Want to hear what energy consumption is like somewhere else?
We live in a rural area. Electricity is about our only fuel source, used for heating as well. The closest street lamp is 9 miles away, but a few houses have yard lights that they seem to run all night for no known reason. Yup, night sky is pretty good, though there is still very noticeable light pollution from a small town 18 miles away.
We have cold winters, our AHDD (annual heating degree (C) days, a weather metric used to calculate heating costs) is 6100, probably 150% of what many of you have. Our annual electricity usage is around 10000 kwh. We keep the thermostat quite low most of the time, 13-16C. If you took out the heating, our consumption is close to your 3300 average. Our electricity is distributed by a private cooperative, so we get a pro rata portion of what little profit is made. Thus our cost closely represents the actual cost of production and delivery, about 4.5p/kwh (GB pence, not US pennies). Cheap by US standards as well. US in general pays about what the UK does, from the sound of things.
We do use some cord wood for supplemental heat. About 1 cord (3.6 cubic metres) a winter. Sounds like a good bit of wood, but it isn't really. We used to have to go out to a forest to collect wood. In recent years, due to an extended drought combined with a surge of native pine bark beetles, our fuel wood has come from trees that have died on our property. Cutting wood is really hard work! If it weren't for the need to rid our property of dead trees, we wouldn't bother any more. It would be well worth the extra 4.5p/kwh to just turn up the thermostat.
We live in a rural area. Electricity is about our only fuel source, used for heating as well. The closest street lamp is 9 miles away, but a few houses have yard lights that they seem to run all night for no known reason. Yup, night sky is pretty good, though there is still very noticeable light pollution from a small town 18 miles away.
We have cold winters, our AHDD (annual heating degree (C) days, a weather metric used to calculate heating costs) is 6100, probably 150% of what many of you have. Our annual electricity usage is around 10000 kwh. We keep the thermostat quite low most of the time, 13-16C. If you took out the heating, our consumption is close to your 3300 average. Our electricity is distributed by a private cooperative, so we get a pro rata portion of what little profit is made. Thus our cost closely represents the actual cost of production and delivery, about 4.5p/kwh (GB pence, not US pennies). Cheap by US standards as well. US in general pays about what the UK does, from the sound of things.
We do use some cord wood for supplemental heat. About 1 cord (3.6 cubic metres) a winter. Sounds like a good bit of wood, but it isn't really. We used to have to go out to a forest to collect wood. In recent years, due to an extended drought combined with a surge of native pine bark beetles, our fuel wood has come from trees that have died on our property. Cutting wood is really hard work! If it weren't for the need to rid our property of dead trees, we wouldn't bother any more. It would be well worth the extra 4.5p/kwh to just turn up the thermostat.
