TrinaForest

Thanks for your replies, appreciate it we were told by two different reps that the delivery charge is $23.42. It's 5 min from Keswick, there are many houses nearby. I guess we will just have to wait and see.

bats

We use an oil filled radiator in one room, it works well but no idea of costs etc as it is the first month we have used it. Might be worth looking into costs for thoise. I think Hydro One hss an appliance calculator on their website

TrinaForest

Yeah, I'm going to do some more research. The calculator would appear to use the off peak rate. We will probably need at least three heaters and that's just a guess.

Novocastrian

I gather from your earlier posts that your OH works in Toronto and in a professional position.

Why on earth are you renting a hovel near Kes-wick?

dbd33

I think "delivery charge" is separately itemised and ours may be $23.42. The bill is a baffling document running to several pages and using different billing periods for different line items. The $140 is the fixed cost, the amount paid whether or not electricity is used, and includes "delivery charge", "debt retirement charge", "low population density surcharge", "meter reading charge" and so on.

Thinking of electricity, you might want to consider getting a generator as we're into the power cut season.

orly

Last winter we lived in a ~700sq.ft apartment with baseboard heating. By basically being cold during the day (heating off) and only having it on a few hours in the evening and over night we kept the bills to about $100-120/month with Hydro One.

I'd recommend buying some hot water bottles.

iaink

Delivery charge is just the tip of the iceberg when it comes to non usage related hydro one charges. Our $130 a month Hydro Bill is only actually about $50 of actual usage. We dont heat anything with hydro and still pay $130 a month.

As others have said, its going to be pricey. Ive seem people pile bales of straw around the outside of properties to prevent cold air circulating into the crawl space.

As you are open plan, if you can convince the landlord to allow it spring for a woodstove. Hydro based heating is the most expensive option in Ontario. Our neighbours across the road peaked at about $1300 for a single month before switching to a propane forced air system from their old electric furnace (which apparently heats simply by burning money!)

orly

Was hoping the new building I'd moved to would be easier to keep warm. Being on the 3rd floor we'd hopefully get some heat from below. The building itself has a HVAC system throughout. I was less than impressed this morning when I walked down the hall to find the vents were blowing out cold air. Silly buggers have the AC on when it's -5 outside.

Siouxie

I would have a word with the Building Dept. Property Standards at (519) 837-5615.

http://guelph.ca/wp-content/uploads/...dardsBylaw.pdf

The City of Guelph Property Standards By-law states:

HEATING SYSTEMS

4.13 Every building, except for an industrial occupancy, shall be provided with heating facilities capable of maintaining an indoor ambient temperature of 21 degrees Celsius (70 degrees F.) in all occupied areas.

4.14 Every heating system, fuel burning appliance, chimney, and other mechanical system shall be operated and maintained in good working order and free from unsafe conditions.

4.15 No portable heating equipment shall be used as the primary source of heat in any room.

Souvy

Errrm...

You don't just buy baseboard heaters and plug them in. They run off 220V. Your wall sockets are 110V.

Look at alternative forms of heating.

Or what Siouxie just said.

orly

Oh it's capable of blowing out warm air...just seems today it's set to blow out cold air in the public hallways (or it's malfunctioning). I'm sure one of the older tenants will be having words in short order. If not I'll give our building people a call

ultrarunner

Like this one

iaink

The max you can get from any one circuit here (outside of 20A circuits in more modern kitchens) is likely to be 1650W (15A x 110V)

Any more than that and you start to blow breakers or melt wiring

Probably not enough to fight off the worst of the winter here, no matter how artfully designed or massively marked up the cost is.


Still, I suppose if you can Jerry Rig the breaker and plug a couple of space heaters in then you will be able to keep warm for a while in the warm glow of your home burning down around you.

orly

As custom PC builders will begin to find out more and more in future as their epic hardware begins to max out what can be delivered. Already plenty of graphics cards capable of drawing 400w on their own when loaded and no shortage of basement dwellers who have 2 per computer lol.

TrinaForest

Just an update to let you know that I got my hydro bill for 5 months of service and it wasn't bad at all. I had 5 baseboard heaters working away all winter to maintain a temperature that was comfortably warm. Bill amount: $1300. Not bad at all, right?