saving electricity on the farm

[Destroked 450]

Sure, lots of variables. Suppose the heat pump had a COP of 4, but electricity cost went up 3X? You loose. Plus the fact that the capital cost is so very high for heat pumps and they are so poorly built in China. Natural gas is made in the earth for free, piping is not very expensive (much lower capital cost and operating cost for nat gas). Just think how many high priced electrical engineers,techs, electricians it takes to run an electrical utility. Electricity will always cost more than natural gas. So electricity should not really be used to produce heat only. If you doubt this do you have any proof?

Closes natural gas to me is 10 miles, we have a choice of electric or propane, if you don’t pre purchase propane during warm weather when the price is down to different in winter cost is much different

 

[John T]

Oh gee wiz an engineer that became a lawyer. I cant imagine the conflicts in your peace of mind. My sympathies to you.

Thanks but no sympathies required nor any conflicts whatsoever I’m a happy contented at peace Christian man at peace in mind body and spirit. I worked hard for and am proud of my law and engineering degrees that’s something no one can ever take from me and I try my best to help everyone here with all due respect to all regardless of their occupation or education. I figure a man should be proud of however he chose to raise his family and the education he received. Im sure proud of mine and not the type to question a man’s profession, education or career as that’s his private sacred choice .

Best wishes God bless you and yours nice chatting with you. I wish you a happy prosperous and blessed new year

PS Congratulations on your engineering career.

John T. Proud BSEE as well as JD

 

[will-max dairy]

Sure, lots of variables. Suppose the heat pump had a COP of 4, but electricity cost went up 3X? You loose. Plus the fact that the capital cost is so very high for heat pumps and they are so poorly built in China. Natural gas is made in the earth for free, piping is not very expensive (much lower capital cost and operating cost for nat gas). Just think how many high priced electrical engineers,techs, electricians it takes to run an electrical utility. Electricity will always cost more than natural gas. So electricity should not really be used to produce heat only. If you doubt this do you have any proof?

And natural gas furnaces aren't made in China?

And natural gas piping just naturally occurs in the ground? They just inject in with a big syringe and it follows tree roots and mushrooms mycelium to your house?

And the ductwork or piping used to distribute natural gas heat around a house doesn't cost anything?

Doesn't need a chimney?

Doesn't blow up a house or two here and there every year?

Doesn't kill a few people here and there every year with CO poisoning?

There was a comment somewhere that every situation is different. I would agree with that 100%. Every type of heating has advantages/disadvantages.

By the way... the WattSaver should be called the What?Saver?...

I saw John T's comment about power factor correction (agree 100%) ; and yeah... power factor correction IS a thing... if you are running a factory with a bunch of inductive motors... which isn't what What?Saver?s are designed for.

Also... when it comes to heating pipes. An electric heat tape and some pipe insulation is a FAR better solution in many instances, as opposed to heating an entire area of a house/garage/cellar, crawl space, just to keep a water line running.

In my case, I can either run an 1800Watt Space heater to heat the entire space... or a heat tape of a few watts wrapped on the pipe with some insulation.

Conservation is the only thing that "saves" cost... but not many people want to hear that...

 

[John T]

I'm an engineer and a master electrician--the formulas for power usage haven't changed in hundreds of years. Those ads are a joke.

Exactly they are the same as when I learned them over 50 years ago at Purdue EE and were hundreds of years old then lol

Nice sparky chatting with you Paul

John T. BSEE,JD

 

[Texasmark]

There are a lot of them out there, deliberately asking a question most folks never thought to ask trying to arouse your curiosity. If I want to know something I post the question on my www search engine and review the comments.

I read the other day that the annual expenditure in the USA for advertising is.......hang on......$330 "B"illion.....that's Billion with a B, not M.

I started clocking ads on "free" TV that I have now with a 60' antenna on a tripod catching a station 7 miles away, and some have the same time line for commercials as for story content; every 7 minutes was the worst; most every 15 minutes. Watching football games is a real jerk when not only do they cram commercials into any break they get, buy sometimes run over and block out plays that you may have wanted to see if they haven't posted the required number of revenue dollars.

I used to have satellite TV and cancelled it......decided I wasn't going to pay $150/month to watch TV commercials.

Update on my COOP supplier: Being a coop they are non profit. My kickback for the year, paid on the last bill of the year, amounted to half the amount of my Nov. bill. Now that's real savings, not a gimmic.

 

[stdsch40]

 

[petertay]

I knew someone that did that, but the power company saw that the light bill suddenly took a huge drop and investigated. They sent him a bill and told him to pay it or face prosecution. Needless to say he paid it. They just checked what his bill had been before and that's what he had to pay back.

When we moved onto an old farm house, we added a door between the kitchen and the unheated porch. The electric company came by after a few months to look at our meter. They thought we might be cheating somehow. No, we were just using less electricity!

