I'm curious, do electric kettles cause electricity bills to spike? My home just started using 1 to 2 electric kettles every morning and this month's bill spiked by $20-30
Barely.
A kettle is 2000W, but runs for what? 1-2 min to boil water?
A big A/C unit will use 2000W continuously when cooling. Which is even if you limit to 8 hours per day is likely cooling almost continuously.
So you can take
2000W / 230V = 8.7A (for heater or AC)
That is how much current you are using, it is a lot but most heaters and/or AC are around that rated power.
For AC, you can calculate,
2KW x 8 H = 16 KWH every night.
16 KWH x 30 days= 480 KWH per month.
Based on current electricity tariffs,
480KWH x 32. 47 cents /KWH = $155.9 (just for AC).
To reduce usage on AC, can consider turning off AC at certain timing and turning on the fan to keep cool.
Alternatively, consider setting AC to higher temperature and on the fan at low speed. IIRC, 1 AC unit in operation = 8 no of fans running. So you can imagine the difference in Energy usage.
In Singapore, the electricity tariffs is really crazy high due to a lot of external factors (Ukraine-Russian war etc.).
I also advise people to use gas to cook water instead of electric water heater. Once water is cooked, can store in thermal flask to keep water hot if needed.
Electricity tariffs - 32. 47 cents / KWH
Gas tariffs - 25.2 cents /KWH
With the above tariffs, you can imagine the difference in price.
Anyways, apart from your AC, you try to calculate every single usage (lighting, your TV, computer, oven, hood, vacuum etc) in your house or if you want, you can also engage a LEW to help you too.
Hi hi. Your numbers are wrong.
AC takes about 1kWH. So the cost is halved.
Hi OP, the other culprit is your hot water for shower. That alone is 2.5kwh. Storage heater is even more, because it heats more water then used and stores it. Once stored, it cools and you have to reheat.
The last culprit is your clothing dryer.
Yup, it does, look at the rated power of your kettle.
Any electrical devices with heating or cooling functions will take up huge amount of energy.
For example,
Water heater for cooking water (best to use instant heaters that does not have keep warm function)
Water heater for showering (tank type)
Air conditioners
Refrigerators
If you don't mind, care to share your utility bill?
Instead of seeing the $$, you can take a look at the energy, water and gas usage.
That will better determine the usage of the household rather than the respective tariffs.
Yes, I did a research study during my university final year project.
Older electrical equipment is less efficient due to wear and tear. Technology improved over the years to make products more efficient.
Fyi, my parents had a 30 years old fridge, almost same age as me. I found that the insulation has worn out and the cold air kept leaking, causing the refrigerator to keep running to generate cold air.
After we changed the refrigerator, there were significant savings.
This study was from the US, but should still be relevant. In terms of annual electricity consumption of fridge:
- 2020 Model: 350 kWh
- 30 years old: 2k+ kWh
So you should change your fridge periodically to save electricity. If yours is 20 years old, replacing with current gen fridge should cut your electricity bill from fridge usage by at least half
Source: https://blog.sense.com/how-much-energy-does-your-refrigerator-really-use/
mine is 15 yrs and i was contemplating to change to a more energy efficient one... but this fridge was the only surviving electrical appliance that hasn't spoilt before!
When i changed my old fridge also 20+ years old to a 3 tick one using the gov voucher it really did cut my bills by nearly 90 per month that thing was dying
get a cheap $10 power plug and measure.
intuitively, i'd think yes though. i doubt it uses the newer tech (inverter, fridge fans).
the tick system was also revamped some years back. old 3 ticks fridges are 2 ticks in the new system
That's odd - Do you have an old aircon?
4rm HDB here, 3 persons - We have 2 air-cons on every night for about 10 hrs, some times I switch on for a couple of hours in the afternoon when it's hot and I work from home - Our monthly electrical bill is around $120 - $140 range.
Refrigerator might be the case. Higher ambient temperature, it will work harder to cool. Monitor the coolness in your fridge. If it start feeling warm outside the fridge beware you might need to budget for new refrigerator.
Recently there was this govt subsidy thingy (can't rmb the name for it now) that we used up and our bills went up as well. Maybe its not ex from the start due to that and now only then shoot up. At least for my case I think that's what happened. My bills two hoomans at home oso one month 160+. Even tho last time my old house five hoomans oso not more than 300 dk why.
Heated water tank consumes power at about 3x that of aircon. Did you recently install a new water tank? Or someone recently decided to have the tank heated 24/7?
Depending on your electricity provider they will also do on and off again meter reading - one month estimate, one month reading. So some months the bill is estimated lower, then they charge you the difference when they check the meter.
