Typical electric usage in kWh?

spacecadet said:

I usually used 700-900kWh in my 800sq ft apartment in Houston. Peak being in the summer of course. I think we breached 1000kWh's once. 

My next apartment was 400 sqft and I used 800-1000kWh because the AC unit was very old and the building was not well insulated. 

Age of the home and efficiency of appliances makes a huge difference. 

I imagine your heat pumps are not very efficient.. 

House was built in 2001, so should be reasonably well-insulated, although there are a lot of windows.  The natural light is nice, but even with double-pane windows, I know the heat loss is significant.  I think we're around 2000 ft. ^2.  Both heat pumps have been replaced once, so they're pretty new.  We didn't spring for the super high-efficiency units, but they are no slouches either.

We probably average about 3 loads of laundry a day, so there's that, with the electric dryer.  Washer uses cold water almost exclusively.  Dishwasher runs once or twice a day.  Two 5000 BTU window units, one in the room over the garage, one in the garage, just to keep the humidity at a reasonable level.  Oh, and five computer systems running right now, with the kids running game servers, but I don't suspect that adds up to too awful much. 

Seems usage used to dip below 1000 kWh in the Spring and Fall every once in a while when the kids were little.  Now it's more showers, more laundry and more computers.  Gonna have to start billing them!

1988RedT2 said:

We probably average about 3 loads of laundry a day, so there's that, with the electric dryer. 

It's obvious that you're not too worried about electrical usage with everything you're doing, but this line specifically blew me away.

How does a family of 4 do 20 or more loads of laundry per week? That's 5 loads of laundry per person every week. Are you guys doing wardrobe changes like a broadway musical? Just insane. In my house (family of 3) everybody gets 1 load of lights, 1 load of darks and there's a joint load of towels and a joint load of sheets weekly.

STM317 said:

1988RedT2 said:

We probably average about 3 loads of laundry a day, so there's that, with the electric dryer. 

It's obvious that you're not too worried about electrical usage with everything you're doing, but this line specifically blew me away.

How does a family of 4 do 20 or more loads of laundry per week? That's 5 loads of laundry per person every week. Are you guys doing wardrobe changes like a broadway musical? Just insane. In my house (family of 3) everybody gets 1 load of lights, 1 load of darks and there's a joint load of towels and a joint load of sheets weekly.

I'm not 1988RedT2, but we have 5 kids, including 1 year old twins, so we run a load of diapers every other day or so in addition to the extra bedding and clothes.   I'd say we average about 2+ loads per day, normally it's 4 or 5 loads on one day and none for a few :)

Yeah it should be noted that we ran the dishwasher 1-2 times a week at most in place #1 and we ran laundry only a few times a week. 

My second place had no on-site laundry and didn't have a dishwasher.. 

In reply to WonkoTheSane :

Yeah, I'd say your usage is understandable for the situation. But you've got nearly twice as many people in your house as OP and you're still doing less laundry.

Well, let's see.  We just got off the boat.  Took the kids and two of their friends out on the river.  Towed them at breakneck speeds on a tube-like thingie.  Burned up 6 gallons of gas.  No one died.  Everybody had fun.  Win. Win.

There's a pile of wet swimsuits and towels on the floor in the laundry room as we speak.  So there's one load.  Sheets every week or so, towels, towels, towels, plus big kids have big clothes.  Yeah, okay.  Maybe two loads a day.  It varies.

Also, one king set, one queen set, and one twin set, plus pillowcases will NOT fit in a single load of laundry, so sheets is two loads, not one.

I do about 3 loads per week through the washer.  Those are medium sized loads.  Maybe 1 through the dryer.

Dishwasher is maybe 4x/week.

Gas heat and hot water. electric dryer and conventional AC (no heat pump). 1700sf brick ranch with full basement.

Summer peak use: 2,000 kw

Winter lowest: 875 kw

We run the AC cold in summer. R60 attic insulation. Double pane windows.. but leaky walls. Comfort costs more - but I choose comfort.

Edit: "always on" radon fan and a basement dehumidifier suck the watts. 

We had been seeing lower kWh usage with two new heat pumps and mild weather, but the last month has been brutally cold.  I'm looking at my latest bill for 2800 kWh, near $400 for the month.  Not a lot has changed.  Seems the heat pumps run continuously at night and switch off occasionally during the day.

The most noticeable difference is higher bills due to rising cost per kWh and surcharges.

In reply to CynthiaPrice :

I use this to reduce my off-peak. It has a flexible rate and insulation, local climate, and appliance efficiency and likes octopuses.