What do you pay for electricity?

[dasRad]

The cost of electricity is a regularly recurring topic scattered throughout various threads on this site. Most of the time it takes to form of a complaint about what it costs, but seldom does anyone actually state a bottom line. So, I'll start.

My home in Kelowna receives it's electricity from FortisBC. Billing is bi-monthly and the actual cost paid for electricity on the last 6 bills was:

Billing Period	Amount paid	kWh used	Actual $/kWh
May-Jun 2017	$263.35	1964	$0.134
Mar-Apr 2017	$289.75	2125	$0.136
Jan-Feb 2017	$486.58	3328	$0.146
Nov-Dec 2016	$445.05	3147	$0.141
Sep-Oct 2016	$269.36	2046	$0.132
Jul-Aug 2016	$357.92	2601	$0.138

Current quoted rates are $0.10117/kWh for the first 1600 kWh in a 2 month billing cycle, and $0.15617/kWh for any amount over 1600 kWh. There is an additional "Basic Customer Charger" (~$0.50/day) and tax (GST) on everything.

 

[BrettS]

I’ll play along. Here are my numbers for the past three months. I got my model S at the beginning of April, so that’s as far back as I went. The car has added about 1000kWh/month to my usage. I’m in Florida, so the bill has been going up as my air conditioner usage has been going up.

Billing Period	Amount paid	kWh used	Actual $/kWh
June 2017	$316.66	2209	$0.143
May 2017	$280.39	2003	$0.140
April 2017	$262.64	1886	$0.139

My published rates include a flat charge of $8.76 per month, then 10.555 cents for the first 1000kWh and 12.971 cents per kWh after that. Plus taxes on top of it all.

 

[john pane]

Don't your bills have some fixed costs and some marginal costs based on kWh? If so, the marginal cost per kWh is more relevant.

 

[Webeevdrivers]

Hmmm. Already two replies from two different country's using two different currencies. This may get confusing if we get an Aussie response, a Euro response, and a pound response. A dollar is not a dollar is not a dollar if it is from three different countries.

A suggestion would be to pick a currency and convert from their.

For what it's worth our rate is the same as the OP's (same power company in the same valley but our bill is seldom over 110 Canadian dollars per month and we are an all EV household so two EV's to charge. Having said that we have a gas water heater and all energy efficient appliances as well as all. LED bulbs.

 

[SageBrush]

9 US cents a kWh when I use the grid,
~ 2.5 cents a kWh from my PV

My consumption has spiked along with EV adoption. We now use ~ 500 kWh a month.

 

[McRat]

All taxes and fees at home to charge our EVs, just under .12 USD. Work is 'free' as a perk provided to all employees.

 

[Dakkor]

I have the monthly plan with Hydro-Quebec. When we bought the house 3 years ago we start paying 150$ per month. Old owner told us the house costed them 100$ per month. Well i think they we're never home because before having EV the bill got higher and higher and higher. WIth 2 EVs we now pay 275$ per month. We used to pay 400$ per month in gas. Now this year we used a lot less energy and i'm up to 260$ in credit for the annual revision so next month will be probably free. My analysis is about 80$ per month in car energy.

 

[wdolson]

I'm surprised at some of your energy usage. I thought ours was high, but we've never cracked 2000 KWh/Mo. My energy usage has gone up so little since getting the car variations in weather have a lot more impact on energy usage compared to the same month in previous years.

We have a $12 fixed charge and 6% usage tax, but we pay $0.08/KWh USD. Not far from here (in the county where Bonnie lives), it's only $0.07/KWh.

We get all our electricity from dams owned by the US government, but Rick Perry (Secretary of the Department of Energy under Trump) is trying to sell them off, probably to the next Enron. If he manages to do that, our electric rates will probably skyrocket. The entire Washington and Oregon congressional delegation from both parties oppose it, but Perry wants to destroy the DoE.

 

[dhrivnak]

In theory I am to pay $.095/kWh for power. The reason I say in theory is with our rooftop solar we just pay the grid connection fee of $13.06 and have gone 16 months without paying for any kWh used

 

[rapoport3a]

Not sure what anyone here is doing to get kWh used; if you're getting that from the car, it's too low by a serious amount. You need a meter to read how much electricity (energy) is going into the car.

Whatever the base price per kWh, additional per-kWh charges and similar add-ons should be included (there are many where I am), plus taxes, but not fixed charges if the car is charging along with a house full of appliances and so on.

 

[BrettS]

Not sure what anyone here is doing to get kWh used; if you're getting that from the car, it's too low by a serious amount. You need a meter to read how much electricity (energy) is going into the car.

