# electricity cost?



## yuesaur (Aug 29, 2011)

how do you calculate how much electricity you spend daily on your reps

i.e, how much does it cost to run a 14 inch by 14inch heatmat daily?

ive gone back home from uni with my reptiles, and my brother has insisted that he wants to take care of Axel (leo) over xmas (hes 14 i think), so im helping him to care for her and hes really enjoying looking after her, and im pretty sure he wants one for himself.

my mum has come round and has warmed up to my beardie and she even held him for the first time last night, before he snuggled up on her and went sleep on my mum. XD
so my brother could possibly get one by the looks of how my mum is with my beardie.


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## Tombo46 (Aug 5, 2010)

Unless you're extremely tight and watch every penny, it costs next to nothing!


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## yuesaur (Aug 29, 2011)

my mum seems to think its expensive

as im back at home i said id contribute to eleccy, so thats a tenner a week

for a 
-arcadia t5 39watt controller, with 39watt 12% uvb tube (on from 8am -10pm)
-75watt reflector bulb (on from 8am-10pm)
- 2 14x14 heatmats (on 24/7)

is there any calculation or does someone know how much it costs to run them for a day?
if i can prove to her its not as expensive as it seems my brother will probably join the reptile craze


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## GlassWalker (Jun 15, 2011)

You can work it out from the power rating of the mat and the current electricity prices.

Picking numbers for example 
Assume electricity at 12p per kWh (likely different now as I had last looked a while ago, and often goes up over winter)
Assume heat mat is 30W
If you run that for 24h a day, the power usage is 30*24= 720 Wh or 0.72 kWh.
0.72*12p= 8.6p.

Find out what the power rating of the heat mats are and if you know your electricity cost and we can do a better estimate.


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## Amazonia (Mar 6, 2011)

I've had my beardie since July and my mother *still* nags about "how much it costs to heat that cage". Of course, she has no idea about how much my electricity bills are, she just likes to have a go at me because I got a pet, and OMG it's a reptile so people will think I'm weird lol.

I don't imagine it would be that much to be honest, not for a single animal. In fact, I got a substantial amount of money back from my previous utilities supplier when I changed over recently! 

ps I've seen you on the FB Bearded Dragons UK page - hi!


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## yuesaur (Aug 29, 2011)

one heatmat is 12 watts

the other heatmat doesnt say, but i bought it off them awesome heatmat guys with the cheapest heatmats ever in equipment classifyed. i think there located in devon?
its the same size as my other heatmat so im going to assume its also 12 watts.
and i have no idea what my electricity cost is. XD

so 1, what would the total cost be for everything,

and 2, what the cost to run 1 heatmat all day


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## GlassWalker (Jun 15, 2011)

Working on some assumptions:

UV tube 14 hours at 39W = 546 Wh (might be a little higher than that in practice depending on controller efficiency)
Reflector 14h at 75W = 1050 Wh
Two 12W heatmats for 24h = 576 Wh

Total = 2172 wh

Assuming 12p per kWh, that gives about 26p per day.

Note the leccy costs are more complicated than that. I just had a quick look and suppliers often use two rates, a higher one for the first xxx units and a lower rate for units after that. They did this to hide the old standing charge, but just get it from you a different way anyway. So if you use a little leccy over a year, the price per unit is effectively higher and you could be looking at double the above. Around 12p per unit still seems to be a typical ball park for the lower rate, and assumes you're a high leccy user over a year. As a ball park guide, you can look at the above value as a minimum, and worse case double it.

Further more, note the leccy use will turn to heat. If you're using other heating at home at the same time, that could run a tiny bit less, so there is as secondary effect to consider there. Probably not significant, but still there.

Forgot to add, 12W heatmat by itself about 3.5p a day with same considerations as above.


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## Captainmatt29 (Feb 28, 2009)

Yup as above really heatmats are around 3.5p a day wattage dependant but there is a new heatmat out that uses 1w and heats sufficiantly this as a result will drop the bill massively.

I use 5w heat mats and really its about £5 a month and im on key meter.


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## yuesaur (Aug 29, 2011)

Amazonia said:


> I've had my beardie since July and my mother *still* nags about "how much it costs to heat that cage". Of course, she has no idea about how much my electricity bills are, she just likes to have a go at me because I got a pet, and OMG it's a reptile so people will think I'm weird lol.
> 
> I don't imagine it would be that much to be honest, not for a single animal. In fact, I got a substantial amount of money back from my previous utilities supplier when I changed over recently!
> 
> ps I've seen you on the FB Bearded Dragons UK page - hi!


 
lol hey there, seems as you know who i am, care to share who you are? XD

and i shall go show my mother this now XD

my mum says shes with scottish power, so what does that equate to?


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## jo-jo-beans (Jun 28, 2010)

I had worked mine out a few months ago, using a web site that I can't find at the moment :devil::lol2:

I'd worked it out at roughly £50 a month for 

On a 12 hour cycle 

2x 75 watt basking bulbs
2x par 38, 75w basking bulbs
2x 40" uvb strip lights
1x 48" uvb strip light
1x 20" uvb strip light
1x 20w energy saving bulb 

On 24 hours

1 x 100w ceramic bulb and dimmer stat
2 x 200w heaters for aquarium
1 x massive external filter for aquarium

I think thats ok, if youre looking at less than £15 a week :2thumb:

So that's a 6ft viv, 2 x 4ft vivs, a 3ft viv and a 5ft (400 litre aquarium).

Ps I'm with scottish power too


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## sheena is a gecko (Apr 22, 2011)

No idea how much one costs per day but we have 25 heat mats, 5 heat strips, 2 16m cables, some lights and all the other usual house hold stuff and we use about £10 a week total : victory:


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## _simon_ (Nov 27, 2007)

You'd have to dig your tariff information out or call scottish power to have them confirm. 

Once you have that info you can use something like this: Electricity Running Cost Calculator | Electricity Prices | Electricity Costs


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