subject: Electricity Bills: How To Lower Your Electric Bill In 5 Minutes Or Less [print this page] Electricity Bills: How To Lower Your Electric Bill In 5 Minutes Or Less
There are two ways to lower your monthly electricity bill: either reduce the amount of electricity you use, or lower the price you pay per kWh for the electricity. Reducing your electricity usage takes planning and diligence, but you can reduce your electricity rate in as little as 5 minutes by comparing electric rates and switching to a cheaper rate.
Whether you live in an apartment or a house, your electricity bill is probably one of your most expensive bills month after month. Here is how I lowered our monthly electric bill. The first thing I did (since it was the easiest and quickest) was compare electric rates of competing electric providers in our area. I found that we had been paying almost 30% above the going rates, so with just a couple of minutes of work I locked in a great 2yr rate. Presto, our electricity bill is now 30% less than it had been!
Next, I replaced our old manual thermostat with a new programmable one. This allowed us to program a schedule for the use of our A/C. We like it cold while we sleep, but we were having to manually make it warmer when we awoke and then it would be hot when we arrived back home from work in the summer. Now the temperature automatically switches from 68 to 78 about an hour before we wake up, stays that way while we are at work, then switches to 72 about an hour before we get home and then back to 68 around 10pm. This helped lower our bill another 15%.
The last step I took was to replace our standard bulbs with CFL bulbs. This lowered our bills by another 5% or so. Since the CFLs last 15 times longer than the standard bulbs, we should come out way ahead on the cost of switching out the bulbs.
I was pretty amazed at how little effort it took to substantially lower my monthly electric bill. The initial 30% savings was huge and immediate. The replacing of the thermostat took a bit of effort, but I was able to do the workmyself in about 30 minutes, and I am anything but "handy" as my family will attest to. The CFL bulbs cost more then the normal bulbs, but it they did lower the electric bill right off, so they work as advertised.
