Anybody using Interruptible electric service...?

[PatrickW]

My local electric company offers a hefty discount (50% off the normal rate) on electricity that is run through an Interruptible meter.

That is a meter which is read separately from the regular house meter, and which can be remotely shut off by the electric company during times of "peak usage".

Anybody doing this for their garage...?

I bought one of these meters for my garage. Between the price I paid for it ($100) and a rebate by the electric company for my electric heater (-$100), the cost was a wash.

I'm also thinking of running my kitchen and living room through that meter. Both of those rooms have old refrigerators which I believe really consume a lot of electricity (they dim the houses lights whenever they kick in).

I'm interested in any real-life experiences or "gotchas" from anybody else who's using an interruptible meter. I'm going to have a local electrician install it, just to be on the safe side.

- Patrick

 

[milly]

My parents are on that type of plan. Only the A/C system is on the interruptable box. During peak hours of usage, the electric company shuts down the box for about 15 minutes every hour.

 

[Brian]

I worked at a place that had interuptable service. It became problematic for them because in the summers the power was being shut off far more often than the electric company had led them to believe.

 

[TACRick]

My parents are on that type of plan. Only the A/C system is on the interruptable box. During peak hours of usage, the electric company shuts down the box for about 15 minutes every hour.

Around here item #2 that they include is the hot water heater. Unless you use a lot of hot water in high-demand periods you wouldn't notice it. But losing the A/C (in general) or the power in your garage at the whim of the power company would be a bummer.

 

[trovato]

I'm also thinking of running my kitchen and living room through that meter. Both of those rooms have old refrigerators which I believe really consume a lot of electricity (they dim the houses lights whenever they kick in).

- Patrick

Old refrigerators use a lot of electricity. The first question to ask yourself is do you really need more than one? Then look into replacing with new ones. Depending on how old and inefficient the current ones are, the payback time may be very short.

 

[PatrickW]

Those are good comments - just what I was looking for

So perhaps a better idea would be to run just the electric garage heater through the interruptible meter, and "give in" to my wife's repeated requests for a new refrigerator...

Of course what that will actually mean is that the "old" refrigerator will then be moved out into the garage as a "beer 'fridge", so it'll probably end up on the interruptible circuit anyway.

- Patrick

 

[DynoDave]

Our home a/c is on that service. It's been turned off a few times, but not too much. My one gripe is that it's only supposed to be for 15 minutes at a time, but one day it was off for several hours. That sucked, but has never happened again.

Interesting comments on the fridge!

 

[JohnZ]

"Interruption" is normal with Detroit Edison (usually for no apparent reason - no storms, etc.); finally got sick and tired of it after losing several freezers full of food when the power went off while we were gone on weekends and installed an 18-KW Generac natural gas-powered automatic standby generator. We'll never get "interrupted" again.

http://www.villagephotos.com/pubbrowse.asp?folder_id=359956

 

[bmwpower]

"Interruption" is normal with Detroit Edison (usually for no apparent reason - no storms, etc.); finally got sick and tired of it after losing several freezers full of food when the power went off while we were gone on weekends and installed an 18-KW Generac natural gas-powered automatic standby generator. We'll never get "interrupted" again.

http://www.villagephotos.com/pubbrowse.asp?folder_id=359956

Man, that's awesome. I wish I would have installed one of those when I built my house, but the price was up there.

 

[mike944]

Aren't "peak electricity demands" usually in the middle of the day on weekdays? Unless you're retired, and work in your garage during these time periods, or you have a business running out of it, chances are that you're probably not even around when your service is likely to be interrupted. Sounds like a big money saver to me!
________
Yamaha XV250

 

[AndrewM]

I used to work for Scientific-Atlanta, selling these things to utilities (before the business went in the crapper). Well, I was an Applications Engineer - basically the guy who sits in the meeting and corrects the Sales guy when he promises the moon. "Uhh, Bob, it really works this way..."...

They are designed to take a command from a master station, and cycle a certain number of intervals for a certain duration. A/C and water heaters are the main application, but other areas control pool pumps, irrigation pumps, or floor/strip heaters. None of the programs I worked on were aimed at fridges or even full meters.

And yes, they are 'supposed' to be used during heavy load or emergency situations. They are considered as "negawatts" - negative megawatts - to a power company. Shave the peak, save money by not having to buy on the $expensive$ spot electricity market.

Now, we never did full meter programs either. That'd be an interesting program. We did have a service interrupt device (full meter disconnect), but those were usually for slow/no pay customers or high turnover areas.

They are supposed to allow the A/C to run during intervals - the house will warm up some - but since they're supposed to cycle, you don't lose A/C completely.

I probably wouldn't put the fridge on an interruptible meter. They likely expect you to put 'stuff' behind the meter that would be off for a while. I wouldn't want to cycle a 100A or 200A service every 15 minutes... Parts would wear out fast.