I reported total amount of power used by my house as reported on my power bill, which I believe is what the OP was asking for.

 

[dasRad]

I reported total amount of power used by my house as reported on my power bill, which I believe is what the OP was asking for.

That is what i am looking for. I wasn't asking about power used by the vehicle as that will vary (greatly) depending on usage. What i am interested in is what people actually pay for their electrical power in various jurisdictions.

Almost every post I see about the price of electricity is either marketing ("BC has one of the lowest electrical rates in North America"), or whinging ("We're getting ripped off by the power company (and it's all the fault of the government)"), but seldom is the actual price paid stated.

What I have posted is the actual amount that I pay FortisBC for the actual kWhs used in each of the 6 billing periods within the last year).

I'll be happy to convert various currencies to a base currency, though I will admit that I did expect that most of the responses would be from Canada

 

[LimoX]

Here in Ozstralia there is a current deal with AGL (the country's largest energy generator/distributor/retailer) see below.

Coupled with free Supercharging for life, my fuel bill has dropped from 9.5k-11k per year, to $365.00 per year. Add $750.00 for a 2nd smart meter and fitting the Tesla HPWC and till the AGL deal continues I'm clawing back some of the 205k I paid for my Model X P90 here.

"Unlimited charging for just $1 a day with AGL.
Charge your electric vehicle for just $1 a day – anytime, any day of the week – on our 12-month energy plan. This way you'll always have the certainty of knowing how much it will cost you to charge your car."

 

[personthing]

$0.033/kWh - Xcel Energy EV rate plan in Minnesota. 9pm-9am weekdays, all weekend and holidays.

 

[LimoX]

If I WAS charging off-peak here in Oz, it's 13c p/kW which is roughly the same as Canadian Pesos, and 10c US

 

[cwerdna]

I'll play along with some figures which are all in USD. I'm in PG&E-land, aka Pacific Gouge & Extort, by some. Most of my EV charging is NOT at home (and would only be at very slow 120 volts), but rather for free at work. I do some charging at free public L2 charging on Fridays and/or weekends.

3/14/17 to 4/12/17, 284.203 kWh, $51.79, 18.2 cents/kWh
4/13/17 to 5/11/17, 298.9 kWh, $57.76, 19.3 cents/kWh
5/12/17 to 6/12/17, 301.333 kWh, $62.61, 20.8 cents/kWh

Note: On the first bill, I didn't deduct the $17.40 California Climate Credit (California Climate Credit) that I received and that after adjustments amounted to $18.32 of credit on that bill. It looks like I'm going to get that credit again in an October bill.

The $ amounts I listed are my total electric charges including all fees and taxes. I have no means of determining how much came out of the wall at home to charge my Leaf, but it's minimal anyway due to virtually no charging @ home. I'm doing about roughly 11K to 12K miles/year on my Leaf.

I'm on E-6 (https://www.pge.com/tariffs/tm2/pdf/ELEC_SCHEDS_E-6.pdf, see pages 2 for rates and page 4 for definitions of the peak, partial peak and off-peak). E-6 is a TOU (time-of-use) plan.

On all of the above bills, I stayed within tier 1 (baseline). If I went beyond it and/or used a lot during peak times or a lot more during partial-peak, my bill would be a lot higher.

If one looks at page 2, the cheapest possible rate on E-6 during "summer" is off-peak baseline at 16.728 cents per kWh. The cheapest possible "winter" rate is off-peak baseline at 17.162 cents.

Simplest plan for us w/no-TOU is E-1. See page 1 of https://www.pge.com/tariffs/tm2/pdf/ELEC_SCHEDS_E-1.pdf. I'm in area X, code B of Understanding Baseline Quantities. So for a 30 day billing month, my "summer" baseline is 10.1 kWh/day or 303 kWh/month. For "winter", it's 10.9 kWh/day or 327 kWh/month.

So, if I were on E-1, first 303 or 327 kWh cost 19.9979 cents. The portions above that up until 1212 or 1308 kWh (101 to 400% of baseline, aka tier 2) cost 27.612 cents. Above that (aka tier 3), each kWh is over 40 cents.

Baselines for E-6 are the same as for E-1.

We also have per Making sense of the rates other plans like EV-A, EV-B, ETOU-A, ETOU-B, which have different time and day bands than E-6.

I won't go thru all of them, but EV-A (meaning you have no separate dedicated meter for charging your EV only) is at https://www.pge.com/tariffs/tm2/pdf/ELEC_SCHEDS_EV.pdf page 1. Definitions on page 4. Look at how horrific the rest of the times are.