 

[Russ from MN]

If the electrical loads have a low lagging power factor and the utility charges for inductive current . Then yes a large enough magic box of power factor correction capacitors can push the PF closer to unity .

I think that might have been the reason for leaving some large motors idling in the paper mill when they weren't grinding pulp. One department had 12-5,000 hp synchronous motors on chip refiners that only ground chips when power was cheaper at night. If we didn't need to do maintenace on them they would just idle all day.

 

[JMOR]

Is it an absolute fact that IF your current and voltage at the power meter are 180 degrees out of phase, then the meter reads zero usage?

 

[bc]

Something just come to mind. Hypothetically if you splice in conductors before the meter and connect them to your panel with the ones going through the meter, what would that do to the meter reading? Just wondering.

 

[Brown David]

Something just come to mind. Hypothetically if you splice in conductors before the meter and connect them to your panel with the ones going through the meter, what would that do to the meter reading? Just wondering.

Try it and let us know.

 

[JMOR]

Something just come to mind. Hypothetically if you splice in conductors before the meter and connect them to your panel with the ones going through the meter, what would that do to the meter reading? Just wondering.

Seems clear to me that you would simply be shorting out the meter, such that (given big enough wires), resulting in zero readings and considered theft.

 

[JMOR]

Here is a nice story for ya. I once changed out the 120v service in a place to a 240v service & of course the meters are not compatible. Power company said maybe a few days before they could get a new meter in and advised me as to how to keep things running until new meter installed. Meter plugged into a blade type connector slots & I was told to cut or break hacksaw blades to proper length to reach from input to output connector slots. Worked perfectly. Best part was that I didn't electrocute myself doing it!!!

 

[Texasmark]

Seems clear to me that you would simply be shorting out the meter, such that (given big enough wires), resulting in zero readings and considered theft.

No doubt somewhere along the line, someone at the power company would realize the fact that your monthly charge is zero after it being what is was and investigate. Besides they work for me, restore power in the most difficult of conditions during.....during.....storms 24/7, get them up at all hours of the night from their beds and family and go out in harm's way and they earn their pay checks. Shame on folks who impede that process.

 

[bc]

Seems clear to me that you would simply be shorting out the meter, such that (given big enough wires), resulting in zero readings and considered theft.

It couldn't be wired up that way where I'm at.

I don't see how the meter would be shorted out. It would just carry a lesser amount of the load. If I had 2 water lines coming in the house with only 1 going through the meter, the water meter wouldn't short out to no flow.

1. I'm just thinking you have two parallel paths of the same size wire, neither one going through a meter that each path would carry 50% of the load.

2. Assuming number 1 is true, if you have two parallel paths, one unhibibited and one meeting a little bit of resistance going through the meter, would the load going through the meter be less than 50% depending upon the amount of resistance the meter has?

And wouldn't this get picked up at the meter with all this power factor correction mumbo jumbo everyone is talking about?

I'm thinking something like jumper cables.

Talking theory here.

 

[stdsch40]

A lot of nonsense talk about by-passing the electrical meter. Not that I like paying a high price for electricity but this is theft plain and simple. Cheat the utility if you are willing to bear the consequences. I advocate to use less or figure out a way to make your own electricity. How about burning biodiesel in a diesel engine made from that waste of a crop called canola. Or, how about solar panels, batteries, wind turbines, etc. ?

 

[JMOR]

It couldn't be wired up that way where I'm at.

I don't see how the meter would be shorted out. It would just carry a lesser amount of the load. If I had 2 water lines coming in the house with only 1 going through the meter, the water meter wouldn't short out to no flow.

1. I'm just thinking you have two parallel paths of the same size wire, neither one going through a meter that each path would carry 50% of the load.

2. Assuming number 1 is true, if you have two parallel paths, one unhibibited and one meeting a little bit of resistance going through the meter, would the load going through the meter be less than 50% depending upon the amount of resistance the meter has?

And wouldn't this get picked up at the meter with all this power factor correction mumbo jumbo everyone is talking about?

I'm thinking something like jumper cables.

Talking theory here.

Didn’t read carefully! T said, “

 

[JMOR]

Reply

Didn’t read carefully! T said, “

ReplyI said, “given big enough wires”. As for your water case, bypass 1/2 inch meter line with a 4 inch line. See how little your meter reads then!

 

[TerryfromSWIowa]

Here is a nice story for ya. I once changed out the 120v service in a place to a 240v service & of course the meters are not compatible. Power company said maybe a few days before they could get a new meter in and advised me as to how to keep things running until new meter installed. Meter plugged into a blade type connector slots & I was told to cut or break hacksaw blades to proper length to reach from input to output connector slots. Worked perfectly. Best part was that I didn't electrocute myself doing it!!!

How many hack saw blades did it take to fill in where the meter blades connected?

 

[JMOR]

How many hack saw blades did it take to fill in where the meter blades connected?

one for L1 and one for L2