Is the cost of energy (gasoline, electricity, natural gas, propane, etc.) affecting you?

Just curious. My house is all electric. Recently Cincinnati Gas and Electric became 'Duke Energy' and prices shot up about 30% almost immediately. Now, that said, there hasn't been a significant increase in the price of electricity here in the last 10 years, so I'm not really complaining.

Note that I'm asking this of everyone here - NOT just people in the US.

Is the cost of energy (gasoline, electricity, natural gas, propane, etc.) affecting you?

Just curious. My house is all electric. Recently Cincinnati Gas and Electric became 'Duke Energy' and prices shot up about 30% almost immediately. Now, that said, there hasn't been a significant increase in the price of electricity here in the last 10 years, so I'm not really complaining.

Note that I'm asking this of everyone here - NOT just people in the US.

Electricity

When I was living in Southeast Florida, and the only energy you could get (at least in my case) was Electric. I ran the A/C 24-7 at 75 Degrees and it was running about $110.00 per month for a 2 + 2 approx 1200 Sq Feet Condo.

Now living in Georgia, I haven't seen any utility bills yet but I have talked to other people and they say it runs about $50.00-$75.00 for electric per month for a 2 + 2.

I just talked with my sister this past Saturday and she lives in Riverside County in California and she said her electric is running around $400.00 per month for 4 +2.5 two story house about 1500 Sq Feet.

Gasoline

Gasoline prices haven't really affected me because I currently live about 1.1 miles from work.

Natural Gas

Living in Florida you didn't have much of a choice, since approx 85% of the households, everything is electric

Hi Marc,

My house is also all electric, as were my two prior houses, going back to 1978. I felt for many years that overall electricity would have more stable pricing than natural gas or oil for home heating. The greatest impact on electric cost seems to be location. Places like Hawaii have high electric rates.

I do use gasoline, but commute only about 25 miles round trip to work, and drive a car that gets around 28 mpg. I do take longer trips about four times a year, and that is when the cost of gasoline seems rather important, but it doesn't prevent me from taking the trips.

For your survey, I guess my response would be no, but it isn't significantly affecting my budget.

Wes R.

I cancelled my vacation plans to Michigan due the the increased cost of gas for round trip from South Carolina. Also my increased costs of living expenses such as utilities, house payment went up due to increased property taxes, insurance costs for cars and house increased, increased medical insurance costs and copays, etc. Wages.....not increased
Maybe can make it next year.

My house is natural gas & electric, and living around Marc I get the same ^ in costs. Just bought that S10 Blazer in April (already discussed as a lemon here) for trips for photo related stuff, and the extra gas $ is showing now.

I voted yes but not significantly, the extra $ shows but I'm not destitute just yet... (Got behind on my electric bill earlier this year & just getting caught up, the winter $ was killing me).

Jerry

I cancelled my vacation plans to Michigan due the the increased cost of gas
A friend of mine recently almost cancelled his vacation to visit a friend in Florida - Ft. Meyers - Sanibel area - Because of gas prices. He ended up flying with some frequent flier miles, but said if he couldn't have used those he wasn't going to go. I know him and he could afford it - It was a matter of priorities - He HATES to pay for gasoline and he commutes several hundred miles a week to his business. He was complaining that his gasoline bill was almost twice as much in the last year as it was the year before. He DOES get to take it off on income taxes (business car), but he's still paying for it because he owns the company so it's still $ out of his pocket.

(Got behind on my electric bill earlier this year & just getting caught up, the winter $ was killing me).
Check the usage graph on the bill. I'm almost afraid of what it will cost me this coming winter.

I don't take a 'home office' deduction, because of the complications if I sell the house at some time and all that, but this year I will be claiming some of my electric costs which I never did before. I've got over 5000 watts of backup power supplies running, 3 computers around the desk, routers, etc.

I've made quite a few changes in the last two years to conserve energy.

An energy efficient house in 2004 that is over half again the square footage that cut my electricity costs (all electric to all electric) by half, and now it is costing me about 90% of what the old house did. Theoretically, I'm still ahead in the game.

