OK, so we moved to Florida about a month ago, and are loving it. The problem is, we got out first electric bill a couple of days ago, and the bill was only for 15 days. The bill was for $203!!!!!!! My wife likes to keep the temperature around 65-66 degrees at night, but this is going to kill our electric charge.

Here is my question: which would be cheaper?

1.) Getting a room (window) air conditioner and using that to cool down our room (we don't have kids or anything yet) at night to the temperature we want it at (and leave the rest of the house at 78 degrees)? or...

2.) Doing the same thing we have been doing, and that's cooling down the entire 2100 sq. ft. house to 65 degrees (we leave the house at about 75 during the day)?

Would the window air conditioner use more electricity?

I haven't done the math yet because I'm waiting to see what our next full month bill will be like. If it's over $400, I think we're going to get a window air conditioner.

 

I guess it depends on the size of the room, and the air conditioner. You'd have to do the calculations.

In either case, to cool to 65 degrees, a window air conditioner will probably run all night. But so does your A/C.

If you're worried about cost, you should probably leave your A/C above at LEAST 68, and probably at 75. Then get some lighter blankets on your bed and put a fan in the room.

 

Oh, and... for the record. I have a window air conditioner in my room... I keep the temp at 65 at night.... and my power bill is about $500.

 

65 is pretty cold IMO...I keep mine between 69-72.

 

We keep ours at 74 at night and have a fan in the room. Of-course we don't sleep with comforters on during the summer. But with a light blanket and a fan its plenty cool enough in the room.

I used to set it like you guys do when I wasn't paying the electric bill.

My last months bill (paid on 6/24) was $109. I can't wait to see this months.

To answer your question, I bet a properly sized window unit would lower your bill.

 

Here's a question along the same lines.

Assuming an achievable constant temperature of, say, 72... is it cheaper to keep the place cool or to let it warm up and then cool it down over and over again?

I think of it along the lines of highway vs city driving, but I don't know if it's accurate?

 

just put in a ceiling fan in the bedroom and living room and try to keep them on while at home. we like to keep the A/C b/w 74-77. it seems like the A/C doesn't come on as often as it used to, but it's hard to tell. the socal heat hasn't been helping either (110+ the last few days!). a ceiling fan or just normal fan is probably a good adjunct to the A/C to help move the air better. not sure of the energy cost of having fans yet, but hopefully it's not too bad.

i've heard it's better to keep the A/C at a constant temp, rather than turning it on and off all the time, but i'm not sure. it kind of makes sense though b/c the A/C doesn't have to work as hard as often.

 

I think it depends on what the recovery time is. It's been my experience that it takes a central AC unit a hell of a long time to bring a house down a few degrees. If you need to come down 5 degrees it may run for a couple of hours.

To recover in a bedroom with a good window unit doesn't take that long. When I was younger I would go into my hot bedroom (over 80) turn that sucker on and come back a half hour later. By that time the room was in pretty good shape. Another 30 minutes and it was like the ice-age in there

So I suspect that with window units its cheaper to turn them off when you don't need them, but leave a central AC pretty constant. I would only adjust a central AC for a long period of away time. By long I mean, you are going to work for the day.

 

Yeah, we already have a ceiling fan in there that we don't use, but we have another desk fan we use for the sound ambience. We both cannot sleep when it's too quiet.

I did that experiment a couple of years ago, and we found that it was cheaper just to leave the air at a constant temperature rather than let it cycle on and off. It was cheaper by about 15-20%.

Once we get this new electric bill, I'm going to pay it, and then set the temperature at like 78 in the house, and get a window air conditioner.

 

65 seems way too cold. I keep my place warmer than that in the winter when I am in long pants in a sweater at home. In summer clothers I would be cold. Are you in shorts and a T? Dress cooler, lighter sheets, and keep things at 70.

 

i keep my temp at 76 with the fans running all the time. Try the energy saving bubls, that might reduce the bill a bit. Also get ur A?C system check out twice a year to make sure of no air leaks and that it runs fine. my bill is about $100 for a family of 4 .

 

That's only when we sleep. We're under covers at that point. The only thing though, we have really thick comforters that we're using. I guess we should switch blankets.

