So its monday, which means its laundry day, its meant that its laundry day for years now, but its out of date with the new provincal high, med and low energy power costs. You see when I want to do my laundry on monday, it is in fact at the highest power costs per KWH.
Now I know what you going to say.. move laundry day to the weekend when the costs are the lowest possable, but there is a problem with that.. weekends are the workhorses of my week, they are only TWO days that I get my very strong backed hubby home with me, we tend to spend one day mowing/weeding and working in the gardens and the second day doing some kind of needed farm/critter work with one shopping trip thrown in, normally during the worst of the heat of the day..
Now my laundry line outside happens to run across my garden, no biggie on monday, cuz that is not a garden day, but the weekend, that is a hauling things, chopping of green things, working with hoe’s things and if anything is on the line, sure enough at some point, it will get dirty.
I don’t like to do laundry in the evening, I have tried, its a bright and early morning thing for me, I have started washing clothes in cold water (other then whites and some critter bedding, it needs hot) to help with energy costs, I have a critter laundry line, and peaple line, I have cloths racks for indoor drying, and I use the dryer as little as possable.
I use the water out of the dehumidifers for floor washing, as its grey water otherwise, we have a clear, if its yellow let it settle, if its brown flush it down and we have a very water wise toilet, we shower, instead of baths, and we often use the solar heated, rain water collected outside shower during spring/summer/fall.
No rugs in our house, so we rarely use the wet/dry vac, we sweep and mop instead, we use rainwater for outside waterings as much as possable, we have a hand pump well on the back barn, so that it does not cost energy to get the water from the deep well, and on the powered house well, we use it sparely. No AC, but fans do run for both the house and the barns and with this heat, will continue to do so.. having said that we use tree’s to help create shelter belts, and to cool the air coming in naturally.
Canning season is on us, and it is also hitting the energy prices on the head, the typical cool parts of the morning, when I tend to get up early to beat the heat, the produce was picked the evening before, and I process in the morning.. right at the highest peek costs, now I do have the propane stove, which helps with costs some, but I perfer to pressure can inside so that I have less possablity of temp control issues which means that its on the electic stove, and I am not canning late in the evening tired and heating up the house.
I want to cut power useage on the farm, and I am slowly but surely finding ways to make it happen, I now hand scrub certain things daily on my board, which cuts down on loads, I use my crock pot more, I use the big toaster oven (that can be a oven, a dehydrator, broil or defroster and will fit a full size cake pan or a 13 inch pizza in it) but for a fraction of the power use of the big oven. I have ordered a new thermal cooker, you only pay the energy to bring it to a boil and then it continues to cook for 2 to 6 hours with no further energy cost outpute. I ordered a ecozoom stove to be able to do VERY frugal and renewable outdoor cooking (I’m so going to try using dried cowpies to cook with at some point), I have a solar oven (which only works for a few months at best some of the time) I got a wood smoker for both hot and cold meat smoking, but not the power one.. I have outdoor dehyrdatiors, that only work for a few weeks of the season because of the humidity.
We use our naturally cooled cellar, and I use the one room in the house all spring/fall and most of the winter as a cold room, we use very limited heating in the winter and close off part of the house for the season (like they did in the old days).
I got solar lights to giving the laying girls extra light hours to reduce the cost of the power, for egg production, I keep back and respect broody girls that sit eggs, hatch chicks and raise them the way that has no energy costs compared to the folks that use the egg incubator, and the heat lambs etc. I have little second hand wool coats made for the lambs/kids out of recycled coats from value village instead of running heat lamps in winter.
I am so frugal, that when I heat the kettle now, I fill the thermo with the hot water left so that I don’t have to turn the stove back on to make another cuppa..
And what does it get me, besides a sense of pride.. when the bill comes in.. Nothing!, I have been able to reduce our use so low that the costs of getting it to us, etc is the higher part of the bill but it does not matter, the bills that come in now, use half or less of the power that was used the first year on the farm, and the bill itself is higher..
I know that having talked to other local small farms around me that I am very low on power use, the power company in fact once sent someone out to check our lines because our summer power use was so low, and still, the cost of power in the province is high..
The past couple bills have had a reduction of about ten dollars or so as a farmer rebate.. I will take it, as I am sure everyone who gets that small reduction will be happy to do so, but I will admit that I wonder what about the folks that are not trying to reduce? Do they just have enough money that they don’t care? What about folks on limited incomes? Are they doing without and just not talking about it?
Is it any wonder that I am always! on the look out for things that work without power, and are done by hand power, wind power, solar power, or animal power.. how about you?
Just another Day on the Farm 
Yes, unless you’re up and done before 7, the hydro rates’ll suck the skin right off of you in the morning when EVERYONE does most of their work; and which is, of course, why the rates are highest then. Thanks Dalton!!
