Re: Electricity metering [was: Dear Cohousing Community
From: Mark Owkes (mark.owkesgmail.com)
Date: Mon, 11 Jan 2021 13:39:12 -0800 (PST)
Yes, please!

Mark
Bozeman Cohousing
On Jan 11, 2021, 2:29 PM -0700, Chuck Harrison <cfharr [at] gmail.com>, wrote:
> Yes
>
>
> On Mon, Jan 11, 2021, 12:59 PM Ken Winter <ken [at] sunward.org> wrote:
>
> > A couple years ago, Sunward Cohousing installed a submetering system for
> > our *water* bills. We're very happy with it: It has solved equity
> > problems (our households, no matter how big or thirsty, *used *to pay
> > equally for the collective water usage), our consumption is down by
> > ~20%, and the web-based meter system issues automatic alerts of potential
> > leaks and higher-than-expected consumption.
> >
> > I've been meaning to write an article on this for cohousing.org or some
> > such medium, but I don't know how much interest there is from other coho
> > communities. Maybe I'll use this occasion to test the waters. Is anybody
> > reading this interested in knowing more about the whys, whats, and hows of
> > submetering?
> >
> > ~ Ken Winter
> > ~ Sunward Cohousing
> >
> > On Mon, Jan 11, 2021 at 3:03 PM Sharon Villines via Cohousing-L <
> > cohousing-l [at] cohousing.org> wrote:
> >
> > > > Chris Roth - Communities Editor <editor [at] gen-us.net>
> > >
> > > > At Lost Valley, each individual electric meter has … a
> > > > monthly charge (at least $10 apiece monthly, charged for each of the
> > > > less-than-five-minute visits/readings by the power company person) has
> > > > at times exceeded the actual additional electricity charge on some of
> > > > those meters.— And even though we've talked
> > > > about the desirability of reducing the number of meters to save costs,
> > > > we've also talked about increasing it, as some people likely consume
> > > > five or ten times as much electricity in their individual units (by
> > > > keeping the heat cranked up, etc.) as others do
> > >
> > > This is called sub-metering and is possible. I don’t know the costs but
> > > with a $10 charge for even reading meters, it sounds like it might be
> > worth
> > > it. The complex then has one meter and there are sub-meters inside each
> > > unit (or some other convenient spot). The meters can be read from outside
> > > the unit using wifi or bluetooth or something.
> > >
> > > If the minimum account charge is $30-40, many people will just be paying
> > > for having an account, not for each kwh unless they go over the minimum.
> > > And they may not.
> > >
> > > One intentional community (don’t remember which) put individual readers
> > in
> > > the front hall of units where residents could see them. They had large
> > > faces like clocks and that dramatically reduced usage.
> > >
> > > People worry about one or more households being wasteful users or
> > > whatever, but when I think about each of our households, I don’t think
> > any
> > > of them would be wasteful. Some have more people or are larger or are
> > home
> > > more, so there would be a variation but you could charge per adult
> > (regular
> > > residents, not occasional guests).
> > >
> > > One of our residents had an electric bill of $8 a month when others were
> > > $80 a month. She worked long hours away from home, had a 615 SF south
> > > facing unit, didn’t use her dishwasher or her dryer, and controlled her
> > > thermostat.
> > >
> > > (Our single meter water bill has greatly increased with all the people
> > > working from home. The treasurer was asking about a leak somewhere until
> > we
> > > realized what caused it.)
> > >
> > > Sharon
> > > ----
> > > Sharon Villines
> > > Takoma Village Cohousing, Washington DC
> > > http://www.takomavillage.org
> > >
> > >
> > >
> > >
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> > >
> > >
> > >
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> >
> >
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