NightWatcher
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The just of this story is that I'm either oblivious to worldly expenses or something isn't right. I'm just trying to help my mother get by every month.
We moved houses and the original owner had installed this solar system himself. A year ago the gel batteries died and we installed new lithium batteries. The entire setup will be posted below.
The Issue:
We have both a borehole and solar setup however my Mums utility bill for electricity keeps falling within the range of R7000 - R8000
So from the setup its good to know the entire house runs on the solar except for the stoves ( 2 gas plates 4 induction, oven, microwave and pool pump and borehole pump )
even our geysers are solar.
so a weird thing started happening a few months ago. City power gives us an estimate of our bill usually R5.5k for lights every month, keep in mind its a a house with 3 people living of which during the week no one is home most of the day as we all work and I'm studying. So besides the maid cleaning there's no one using that much power everyday. During the nights we hardly use the lights and I'm usually sitting at my laptop in my room doing work with a side light while my mum watches tv. The pool runs for 2 hours everyday and besides my mum baking twice a month everything else is pretty standard in our household. We just don't seem to be using that much power for the price city power is charging us.
every 3 months city power sends a new bill saying that they underestimated the money we owe them and jack it up saying we owe them 4-5k. in December the bill showed that we were even using stage 3 power. Keep in mind we don't even use fans during summer and as i said the geysers are even solar.
when brought up with city power ( obviously they do nothing )
1. My mum went to their offices as we still have a digital meter but not a prepaid one. The guy told her its 3k to put a meter in and we have to be on the list. I know the list thing is true but is it true that they charge you 3k for the prepaid meter to be put in? i know the service fee every month for the meter is R800 so if i switch that means my mum will save that R800 or so every month?
2. Someone advised us that if we hire a private electrician to do it and buy our own meter city power will have an issue so is that true should i not go about it this way?
3. To address our issue of high power consumption they told us they can monitor our power by putting some meter but it will cost us 2k every month to rent the meter which will read how much power we using inside the house vs the rate on the outside box. That's dam ridiculous . So I'm currently thinking it will be cheaper to call an electrician to take a look but really what can they do, Perhaps anyone here would have a suggestion as to how i can more effectively monitor this and try and reduce our bill because the price and consumption doesn't correlate. Last year i 3D printed some months and our bill wasn't this high.
4. The solar issues now : the way our solar is set up is to run the entire house off the solar, when there isn't enough use the store battery power and then only then use utility. when i monitor the power majority of the time i.e. 90% its running us on solar power and the stored solar battery power at night. So when exactly are we using R7k worth of electricity?????
I've seen some WIFI modules to monitor your solar consumption using an app but does anyone have any idea how i can figure this out. i.e. monitor the consumption and how exactly we using all of the solar power finished to a point that my mums electricity bill is still so high. that means if i had no solar my mum would be spending upwards of 10K on electricity alone?
5. My last issue is everyone we called has spun a different story thus far. The guy who installed the battery informed my mum that the inverter is old and needs to be changed because it cant handle the batteries. is that true?
someone else then told us we need to add 5 more panels to run completely off the grid as we have very little panels, is that true?
i know this is a long rant and me seeking a lot of advice. if my mum could afford it id just hire someone but like i said, I'm studying and she's trying to keep the house running and every month when that electricity bill comes i can see her stressing so if anyone can try and give me some advice id gladly take it. I'm always not home when the installed the new batteries etc. so i tend to miss out of what they tell my mum.
i hope this is in the correct thread
Note we have 2 batteries not just the one
We moved houses and the original owner had installed this solar system himself. A year ago the gel batteries died and we installed new lithium batteries. The entire setup will be posted below.
The Issue:
We have both a borehole and solar setup however my Mums utility bill for electricity keeps falling within the range of R7000 - R8000
So from the setup its good to know the entire house runs on the solar except for the stoves ( 2 gas plates 4 induction, oven, microwave and pool pump and borehole pump )
even our geysers are solar.
so a weird thing started happening a few months ago. City power gives us an estimate of our bill usually R5.5k for lights every month, keep in mind its a a house with 3 people living of which during the week no one is home most of the day as we all work and I'm studying. So besides the maid cleaning there's no one using that much power everyday. During the nights we hardly use the lights and I'm usually sitting at my laptop in my room doing work with a side light while my mum watches tv. The pool runs for 2 hours everyday and besides my mum baking twice a month everything else is pretty standard in our household. We just don't seem to be using that much power for the price city power is charging us.
every 3 months city power sends a new bill saying that they underestimated the money we owe them and jack it up saying we owe them 4-5k. in December the bill showed that we were even using stage 3 power. Keep in mind we don't even use fans during summer and as i said the geysers are even solar.
when brought up with city power ( obviously they do nothing )
1. My mum went to their offices as we still have a digital meter but not a prepaid one. The guy told her its 3k to put a meter in and we have to be on the list. I know the list thing is true but is it true that they charge you 3k for the prepaid meter to be put in? i know the service fee every month for the meter is R800 so if i switch that means my mum will save that R800 or so every month?
2. Someone advised us that if we hire a private electrician to do it and buy our own meter city power will have an issue so is that true should i not go about it this way?
3. To address our issue of high power consumption they told us they can monitor our power by putting some meter but it will cost us 2k every month to rent the meter which will read how much power we using inside the house vs the rate on the outside box. That's dam ridiculous . So I'm currently thinking it will be cheaper to call an electrician to take a look but really what can they do, Perhaps anyone here would have a suggestion as to how i can more effectively monitor this and try and reduce our bill because the price and consumption doesn't correlate. Last year i 3D printed some months and our bill wasn't this high.
4. The solar issues now : the way our solar is set up is to run the entire house off the solar, when there isn't enough use the store battery power and then only then use utility. when i monitor the power majority of the time i.e. 90% its running us on solar power and the stored solar battery power at night. So when exactly are we using R7k worth of electricity?????
I've seen some WIFI modules to monitor your solar consumption using an app but does anyone have any idea how i can figure this out. i.e. monitor the consumption and how exactly we using all of the solar power finished to a point that my mums electricity bill is still so high. that means if i had no solar my mum would be spending upwards of 10K on electricity alone?
5. My last issue is everyone we called has spun a different story thus far. The guy who installed the battery informed my mum that the inverter is old and needs to be changed because it cant handle the batteries. is that true?
someone else then told us we need to add 5 more panels to run completely off the grid as we have very little panels, is that true?
i know this is a long rant and me seeking a lot of advice. if my mum could afford it id just hire someone but like i said, I'm studying and she's trying to keep the house running and every month when that electricity bill comes i can see her stressing so if anyone can try and give me some advice id gladly take it. I'm always not home when the installed the new batteries etc. so i tend to miss out of what they tell my mum.
i hope this is in the correct thread
Note we have 2 batteries not just the one
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