Kierland wrote: ↑Thu Jun 27, 2019 8:56 pm
So you made $20 bucks.
How much did you save on the e bill and the gas bill?
May and June are usually our lowest months, due to little or no AC and increasing PV production coming out of winter and spring. Depends a lot on the weather, but last year we paid $67.00 in June, $155 the year before (it was a very hot month). Since then, though, I added the EV and we changed out the propane dryer for an electric one, so I figure we're maybe $150.00 ahead for the month.
It's propane that's killing us. I get the tank filled 3 or 4 time per year at about $400 - $500 per shot. Last fill was over $700. My next move is a solar water heater with heat pump backup. Then, replace the AC and furnace with a heat pump as well, and we will be off propane completely. Amerigas can go fuck themselves.
Last edited by Mikey on Thu Jun 27, 2019 9:31 pm, edited 1 time in total.
California actually has fairly low property taxes, at least on average, because of Prop 13 which limits the property tax to 1% of the assessed value when ownership of the home changes. Assessment increases are limited to 2% per year. We've owned our home for 20 years so our taxes haven't gone up much since then.
Great for existing property owners, but sucks for people wanting to buy. If our home was sold today the taxes would just about double. Still a lot less than you'd pay in New Jersey, though. Or even Texas.
One thing I didn't mention earlier - I haven't bought any gasoline in over a month.
The one thing that they will really need to address is money for building and maintaining roads. Most of that currently comes from gasoline taxes and, obviously, EV owners don't pay any gas taxes. This is not only unfair, because EVs use the roads too, but very regressive since most EVs are not bought by lower income drivers. They may have to put an assessment on the registration fee, or even come up with some kind of odometer tax.
Right now, they're actually paying people to buy EVs. I have a $2500 rebate coming from the state sometime in the next month or two.
Our son moved out a month ago. Our daughter moved out last year, so hopefully our usage will go down. It's only for hot water (mostly) and space heat - we replaced our gas (propane) clothes dryer three years ago with an electric one, and just replaced that with an ultra high efficiency ventless heat pump dryer. Propane is pretty expensive - I think we pay around $4 per gallon. Way more than natural gas, though I can't really make an exact comparison.
Edit:
Actually I can make an exact comparison.
SDG&E's current residential general service rate is $1.31/therm.
Our last propane purchase was at $4.79/gal.
1 therm is equivalent to 1.1 gallons of propane.
So,
(4.79 $/gal) / (1 therm / 1.1 gal) = $5.27/therm
So propane is 4 times as expensive to use as natural gas.
Like I said, fuck Amerigas.
Last edited by Mikey on Fri Jun 28, 2019 7:20 pm, edited 1 time in total.
Gotta get it while you can. I'm going to buy as much energy saving stuff that has rebates and incentives as I can so that when I retire in a few years I'll have all that stuff in and be paying minimum utilities.
I just realized after doing the calcs on propane vs electricity, I can save 90% or more on my water heating cost by getting an electric heat pump water heater, which has a $350 CA rebate right now. Starting to shop around today. That should have about a 2 year payback, or less.
