Lowest electric bill ever.

[ItsNotAboutTheMoney]

Originally Posted by ALS

Well when the electrician said you do realize how much money you're going to save switching over to the T-8's, especially with your cooling costs?

Well I was wondering what he meant by the drop in my cooling costs. This past week I found out pretty quickly that yes those old four bulb T-12 florescent light fixtures were putting out a whole lot of heat. Normally I have my AC set at 73 degrees. Well all week my employees and customers were complaining how cold it was at work. So on Wednesday I reprogrammed the thermostat up to 74 degrees. On Thursday and Friday the complaints were still coming in so I had to reprogram the thermostat again up to 75 to keep everyone happy.

I still have six of these units to swap out in the next two weeks. This major drop was only due to swapping out the first twelve units.

Although T-12 are 40W while T-8s are 32W, you'll see greater savings because of the switch from old magnetic ballasts to electronic ballasts (15 to 20% efficiency saving), with each quad fitting dropping from 196W to 112W.

12 * (196-112) = 1008W. (With another 504W to come).

The reduced 1kW of heating isn't much for a large space, but the significant difference could be that because lights output heat as electromagnetic radiation the effect on people is like the difference between being in the sun or shade.

Of course, that means you'll also need to heat more in winter, but you'll be able to use more efficient and cheaper heat.

[ALS]

I went from four bulb T-12 to three bulb T-8 units. The up side of this is a the drop in cooling costs and the three bulb 32 watt units are at least 25% brighter than the old four bulb T-12's. This is with 10 foot ceilings.

In the back room area I have seven foot nine inch ceilings and my electrical supplier suggested I replace my four bulb T-12's with two bulb 32W T-8s units.
I'm still contemplating whether I should go with the three or two bulb units.

The difference is only 192 watts.

The present lighting is 1032 watts.
New three bulb is 528 watts
New two bulb is 336 watts

T-8's run at 88% max power unlike the T-12 that run at 100%

[ItsNotAboutTheMoney]

Originally Posted by ALS

In the back room area I have seven foot nine inch ceilings and my electrical supplier suggested I replace my four bulb T-12's with two bulb 32W T-8s units.
I'm still contemplating whether I should go with the three or two bulb units.

The difference is only 192 watts.

The present lighting is 1032 watts.
New three bulb is 528 watts
New two bulb is 336 watts

192W, 8 hours per day, 5 days per week, 50 weeks per year is 384kWh. Since you're going to pay to replace the lights anyway, 2-bulb units would save you money in electricity (as well as bulbs) and reduce energy consumption.

The question is, would the savings cost you indirectly because of worse lighting? If the area needs more light, does it need the light everywhere or are there just small areas that needs some task lighting? Could you easily remove a T4 from each current fitting to see whether you currently have excess light?

[ALS]

Compared to the front area the back area is a lot dimmer. I have been contemplating about using three two bulb units and three three bulb units. The front and hall is T shaped the back is like an L
On the top of the T and bottom of the L using three bulb units and the narrow hall way between them using three two bulb units. Benefit is if they are not bright enough I can swap out two of the two bulb units for three bulb units. I have two other two bulb T-12 units in small areas where I can use them.

[PaleMelanesian]

Off on a tangent here. I had a leaking toilet fill valve. Instead of replacing the valve for $10, I replaced the toilet for 100 instead. I see it as a $10 discount. The difference between the old 3.5 gallon and the new 1.0 gallon will easily pay for itself in a couple years.

Bonus: it actually flushes better, too!

[ALS]

Return on your investment is going to come pretty quick. I had the plumber next door swap out a 5.0 gallon unit for a 1.6 gallon unit a couple years ago and I'm saving $40-$45 a month in my water bill at work. Heck the energy efficient front loader washer that replaced a standard top loader is saving me 3,500 gallons of water a month.

[DaveJ]

Originally Posted by ALS

Return on your investment is going to come pretty quick. I had the plumber next door swap out a 5.0 gallon unit for a 1.6 gallon unit a couple years ago and I'm saving $40-$45 a month in my water bill at work. Heck the energy efficient front loader washer that replaced a standard top loader is saving me 3,500 gallons of water a month.

Are you doing laundry for an army? 3500 gal. a month is just under what I use total for a month for everything.

[ALS]

At work we wash five to six loads of towels per day, six days a week.

We use between 7,500-8,100 gallons per month down from 12,000 to 12,500 gallons before swapping out toilets and washer.

[MN Driver]

I just opened my electric bill for mid-June to mid-July and I used 266kwh($40), which is about half of last year, which was 569kwh which was the highest I've ever hit. I've been using some a/c efficiency/comfort actions that I found on a different forum dedicated to energy usage reduction and it seems that the dew point reduction strategy with timing the usage of a/c to run one long cycle daily is working for me very well. I also have the advantage of staying out of the 4th floor bedroom for sleeping and migrating to the 2nd floor where it's generally 10 degrees cooler, helps a ton and is nice to have a seasonal change of living location. At the beginning of July my air conditioner failed with the compressor locking on startup, I took off the cover and found the compressor ohmed okay and that my 1986 8.5 SEER air conditioner doesn't even have any high or low pressure safety switches to fail or trip. So I took a good look at the dual-run capacitor and ran my finger around the rim and the lip seal had leaked out oil. I replaced the capacitor the morning after it failed and everything is operational. I'm not using it enough to justify replacing the ancient unit so the ancient 26 year old unit gets to stay.

"At work we wash five to six loads of towels per day, six days a week."

Can you please explain how you have six loads of towels daily? I wash my towels(bathroom floor, bathroom body towels, and kitchen rags) once a week and they just go through in with some shirts or jeans.

I'm just trying to fathom 12,000 gallons a month because I have months where I haven't used enough to trigger the 1,000 gallon point and the water bill comes and I'm only charged for sewer. The bill I got at the beginning of July was one of those and that included outdoor watering of my 12'x12' space of food crops.

[PaleMelanesian]

266 kWh? Wow. It's apples and oranges, but my lowest ever was 540 this April. That's when I use nearly zero heating/cooling so it's all from water heating and refrigeration and cooking and lighting.

I'll be knocking a chunk off that when I get the heat pump water heater installed. Other projects are slowing that down down. (requires relocating the heater to a space with air flow)