I just did a quick calculation. We have a Lennox 3 ton cooling capacity unit, which uses, according to Lennox, 10.6 kW of cooling power. Using that 13 hours a day (8 hours at night and 5 hours during the day) and the elctricity cost of $0.099119/kWH, our electricity would be, just to the A/C unit alone, $409.76/month (+$1.61 for a desk fan for 9 hours/day for the month)!!!

A 5300 BTU/hr window A/C unit, running at $10 hours a night, would cost $46.18/month.

For every degree below 78 degrees, it increases your bill roughly 4%. So at 66 degrees, our bill would be the above bill, or $411.37. At 78 degrees constant temperature (running during the day), it would cost about $252.05/month, which is 48% less. Even with the above cost for a window A/C unit, which adds $46.18/month, our bill would be $298.23. If we have the central A/C off during the day and only run it maybe 4 hours/day (after we get home and turn it off at night), it would cost $126.08/month.

Now I just have to convince my wife that a window A/C unit is appealing.

 

Just install it when she isn't home and then invite her up to the ice room.

 

make her pay the power bill!

 

As I reply it is 96° at 11:40pm for about the fifth night in a row .
My power company says set the thermostat and leave it alone. They suggest an adjustable programmable unit that that you can set for almost any period of time.
Ceiling fans help a lot. Setting @ 65 is going to cost you a bunch. Window A/C will be cheaper. BTW the water in my pool is @ 90° which feels great considering the temperature. It was about 112-114° the past few days and not much better before. My bill night hit $450 - $500 this month and I don't care.

 

I wish we could man, but we have a joint checking account.

 

65 is just way too freakin cold. Your unit will have to run continuous to acheive that temperature.

Ceiling fans will help you reduce the temperature by circulating the air better. Try a few and raise the thermostat up to 74 or so. You'll feel the difference, especially in your electric bill.

 

So my wife and I had, "The talk" last night. I showed her all the calculations I made. I told her it made economic sense to do this. I showed her the numbers. I said you could use ceiling fans more often.

Did she listen to any of it? Nope. She said, "Let's compromise." (aka she gets her way)

She said, "Let's leave the house at 75 during the day, and 66 at night." I told her it did not make economic sense to do that. She countered with, "Well, did it make economic sense to buy a carbon fiber hood for your car? No. You wanted it. This is what I want. Plus, even if I did use fans, that is not going to help. It just blows the hot air around."

I said, "Right, but it blows the hot air off YOU, and it won't come back to that area." She said, " So I have to carry a fan around with me wherever I go?" I said, "No, but we don't have to have the house so damn cold." I want to turn the A/C off during the day, and run it when I get home. Mr. Electricity (google him) said it's a lot cheaper running the A/C once during the day, instead of continually trying to remove the heat during the house the entire day. My wife did not take that to well.

She said, "What's the point in having a beautiful house if you can't enjoy it and I'm constantly hot during the day. I can go outside to sweat. Now I have to go inside to sweat?"


Uhhh. Looks like the wife won this round. Normally I would just not do anything, change checking accounts and have her pay the bill, but that would not go over well.

Hopefully I'll win round two tonight.

 

* > marriage

 

Two incomes>>>>>>>>>>>*

 

while i agree there are advantages. i personally feel the disadvantages outweigh the advantages.

/hijack

 

Well paid wife >>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>*

 

You are never going to win this one, go back in your hole.

If you had the argument that you couldn't afford to pay the electric bill then you may have a chance. But with her earning income and you both having plenty of money, no way.

 

Well, the thing is, she makes more money than I do, because she's in the military. No taxes, housing and food allowance in addition to basic pay, etc. I make more than her in gross pay, but factor in everything, and she pulls in more.

I'm just trying to prepare for when she leaves the military in about a year and a half. Then the income is pretty much going to be up to me (unless she decides to work while pregnant).

I'm just not used to having a frickin' $400 electric bill and a $200 water and sewage bill. Seeing that our income went down because of the low (yeah my ass) cost of living down here vs. DC, I want to try to save some money.

 

I agree there. I guess I'm never going to convince her.

 

by buying the CF hood...

