REC computer
which records this information. At the end of the cycle this data is
turned into a bill.
So you have a self-reading meter. That's nice. If you'd told us that in the first
place it would have saved all of us a lot of time and effort.
2. The data from the individual meter reports is available to the
customer in what is called a 'turtle' report. This shows meter reading
and usage for each ~27 hour period. Turtle info: http://tinyurl.com/yo3lcm
You're lucky. You have the good self-reader. This one uses a conventional
electromechanical meter with an add-on module that optically reads the wheel. Very
reliable and in the event the electronics get knocked out, the register is still
there for manual reading.
3. The REC said they were also surprised that the overall usage didn't
go down more than it did with the outage and all. They could offer no
explanation other than 'it was colder'. They didn't have the actual
Heating Degree Days!! They said they had considered including it on the
bills, but hadn't yet. I found the heating degree days at
www.weather.gov . Click on the map for your location then select
climate/local from the menu on the left side of the screen.
Locally Dec 07 had only 4% more HDD than average, but 31% more than 2006
which was unusually warm. A comparison with last years bill could be
misleading.
4. As I had suspected for some time during this discussion, there was
more than 1 thing going on, which clouded the issue:
You suspected? Geez, that's what several of us were trying to hammer into your hard
head!
a) the colder than last years temperatures which would increase usage
across all customers,despite the outage and (drum roll please)
b) My 'turtle' report showed I had days of increased usage starting Nov
23 and ending about Dec 23. Every day in this period was higher than my
22kwh/day 6-year average and some were 2X that average (44,48,49)!!!
Before 11/23 and after 12/23 and continuing until today, my usage has
been normal average.
Recap:
Oct 25 - Nov 22. Normal usage: 13-22 kwh/day 408kwh/28days=14.6kwh/day
Nov 23 - Dec 11. Extreme usage: 28-49 kwh/day 574/19 =30.1
Dec 11 - Dec 17. No usage: power outage 0
Dec 18 - Dec 23. Extreme usage: 28-44 kwh/day 163/6 = 27.2
Dec 24 - Jan 21. Normal usage: 16-33 kwh/day 612/29 = 21.1
For some reason, which I'll probably never find out, we used an unusual
amount of electricity for nearly a month, interrupted, luckily, but the
power outage. Whatever the draw, it went away and as far as I know it
went on its own.
In other words, the storm disrupted your normal activities, which is what I said in
my last post in this thread.
I plan to monitor my meter closely if not daily for a while.
I'm not sure that'll do much for you since you can call up your turtle report on the
web.
If you're THAT concerned then perhaps you should get one of the several available
instruments that connects to your service and displays on an inside display real-time
usage as well as cumulative stats for the month. Some even have alarms that can be
set to warn you when your rate-of-use exceeds a certain value. And some can send
data to your computer so you can trend data yourself.
John
--
John De Armond
See my website for my current email address
http://www.neon-john.com
http://www.johndearmond.com -- best little blog on the net!
Tellico Plains, Occupied TN
Nuke the Whales!