In 2005 I bought a new car that gets 28-30mpg vs my truck that gets 18-20. I'm paying the same or a little more to fill up a 15 gallon tank vs. the 24 gallon tank. So, I'm breaking even there as far as dollars spent per week, but now I have car payments and two sets of tax and tags, insurance etc.

We scaled back on our vacation plans this year to stay within five hours of home instead of the planned trip back home to see relatives (28 hours). And, we try to plan our big shopping trips to the "cities" to combine errands where we used to run up every 2-3 weeks. We turned the air conditioner on a little later this year, and will probably do the same with the furnace this fall. It's not killing us, but we definitely have less spending cash than we did last year.

I had seen an article predicting that electric would increase 100-150%. We bought three Paul Harvey Edenpure heaters and it cut our total utilities by about $100+ a month. Thru the years I replaced lights with the efficient ones, did new windows, new storm doors,bought more efficient appliances and tried to reduce, reuse and recycle. At work we have lost several people who drove distances many went to local restaurantes because they ended up with more $ in their pocket by not driving. We bought more efficient cars and I just bought a motorcycle to drive to work. Prices for items have started increasing due to petro prices, so as it deepens into our pockets it will only get worse.

Living in Idaho I don't feel that I pay that much for my all electric home. $170 w central air in the summer and $220 in the winter for a 2500sqft, which includes a 400sqft standalone studio. I also use a wood stove that heats 2000sqft for really cold days. I sat down and had a good chat with my builder. He stated that electric (U.S.) is the most stable. He has seen many a homeowner really angry after they purchased either oil or gas heating. I vanpool 70miles a day and pay $90 / month for a seat. But I drive in at least once a week for early meetings. I hope to someday ride mass transit on an electric vehicle powered by solar, wind and hydro or something other than fossil. Now I do 75% of my work on the computer but the company culture is not good about telecommuting even though we are 14001. :confused:

I know it's a sacrifice, but I haven't turned on the heat all summer long, and I don't plan to turn on the air conditioner at all this winter...

I know it's a sacrifice, but I haven't turned on the heat all summer long, and I don't plan to turn on the air conditioner at all this winter...

You're a trip:lmao:

I've seen an increase in airfares, anywhere from 20-50% over the same trips last year.

The price of these utilities and commodities isn't hurting me as much as those in the middle east - both us and them!...and it definitely is not hurting the speculators !!!!!

Hi to you all! :bigwave:

Here's a word from the Netherlands, gasoline and natural gas prices over here are high as well. In the poll i voted regarding my company, with a number of air separation units it is a high cost item.

Personally i'm ok, gasoline over here is aprox. 6.4 dollar/gallon (1,43 euro/liter) but i drive on LPG (liquefied gas) so that's about 1/3 the price of gasoline. But not everyone drives LPG. My house is heated with heat coming from a waste disposal unit(?) in the area. Common but still most houses are equipped with natural gas central heating.

Our climate does not demand an A/C in our homes so not many people have one. (it would be nice to have one right now though :cool: )

Anyway, that is not our main issue i guess we also have a new healthcare system among others. Seems to me that overall everyone is paying more these days. (But i'm happy, i reckon it could be worse, a lot worse)

Not hurting my budget.....well, not yet. Petrol is already close to Rs. 54/lt. and may go up. I don't have to commute much. My office is about 8 kms from residence. There's also a proposal to raise electricity charges by about 25%. We don't have A/C nor is heating required. Mild climate. We have a solar heater for heating water.

I have been buring wood in the winter to heat my house. I just checked the price of wood pellets last year I paid $160/per ton this year they are getting $238/ton. I don't know if I can covert my wood pellet stove to a coal pellet stove,that is something I have to look into. At this rate it may be cheaper for me to use my furnace. I did hear that naural gas prices should be coming down ~20-30% from where they were last year.

Here's a word from the Netherlands...My house is heated with heat coming from a waste disposal unit(?) in the area. Common but still most houses are equipped with natural gas central heating.