Most likely culprit is ac. My house electricity bills also high but we usually have at least one ac running 6-8 hrs during the day and 3 at night 
This might be obvious but check if any contracts are up for your electricity bill provider.
Also if you are not submitting meter readings, estimated reading numbers run higher for bills.
My hh switched away from using a 1600w portable AC (8h/day) a month and a half ago (which equates to roughly $100+ a mth) but the latest bill still nvr go down =.=, dunno scam or what lol. See next billing.
Too labour intensive to take manually i guess...so basically they figure ur avg u then charge u based on that estimate (for most people it shld be quite close), then they do a long review or u can submit your readings to get it back in line.
Same here. The main thing is the fridge that is causing the issue. Switch off all electrical appliance's when not in used. That how i do it. But the thing is A/C is also the main culprit in my household. But i managed to reduce the bill to 2 digits...previously is 3 digits....🥺
if you have the new smart meter check the SP app for power consumption. If not get the smart meter for power it's 40 dollar per installation I think. My family peak consumption came from water heater as we could see spikes at morning and evening times before and after work. Next was we could see intervals with airconditioning was 50% higher on than without. It helps you figure out power usage quite easily.
My bill spiked about 15%in the past 2 months and I attributed it to the heat wave. Not only did we use the aircon more, the energy usage is also higher because it's cooling a higher ambient temperature.
Someone told me that if you don’t have smart meter, the meter reading guy will come over to check once per 2 months. So they’ll give an estimation of the price of first month and charge the remaining on the subsequent month. Sometimes, the estimation is off so the bill may jump.
I'm curious, do electric kettles cause electricity bills to spike? My home just started using 1 to 2 electric kettles every morning and this month's bill spiked by $20-30
Barely. A kettle is 2000W, but runs for what? 1-2 min to boil water? A big A/C unit will use 2000W continuously when cooling. Which is even if you limit to 8 hours per day is likely cooling almost continuously.
So you can take 2000W / 230V = 8.7A (for heater or AC) That is how much current you are using, it is a lot but most heaters and/or AC are around that rated power. For AC, you can calculate, 2KW x 8 H = 16 KWH every night. 16 KWH x 30 days= 480 KWH per month. Based on current electricity tariffs, 480KWH x 32. 47 cents /KWH = $155.9 (just for AC). To reduce usage on AC, can consider turning off AC at certain timing and turning on the fan to keep cool. Alternatively, consider setting AC to higher temperature and on the fan at low speed. IIRC, 1 AC unit in operation = 8 no of fans running. So you can imagine the difference in Energy usage. In Singapore, the electricity tariffs is really crazy high due to a lot of external factors (Ukraine-Russian war etc.). I also advise people to use gas to cook water instead of electric water heater. Once water is cooked, can store in thermal flask to keep water hot if needed. Electricity tariffs - 32. 47 cents / KWH Gas tariffs - 25.2 cents /KWH With the above tariffs, you can imagine the difference in price. Anyways, apart from your AC, you try to calculate every single usage (lighting, your TV, computer, oven, hood, vacuum etc) in your house or if you want, you can also engage a LEW to help you too.
Hi hi. Your numbers are wrong. AC takes about 1kWH. So the cost is halved. Hi OP, the other culprit is your hot water for shower. That alone is 2.5kwh. Storage heater is even more, because it heats more water then used and stores it. Once stored, it cools and you have to reheat. The last culprit is your clothing dryer.
Well, based on the information given by the comment, equation remains the same tho.
Yup, it does, look at the rated power of your kettle. Any electrical devices with heating or cooling functions will take up huge amount of energy. For example, Water heater for cooking water (best to use instant heaters that does not have keep warm function) Water heater for showering (tank type) Air conditioners Refrigerators
$320 for electricity or for everything? Water is just as costly as electricity because of all the various taxes on it.
for water gas & electricity
If you don't mind, care to share your utility bill? Instead of seeing the $$, you can take a look at the energy, water and gas usage. That will better determine the usage of the household rather than the respective tariffs.
[удалено]
Yes, I did a research study during my university final year project. Older electrical equipment is less efficient due to wear and tear. Technology improved over the years to make products more efficient. Fyi, my parents had a 30 years old fridge, almost same age as me. I found that the insulation has worn out and the cold air kept leaking, causing the refrigerator to keep running to generate cold air. After we changed the refrigerator, there were significant savings.