I'd start with removing the big comforter because that just sounds unnecessary. If the wife leaves it on for appearance reasons, you can simply rolls it to the end of the bed before you go to sleep so that it is not trapping too much heat and rely on only the lighter blankets.

Second, might be time to invest in a programmable thermostat unit. This way, you can program the unit to shut off during the day (or be at a higher temperature) while no one is home and have the A/C come on a half-hour or so before someone comes home. Also, you can program the A/C to shut off at night so that while you and the wife are still somewhat awake, you can have it at 66º, but once you both fall asleep, the A/C will switch off or at least increase to a higher temperature.

Also, make sure that you're keeping your blinds or curtains drawn during the day to prevent too much sunlight/heat from entering the house. You can always open them after you get home. Also, consider planting some plants near the windows to help provide some shade.

 

get two box fans and have them blowing on high. after a few mins you should be pretty cold.. i know i would be

 

Have her sleep in this...

 

In every window in the house, the blinds are drawn upwards. The light can't even sneak on between the blinds' cracks. Also, we have a Ritetemp digital programmable unit that is somewhat like a Palm Pilot (has stylus and everything). There is a manual override function, and my wife likes to use that.

Oh well.

 

Not sure if this was asked - how many Zones - one or two? In Summer we used to shut all the vents downstairs cause we only had one zone - and let all the cold air go upstairs. I LOVE and NEED it cold to sleep and we never had a bill that high and we would alwyas have it on at night. Bought the programmable thermo and that was great - more so when the wife went to work, we would raise it to 75 and set it to cool down in time for dinner or when we got home from work. But now she is home with my son, so it is cool longer during day. I think sometimes I would knock it to 64. It is hard for everyone here to talk about temperatuures, cause depending on air flow in the house and a million other factors - 65 in your house may feel like 70 in someone elses. We are finding that being at the inlaws house now...there setting reads higher but almost feels cooler than ours was. Do you have an old system? How many SEER? Poor insulation somewhere? Blocked vents? Filter changed? When last time when A/C was charged? $400 is a lot to swallow. Ours way most $200 for a whiole month, but then the gas was low thenduring the summer, then in winter it reverses...GAS goes up and electric goes down...well except at Christmas . P.S. grew up with those window units - instant freezer and noise blocker too - best sleep of my life was sleeping with the big 'ol window unit coolin it down.

 

Our house was built in 2003, so it's almost brand new. I replaced the air filter 12 days ago. Our insulation is top notch. It's just bugging me that we're spending all this money when we don't have to.

 

I have a pic in case anyone wants to host it.

 

Totally true, and I love it, however, spending that much money on utilities is basically pissing it away.

I won't even tell you guys what we keep the house at... but we have programmable thermostats for both zones, as well as fans everywhere. I have the thermostats programmed so they compliment each other. The upper floor comes on first and cools off that floor as well as the open areas below... then about 30 minutes before bed time, the lower floor kicks in and cools that floor and our bedroom (we have a master down), and the upper floor shuts off. The thermostats also have this cool feature called auto-recover. Basically I have them all set at certain temps and times to come on/off for the different settings (Wake, Leave, Arrive, Sleep). We leave the A/C off during the day and I don't have it set to come on until about 8:30pm of so... however, with the auto-recover, once the temp hits a certain degree, the thermostat will kick on the A/C early so it gradually reduces the house temp to my level instead of clicking on at 8:30pm and working very hard. It's an awesome feature and I've got the house cooling (and heating for that matter) down to a science. I'm not sure what our electric bill is yet for this past month, however, the previous month was $184, and the heat has not let up, so I expect this month to be around $200. Not too bad when you consider that we have two outdoor fountains, the uplights on the house, plus the pool running 10 hours a day as well as the A/C to cool the entire house (about 4500 sq ft)...

I'd rather sleep in my underwear under a light blanket and still be comfortable then throw away money to the utility companies...

 

pic of what?

 

I still think lighter bedding will solve your problems by at least a few degrees.

 

His sleeping wife?

 

suite ?!

 

Naw, CG2004TSX is going to host it. I thought I would draw a funny pic to lighten everyone's Monday mood. I started this thread, so it's worthless without a pic right?

 

Here's his pic, in the style of YOTH, from the looks of it...