Hi Deb
I know, the average worker does not start work before seven, so by starting at seven they are aiming it at families, homes and farms etc, we do our chores in the morning, regardess of their planned timing. The thing that really makes me snarl, is that their lowest price is still higher then the flat rate we paided before going to the three level system, so even if I was able to do everything at the lowest price, it would still be a price hike!
Yes, that is what I meant by “everyone” – those of us who work at home. However, I must tell you that it’s also when the day shift starts work at General Motors Assembly in Oshawa – lots of whom are also farmers. (That’s how they’re keeping the family farm alive.)
With the way hydro rates are charged now, the only way to make it work FOR you is to convert your self/family-supporting farm to a farm business and write it off on your taxes. The only way to win the game is to get in it, right?
I understand why the rates are highest at those times – it’s specifically to lower the load at those times because they’re not producing enough power to cover everyone’s demand. My sister thinks that it’s a conspiracy to make life difficult for those who stay at home. 🙂
Anyway, we’re in an apartment, so we don’t pay for our electricity. However, we still work very hard at limiting it because we know we’ll eventually be moving out of here, and I think we’re using about 149 kWh per month, at least with the things we can control, and I want to figure out how to lower that. I’ve talked to others about the cost of electricity, and I’ve seen predictions on how much it is intended to rise. I’ve heard that some expect the cost to be four times what it is now in ten years – so $0.36/kWh.
Sharon Astyk says it, and I agree with her. We need to work on ways to eliminate our use of electricity provided by the utility companies. Prices are going to continue to rise.
I wish I knew an answer for small farmers like you, Farmgal. I don’t know how anyone could be more energy-frugal than you are. How many kwh ARE you using per month?
Hi C.D.
It certainly does put anyone who does everything by hand at home paying out for it, so I can see your sisters point, really I can, I might like that I raise all my own food, but it means that I have to pay out all the energy costs to do all the processing, and freezing or canning etc, that is just included in the can at the store in the price. Would not change it, but it does have a real cost.
The lowest month ever was 18kwh daily, the average is about 30 and on the hardest parts in winter, it can get up to 60 per day, average over the year would be about 900kwh per month. Its worth noting that that is in effect the power for the house, and household needs, the big barn, the little barn and the small critter barn, so to a point, it like the power use of four houses on one bill.
The stuff in the stores is going up, too. Package sizes are getting smaller. You directly see and can control your energy costs, but the manufacturers are definitely not going to swallow the cost of electricity. Every time we go into Sobeys (which we avoid as much as possible!), I’m shocked at how expensive things are getting.
It seems that the average household is using about 1000 kWh per month … so you, with all of your outbuildings, are still using that. I agree with you —- HOW are people paying for this?
Hey CD – a few months back we got an insert with our hydro bill outlining how much the rates will rise. I wish I could find it (I kept it), but they are going up, supposedly to pay for the new green energy infrastructure (turbines and solar panels) in the province. I can’t remember what the increase will be, but it was enough in a short enough period of time to scare me a little, and we use way less hydro than anyone I know. While I understand that the infrastructure will cost money, the insert failed to mention that the companies that will own and run these new green energy endeavours are getting paid by the province per kW at multiple times the regular rate to produce green energy. I really need to find that insert now!
Hi Daisy
I will look forward to that info if you can find it, I know that they were offering a program here that paid up to 4x the amount of power sent back to the grid to the farmers that would put the solar on the barn roofs, they sent out a number of packages and then they started stopping by, the barn I call the little barn was big enough that it qaulified for the program, and they were tripping over themselves on the size amd lay of the big barns roof, as it was perfect for their projects, but the idea of putting myself into that kind of debt, even with a twenty year locked in contract was scary beyond scary to me. Still even then, I remember saying to my hubby, the only way they are going to be able to this is charge more and more for the regular customer.
The program went crazy here, only the first flush got the projected qoutes and contracts, then they pulled part of the program, and then they lowers the contract rates not once but twice if you wanted in on it. I know a number of folks in our area that have put in very large systems but they are not linked back to the grids, they are putting them in as a keep safe on the costs of powering and running their own homes and farms but not everyone can front the fifty to hundred grand needed in the upfront costs that they are doing..
I saw that, too. They’re paying $0.80/kWh for the FIT program, but the consumer is currently paying about $0.10 or less. The first thing that comes to MY mind when I see that, is that they put that in place because they expect consumer prices to go up ABOVE $0.80.
Our coal plants need to be closed soon, and the hydro generation plants are getting old and need to be refurbished. Plus … world opinion is turning against nuclear (for damn good reason, I think). All of this adds up to skyrocketing electricity prices.
