How much did my T5s contribute to my last electric bill?

D

dragon49

How much did my T5s contribute to my last electric bill?
 
Can somebody help me out here.
 
NYC has absurd electric bill rates -  For my current bill, My base charge was reported as:
 
Supply 338 kWh @10.7574¢/kWh =  $36.36
 
But then, I had to deal with:
 
Delivery
338 kWh @11.4053¢/kWh  $38.55
 
I also had to deal with:
 
Basic service charge  = $16.80
 
After a bunch of surcharges and taxes:
 
Merchant Function Charge $1.91
GRT and Other Tax Surcharges ¢92
SBC/RPS charges  @0.6006¢/kWh  $2.03
Temporary NY State Surcharge  @0.3905¢/kWh  $1.32
GRT & other tax surcharges  $3.01
Sales tax @4.5000%  $4.54
 
My Final bill was $105.44
 
I have five 54 Watt 6400 K T5s running 17 hours a day.  For my last bill, exactly how much did the lights contribute?  My guess is around $65.00, as I seem to remember $40.00 winter electric bills, before I started my indoor grow setup.  The service charge will always be $16.80, but I assume that for the additional charges, they can be prorated to figure out what they would be with lower base costs.
 
Thanks
 
It's very easy to figure out how much your lights are going to cost in electricity.  Multiply your wattage times your number of tubes times your number of hours.  That gives you how many watts per hour, so divide by 1000 to get KwH.  Take your daily KwH rating and multiply by number of days in a month, then multiply that by your electric costs.
 
Example:
 
5 x 54W Tubes x 17 Hours a day = 4590 watts per day or 4.6 KwH per day
4.6 KwH per day x 30 days = 138 KwH per month
138 KwH x 0.107574 = $14.85 (rounded) per month
 
Based on the above math, there's no way your bill has been hiked up $65 a month from running 5 T5 bulbs. 
 
OK - so even adding the Delivery Charge:
 
138 KwH x 0.114053= $15.74 (rounded) per month - It looks like the lights costs around $30.60 Per month, unless I am missing something.  Something else mush have gone up because (I need to check old records) I distinctly remember $40.00 winter electric bills in my same apt.
 
OP, if you are not looking for indoor pods and ripening then 17 hours a day isn't necessary, we are still way early for the 2014 grow season.
 
I have "gotten by" with seedlings and floros with as little as 8 hours a day. I do keep the lights close to the canopy, and have booster lights on the sides as well.
 
8 hours is pretty minimal though, and it produces slow-moderate growth. But if you can get lights to the sides and underneath the canopy, then 10-12 hours will easily get you by with a decent growth rate.
 
Results may vary, but you do have to keep floro's close to the canopy, every extra inch decreases the lumens by a lot.
 
Jetchuka said:
OP, if you are not looking for indoor pods and ripening then 17 hours a day isn't necessary, we are still way early for the 2014 grow season.
 
I have "gotten by" with seedlings and floros with as little as 8 hours a day. I do keep the lights close to the canopy, and have booster lights on the sides as well.
 
8 hours is pretty minimal though, and it produces slow-moderate growth. But if you can get lights to the sides and underneath the canopy, then 10-12 hours will easily get you by with a decent growth rate.
 
Results may vary, but you do have to keep floro's close to the canopy, every extra inch decreases the lumens by a lot.
Click to expand...
I've already gotten pods from two of the three plants - They are part of my 100% indoor grow. One in started in January - the others later. For progress, see my main 2013 grog:

http://thehotpepper.com/topic/36740-dragon49s-2013-grow-log/

This is my first ever indoor grow. In prior seasons, I always started seedlings in mid March, then transplanted them outside the third week of May. For the seedlings, 17 hours of light always worked out well so I decided to try it with the full time indoor grow and it has worked so far.

Right now, I've got 4 T-5s on top of the plants, and one T-5 hitting the sides and bottom. I had tried to follow what appeared to be THP board wisdom, to keep lights right on top of the leaves, almost touching them, but with my setup (even when I only had the single-bulb T-5 for the seedlings) this either burned the top leaves, or caused them to curl away from the light, so now, I keep more distance - I'm not sure how much - I'll measure it when I have a chance.
 
I pay 129$ a month year round (equal payment plan) and run an 8 tube and 6 tube about 4 months a year,  then just the 8 tube for the rest of the year.
12/12 on my lights, 18/6 while seedlings.
 
Off and on a couple aerogardens, a few (4) heat lamps outside for cold weather, a fan, couple cloners, air pumps (for the hydro 24/7)
 
Always some special projects.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top