Late last year I finally got around to using the State Government's "Energy Watch" website to compare my electricity supplier/plan with others that were available. After entering some facts about my current bills (costs and usage pattern) it turned out that the best alternative for us was 'switching' to a different plan offered by our current supplier. (Because I didn't actually change supplier I've since received reminder emails from Energy Watch saying that I didn't complete the switching process).
As I have setup automatic payment of our electricity bills by direct debit (I just have to make sure I remember that the charge is due, so I have enough money in that bank account!) the best plan available for us was one where there is a hefty (around 25%) discount on the energy usage component of the bill (ie. everything except the daily 'supply'/connection charge) if the bill is paid "on time". It also involved locking us in to that supplier for a period of time, but as I hadn't bothered switching suppliers for the past decade that isn't an issue.
Looking at the four quarterly bills we paid for 2017/18 vs 2018/19 our figures were:
FY 2017/18 kWh = 8,941 cost = $2,367
FY 2018/19 kWh = 9,065 cost = $2,092
Therefore our usage had increase 1% (no significant change) while our bill had dropped 12%, despite only making the switch to the discounted plan at the end of 2018.
We also saved a little bit by paying more attention to our usage during 'peak' times - managing to reduce our 'peak' time electricity usage from 10% of our total to only 6% (basically by DW not doing any washing during the 'peak' hours, and us not starting to cook dinner most days until after the 'peak' period ended (peak period is 2pm-8pm on weekdays). Peak electricity cost around 60c per kWh, compared to 27c for 'shoulder' periods (7am-2pm and 8pm-10pm) and 13-16c for 'off peak' (10pm-7am) and 'dedicated circuit' supply (which I think is our hot water tank).
Switching plans half way through the year saved us around $250 last financial year, and we should reduce our annual electricity bill by about another $250 this financial year.
The comparisons don't take into account the price changes for electricity over the past two years - as prices have increased 9% during that period, our bills would have been even higher if we hadn't switched plans or reduced our 'peak' usage.
The next item on my 'to do' list relating to electricity costs is to get our solar panels/inverter checked and possibly repaired. We had solar panels installed on our garage roof about ten years ago, and because the cost was subsidised by a government rebate and there were initially very generous 'feed in' tarriffs applied, the system had paid for itself after only 2-3 years, and the solar power had been subsidizing our electricity bills (until the inverter stopped working a couple of years ago).
While our solar power system is out of warranty (and the supplier went out of business long ago), it might be worth getting a new inverter installed (if the panels are still OK). I made a few inquiries about getting a repair quote, but most solar panel suppliers only seem interested in selling new system.
Getting the solar panels working again would only reduce our total mains usage by about 10%, but it would mostly cut our 'peak' and daytime 'shoulder' use, so it would have slightly more impact on our bills than on our mains electricity consumption. It would also help cut our contribution to carbon emissions a little bit (but probably not as much as the fact that I now get the bus and train to work each day, rather than driving).
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