Hey Farmgal,
It sounds like you’re doing an awesome job, and even if it doesn’t show up too much on your bill you should be proud of it. So many people are just willing to do things the easy way and pay. We’ve worked pretty hard on getting our useage down, and like you the delivery charges, etc. are higher than the useage charge on our bill. I wish I could cut it even more but I’ve got it at the bare bones for the time being – Dad has a fridge on his side of the house I would love to get rid of since it mostly just keeps his old deli meat and mustard cold, but he likes to feel he is somewhat independant of us and I can’t deny him that. I would love to get rid of one of my freezers but I only have weekends to do any canning. Still I am doing more drying this year and hopefully I can unplug one of them soon.
I was wondering, have you thought about switching to a gas stove? I know that’s just shifting the energy use, but isn’t gas more efficient? I’ve used gas all my life and for the short time we lived in the city we had electric stoves and it seemed to me it took forever to get things boiling. Could have just been the crappy rental units, though.
What really burns me when I read our bill is the debt retirement charge – we pay tax on that!!! I wish I could find someone to explain that one to me.
morning Daisy,
Thanks for your comments, I know, tax on a debt retirement charge that I pay for something that I didn’t even live in this province at the time it was created. I do have a propane stove in my summer kitchen, my electric stove is very new, (one of the only new things in my house and it works really well)
I am the same, given a choice between paying more in power to run the extra fridge in the summer to keep the produce from the garden till I can process it, is important, as is having that extra working fridge space while processing whole lambs or doing my own meats etc.
While its nice to can meat or smoke meat, lets face it, when you are trying to put away a full years worth of food off your own place, those big freezers are very valuable in the process but we certainly pays for them in energy costs. I normally have two running for part of the year and then once I get everything done for the seasons, I can move it down to one for part of the year, but now that I have half a huge freezer full of flour that I don’t want to go bad, it can’t be unplugged, and then there is the big meat freezer, which only gets turned on when we are sending out the lambs/kids for butcher and now that we have added in a cow and will have not only a pig and lambs but soon a yearly calf to the mix, that meat freezer will most likely be one most of the year as well.
Last night I sent hubby down with 3 dozen more canned jars of meat/pickles/stews made and canned yesterday and he came up and informed me that I am almost out of new shelve space, and that I will need to add more soon (I did a reno on my cellar last month and pulled down the very old shelving and replaced it with new but we only did so much as the start with plans to continue as needed).
I’ll tell you as I listen to the news, I am wanting more prepping while its good to do so, but its mixed with also feeling the need to bump the savings just a bit, just in case.
Hey Farmgal – Just a quick note ’cause I’m at work, I can’t find that insert but I did find this online: http://ottawa.ctv.ca/servlet/an/local/CTVNews/20110419/OTT_Electricity_Rates_110419/20110419/?hub=OttawaHome
It says hydro rates will go up 46% over 5 years.
Don’t you find it curious that everytime some “expert” says that gas/electricity/whatever prices are going to rise… surprise!!! Within a few days the price miraculously Does exactly what was predicted. Call me cynical, but I seem to have noticed that if there isn’t an immediate protest from the public, the proverbial “they” go ahead and raise their prices.
Is it just me, or has anyone else noticed this?
My parents are looking at putting solar into their little patch of land to save on electricity prices. Just to run their house it’s something $60,000. I can’t imagine how much they’d gouge…er charge to put in an array for the farm. That being said, with hydro prices doing what they are it’s a tempting thought. It’s a big out put at first, but think of the savings even if you don’t sell back to the grid.
We do our laundry almost exclusively at night, aren’t home at all during most of the peak hours, don’t have AC, have our heat in our small condo on minimally, seem to be using less electricity every month and yet our bills still seem to rise every time we get one. Pretty soon we’ll be using nothing and paying through the nose for the effort. It’s infuriating! I think we’re all agreed on that. The question is, what can we do about it? Bitching and moaning, while theraputic, ultimately won’t get anywhere. However, organizing ourselves into some sort of useful protest might. Now to figure out what that grassroots movement should look like and how to implement it.
Interesting about your parents looking at solar.. As for what I plan to do about it, well on the list so far, A windmill to bring water up from the big back well to not only provide water for the big and little barns but also to run into the small pond.
Plans to switch the barns over to solar one each year, the plans to switch the house to more wood burning heating and cooking, as I also talked about, I am investing in different new tec’s that reduse power needs directly, example, can use small amounts of heat in the new Ecozoom to bring the new steel pot to boil and then finish cooking in the Assuie cooking box’s.
Within five years if all goes as planned, we will flip the swtich’s and be off-grid from the power company altogether, that is my personal plan on what I can do about it..
but I am all for a grassroots movment effort if it could happen, I do think that power and its costs will be a factor in the next provincal vote.
opps, I should have also said, plans to run the fresh cool water from the pump from the barn, into the little shed as a old fashion spring house(aka water cooled for food storage) and then to the pond, thus allowing me to reduce the amount of fridges needed on the farm and therefor reduce the power use down to one small fridge ideally.