1 thing that I always keep a lookout for whenever I drive is the price of petrol prominently displayed at Shell petrol kiosks. If you are not aware, all petrol companies charge the same price for petrol. So even I don’t pump at Shell, they definitely provide useful information to me. Thanks Shell!
I’ve been anticipating the rise in oil prices as it was covered in news worldwide. However, what I did not expect to happen so fast was the increase in our electricity price. Titled “Electricity prices up again” in The Straits Times.
“up again” they phrased it so matter of fact. I almost lost count the number of times our bills went up. You can complain, shout or cry and there’s nothing you can do about it other than to off your main switch after watching TV. No more standby mode! Use fan, not air-con!
For the 1st quarter of 2010, the price is set at 22.87 cents per KWh. How much is that? Let’s take for example something you are using right now – computer. I ran a check at Hardwarezone.com and realised that the desktop that you might be using now uses a 500W (0.5 KW = 11.435 cents per hour) power supply.
If you are like some of my friends who got desktops that “never sleeps” (24 hours switched on. No idea why, probably supporting NASA in space observation…haha), that will equate to $2.7444/day or $1001.706/year (provided electricity bill don’t go up again…)!
That’s only for your desktop! There are so many other “electricity vampires” lurking in your home. I hope that the US dollar will strengthen and bring some comfort to our electrical bills.
Unless being part of OPEC, we are pretty much held hostage by the supply of oil. What we can do right now is to be more prudent in our electricity consumption. Go green!
