During the colder months, higher bills often result because heating systems having to work harder to maintain the same temperature. MEC recommends you keep your thermostat on 68 ◦. This winter season has been particularly cold for long periods of time, which is significantly impacting electric bills.
In the graph shown below, there were 22 out of 30 days with average temperatures at or below freezing. The total bill for this home during this period equaled $672.00.
With cold weather, heat pumps, water heaters, and other appliances that help to keep your home comfortable have to work much harder to reach and maintain your set temperature. This occurs whether you are home or not and regardless of any changes you may have made to your temperature settings. When these systems work harder, they use more electricity, resulting in higher usage and increased bill amounts.
If you think your home is not operating as efficiently as possible, visit www.energyright.com for ways to reduce your energy consumption and potential incentives available if you make upgrades to your home.
MEC also offers text and email notifications that you might find helpful. If you already have an account login set up, follow the steps below to sign up for High Usage Alerts. This may help indicate a problem with your HVAC system or hot water heater so the problem can get fixed before you get a unusually high electric bill. Often, customers don’t realize their heat pump or water heater is broken until they get their electric bill and see there’s a spike in electricity consumption. If you don’t have an account set up, visit our website and follow the prompts to create one.
MEC would also like to inform you about the upcoming TVA monthly fuel cost for the month of March ($0.04274 per kwh), which is 61.7% higher for residential customers compared to February’s ($0.02643 per kwh). In the “How to Read Your Bill” photo, the line item called TVA Monthly Energy Adjustment is where this monthly fluctuating charge will show. This line item does not reflect the whole amount MEC pays TVA each month. On average, for every dollar MEC collects from its members, approximately $0.75 gets paid directly to TVA for MEC’s energy bill.
For more details about what drives the TVA monthly energy adjustment, please visit https://www.tva.com/energy/our-power-system/total-monthly-fuel-costs .