This study was from the US, but should still be relevant. In terms of annual electricity consumption of fridge: - 2020 Model: 350 kWh -30 years old: 2k+ kWh
So you should change your fridge periodically to save electricity. If yours is 20 years old, replacing with current gen fridge should cut your electricity bill from fridge usage by at least half
Source: https://blog.sense.com/how-much-energy-does-your-refrigerator-really-use/
mine is 15 yrs and i was contemplating to change to a more energy efficient one... but this fridge was the only surviving electrical appliance that hasn't spoilt before!
When i changed my old fridge also 20+ years old to a 3 tick one using the gov voucher it really did cut my bills by nearly 90 per month that thing was dying
get a cheap $10 power plug and measure. intuitively, i'd think yes though. i doubt it uses the newer tech (inverter, fridge fans). the tick system was also revamped some years back. old 3 ticks fridges are 2 ticks in the new system
For the time being you need to clean the air vent. Could be full of dust reducing efficiency and overheating.
Do you have a kid doing mining on its computer?
That's odd - Do you have an old aircon? 4rm HDB here, 3 persons - We have 2 air-cons on every night for about 10 hrs, some times I switch on for a couple of hours in the afternoon when it's hot and I work from home - Our monthly electrical bill is around $120 - $140 range.
aircons are relatively new. does your family use a dryer?
No. we don't. That could be it.
If you’re using an old dryer, it could be the source. I just switched to a heat pump dryer and hopefully will see a smaller bill moving forward.
May I know which electricity retailer do you use? SP group or?
Senoko but the discount is quite small these days.
Refrigerator might be the case. Higher ambient temperature, it will work harder to cool. Monitor the coolness in your fridge. If it start feeling warm outside the fridge beware you might need to budget for new refrigerator.
will monitor, thanks
https://www.pricekitchens.co.uk/blog/can-your-fridge-freezer-survive-the-heatwave/ Some extra info. My chest freezer auto shut down some time back. 😭
Only electric usage or total bill u mention? See your past few month usage chart of water, electric, gas. See which increase
Recently there was this govt subsidy thingy (can't rmb the name for it now) that we used up and our bills went up as well. Maybe its not ex from the start due to that and now only then shoot up. At least for my case I think that's what happened. My bills two hoomans at home oso one month 160+. Even tho last time my old house five hoomans oso not more than 300 dk why.
Heated water tank consumes power at about 3x that of aircon. Did you recently install a new water tank? Or someone recently decided to have the tank heated 24/7?
Depending on your electricity provider they will also do on and off again meter reading - one month estimate, one month reading. So some months the bill is estimated lower, then they charge you the difference when they check the meter.
Most likely culprit is ac. My house electricity bills also high but we usually have at least one ac running 6-8 hrs during the day and 3 at night 
This might be obvious but check if any contracts are up for your electricity bill provider. Also if you are not submitting meter readings, estimated reading numbers run higher for bills.
My hh switched away from using a 1600w portable AC (8h/day) a month and a half ago (which equates to roughly $100+ a mth) but the latest bill still nvr go down =.=, dunno scam or what lol. See next billing.
They estimate the usage every other month. So Unless you sell report. Need 2 months to see changes
Got submit meter reading lol, if its 2mths then next bill might be lower then
Actually why is there a need to estimate? Can’t they get the exact usage?
Too labour intensive to take manually i guess...so basically they figure ur avg u then charge u based on that estimate (for most people it shld be quite close), then they do a long review or u can submit your readings to get it back in line.
Same here. The main thing is the fridge that is causing the issue. Switch off all electrical appliance's when not in used. That how i do it. But the thing is A/C is also the main culprit in my household. But i managed to reduce the bill to 2 digits...previously is 3 digits....🥺
Any change in showering habits within your family?
Your contract with electricity provider ended? The electricity plan might have changed to a more expensive plan.
if you have the new smart meter check the SP app for power consumption. If not get the smart meter for power it's 40 dollar per installation I think. My family peak consumption came from water heater as we could see spikes at morning and evening times before and after work. Next was we could see intervals with airconditioning was 50% higher on than without. It helps you figure out power usage quite easily.
My bill spiked about 15%in the past 2 months and I attributed it to the heat wave. Not only did we use the aircon more, the energy usage is also higher because it's cooling a higher ambient temperature.
my bills started going up after they change the meter to a smart meter those people i know also experience the same thing
Someone told me that if you don’t have smart meter, the meter reading guy will come over to check once per 2 months. So they’ll give an estimation of the price of first month and charge the remaining on the subsequent month. Sometimes, the estimation is off so the bill may jump.
The SP app can show you usage in 30 mins denomination. You can use that to figure out what is causing high usage.
Also, report your meter on the app for the most accurate prices, or PUB will just use your previous rates or neighborhood rates to calculate.
Mine was 770 2 months ago - quit your crying.
who?