Do you mean that your area has an industrial plant that burns waste/garbage for heat, or electricity? This sounds interesting, and I'd like to hear details on this, if you don't mind.

We are trying to watch taking mutliple trips for errands, as 2 of our vehicles get abysmal mileage. My wife and I commute less than 25 miles round trip per day, so that's not too awful. We are on an electric co-op, and get our power from Big Rivers, so our rates are still fairly cheap, and KY has some of the cheapest power in the nation. Even so, we don't run the AC as much as some people do. We have natural gas heat and stove (when the water heater died, I replaced it with electric, and it helped), and winters are expensive. I replaced this unit 3 years ago, and would have looked at a heat pump or geothermal, but it died in the middle of January, and we needed something fast.

I'd say that the rising energy prices are affecting me the most in making us look a lot harder at the overall picture now. We are slowly replacing windows in our old house with the energy efficient models. We are also looking at replacing all ductwork in the HVAC system (most people don't realize how much leaky ductwork is costing them). We may add more insulation in the attic to help also. My truck only gets 13-14 mpg, but it's paid for and I want to wring every mile I can out of it (165K miles now). When I do replace it, it will be with something that gets well above 25mpg.

Wood is in big demand due to many mills switching from gas to wood to fire their kilns. Outdoor furnaces have become common but many places are now banning them due to the smoke. When you look at petro prices do not forget about plastic.

I have decent size kerosene heater we use in the winter, drafty old house (but cheap & neat stuff like pocket doors & Rookwood Pottery fireplace). It does a good job in the living room, where we spend most of the day after work till bedtime.

But kerosene seems pretty expensive. I remember it being even more than gasoline over the winter... Wondering if it's worth it.

Jerry

I used a kerosene heater last winter too. it was $3.07 a gallon. But I think it really helped reduce my gas utility bills. Can't really determine how much because the natural gas charges are a moving target....all upward:(

Do you mean that your area has an industrial plant that burns waste/garbage for heat, or electricity? This sounds interesting, and I'd like to hear details on this, if you don't mind.

Here is a link to the one in my area: Huisvuilcentrale Alkmaar
http://www.huisvuilcentrale.nl/en/index.php

And one in Amsterdam
http://www.afvalenergiebedrijf.nl/main.asp?subsite_id=2

Groet, Wouter

I split Laura's and Ralph's latest posts because I think it's a good stand-alone topic --> Factoring Gasoline in Quotes to Clients (http://elsmar.com/Forums/showthread.php?t=17636).

I make so much money now, after investing in Exxon, that it really does not affect me.

Seriously, I voted that it does affect my budget and it hurts more and more every day. I see things as only getting worse unless alternative solutions are forthcoming.

I commute 400 miles a week to get to work which is starting to strain the wallet quite a bit. It takes about $60.00 worth of gas. Add the cost of electricity and natural gas and the budget takes quite a hit.

I guess the thing that really bothers me is the obscene profits the energy companies are making. They can pretty well set their prices where they wish. If only we could do the same thing...:( Hey boss...I need an extra 1000 bucks this month.

I remember the headlines a few weeks/months ago about oil companies & record profits... Alltime highest of any company. Top execs taking home hundreds of millions in bonus packages.

And these were reported as PROFITS, which to me means AFTER you pay for all the stuff it takes to get your product from start to finish...

Jerry :mad: :argue: :nopity:

Sure the profit numbers are mind boggling. BUT..

We should not be looking at the raw profit numbers. They titillate, but really tell us NOTHING!!!

What we should be looking at is Return on Investment (ROI). Think those oil drilling platforms are cheap? How about refineries and tankers? The industry is very capitol intensive. That capitol will not come if the return is lousy. It is that simple. Here is an opposing view:

http://home.entouch.net/dmd/costofoil.htm

Historically oil has been a not-so-good investment, compared to some others.

Also, if you think that the public oil companies (Exxon Mobil et. al.) are raking it in, how do you think the government-controlled oil companies are doing? We stand a very small chance of ever finding out.

Without getting political (I may have already crossed that line) I think that a little slight of hand is being played by a sensationalistic media.

JMHO