PG&E has a comparison tool that projects how much your annual electricity rate would be if you switched plans. Currently, it claims I'm on the 2nd cheapest ($735/year for electricity) and that E-6 SmartRate is a bit less at $710/year (details in fine print at bottom of About SmartRate). However, I've seen the tool flip flop on that (smart vs. no smart).

ETOU--A, EV-A AND E-1 are projected to cost somewhat more (ranges from $770 to $785/year). The worst by far for my usage pattern is ETOU-B at $910/year.

I'm glad I get free charging at work and have some free public L2 I can use, as well. At PG&E rates, driving an EV that's charged only at home w/o solar can get pricey.

Currently, Google says $1 USD = $1.30 CAD. I wish my electric provider were as cheap as the OP's.

I did a rough calculation on the OP's highest bill of $486.58 CAD (which is $374.57 USD) for 3328 kWh used and 14.6 cents/kWh CAD which is ~11.26 cents/kWh USD. If he were in PG&E-land w/my baseline and on E-1, it'd cost about $1140 USD or roughly an avg of 34.2 cents/kWh USD. In CAD $, that'd be $1477.84 and 44.34 cents/kWh.

 

[Sasmania]

Zero.

I live at the Optima in Scottsdale. I told them I can't move in unless they install a 50Amp plug for my Tesla.

They installed it for free, which was cool. What was even cooler is they don't even charge me for the electric. BAM!

 

[Dakkor]

I'm surprised at some of your energy usage. I thought ours was high, but we've never cracked 2000 KWh/Mo. My energy usage has gone up so little since getting the car variations in weather have a lot more impact on energy usage compared to the same month in previous years.

We have a $12 fixed charge and 6% usage tax, but we pay $0.08/KWh USD. Not far from here (in the county where Bonnie lives), it's only $0.07/KWh.

We get all our electricity from dams owned by the US government, but Rick Perry (Secretary of the Department of Energy under Trump) is trying to sell them off, probably to the next Enron. If he manages to do that, our electric rates will probably skyrocket. The entire Washington and Oregon congressional delegation from both parties oppose it, but Perry wants to destroy the DoE.

Are you getting snow and -40 degree celcius temperature? We pay almost 500$/month in electricity during winter. The annual plan balance during the year the payment.

 

[wdolson]

Are you getting snow and -40 degree celcius temperature? We pay almost 500$/month in electricity during winter. The annual plan balance during the year the payment.

No and natural gas heat are common around here too. Our electric bill usually goes down in the winter, but the gas bill goes up.

We also live in a fairly moderate climate. we do occasionally see temps down to -10 or -15C, but those are rare winter events. Average winter temps are around 5-10C with some nights dipping down around 0C and about one snow storm a year on average. This winter had the worst snow since 2008, but it was still mild compared to most of Canada. Summer temps can crack 40C, but only during heat waves. 30s are common in the summer. Our house gets blasted with the sun in summer though, the side of the house with most of the windows faces SW and gets roasted during the afternoons.

Solar installations are common around here because our electricity from hydro is so cheap and the winters don't get a lot of sun (Portland is among the least sunniest cities in the US, though there are some cities that are worse), but I have thought about installing it here. At minimum it will offset the air conditioning bill in the summer.

 

[ItsNotAboutTheMoney]

Maine. USA. CMP (main utility, covers Southern and Central Maine).

- For the first 39.3kWh per month of charging per month we pay US$0.1371/kWh
- After that we pay US$0.0996/kWh
- Marginal cost for taxable use is
- more than US$0.105/kWh
- less than US$0.107/kWh

Explanations:
Numbers based mainly on current pricing, which changed on 7/1/2017 and past 12 months use, plus maximum recorded peak electricity use.

We're on TOU delivery, now on the optional Supersaver plan (because they just canceled the other optional plan).

We use about 220kWh/month in our garage, which is almost all the Volt, but also garage openers and lights plus occasional other power like my weed whacker or lawnmower.

Given that we'd be on fixed rate if TOU wasn't offered or we didn't have the Volt, then initial use can figured at the fixed rate, and marginal at the TOU rate.

Initial fixed use of 39.1kWh is based on the past 12 months' usage and assuming all 220kWh/month for our garage is off-peak charging of the Volt:

The only tax on electricity not in the price is sales tax at 5.5% in use above 750/kWh in a billing period prorated to electricity use and overall cost. Last 12 months we had a total of 28kWh in excess in December/January (due to the higher energy use of the Volt).

If we had another plug-in, and charged it off-peak we'd end up paying more tax. Since tax is calculated by prorating total cost over total electricity use and the highest peak electricity use for our house I have recorded is 179kWh (July 2015), I have based the net marginal price maximum on that use maximal peak.