Electricity 101

Energy Measurement For simplicity, think of electricity measurement like this: You buy gas by the gallon. You buy electric by the kilo watt hour (kWh) A kWh is 1000 Watts used continuously for 1 hour so any of your smaller less power hogging device will wind up measured as .XXX kWh For example: A 100 Watt bulb left on for 1 hour is going to cost you .1kWh The question is how much does 1 kWh cost ? Using my local rate, that’s 14.5 cents. So with my 5 bulbs burning for 1 hour my cost is 5 X 14.5 cents or 72 cents While this may seem like pennies (in fact...72) don't be fooled. We have been spoiled here in Pa. Because of a cap on rates that is set to expire January 1st 2011 when that happens we could see our rates skyrocket. While this may seem paltry, it’s really only a small part of the actual cost. According to the document I have linked above; “PPL recently conducted two solicitations for wholesale supply to provide default generation service in 2010 to customers who do not choose to receive service from an EGS. The solicitations resulted in projected retail supply rates of approximately 10 cents per kilowatt-hour (kWh) for residential” That's an increase of almost 69%. To put that in perspective: ...If you knew that gas for your vehicle was about to go from $3.00 per gallon to $5.07 per gallon, or if your current electric bill is averaging $200...ish and you knew it would be going up to $338 per month, you would do something...right? (This page is under development, more info coming soon) "If every household in America switched out one compact fluorescent bulb it would reduce energy consumption as much as taking a million cars off the road" http://www.epa.gov/climatechange/kids/index.html