So if anyone read my latest solar electric bill report, you may have remembered that I found something new to save money. When I installed my solar system, I had an electricity monitoring system also put in. I’m able to monitor my electric usage in real-time. I can walk around the house and flip lights on/off while looking at my monitor on my phone and see instant changes. This monitor opened up my eyes to a lot of wasted electric use. I also had no idea how much energy my pool was using until I got this monitor.
My old pool pump was running at 1500 Watts for 12 hours, plus 4 hours where I ran my Polaris pool sweep. Those 4 hours were using an additional 160o Watts of electricity per hour. That’s 18,000 Watts plus another 6,400 Watts for the Polaris for a total of 20,800 Watts or 20.8 KWh each day! Besides in the summer when I use the A/C much more, my pool pump was contributing 50% of my electricity usage or more.
My new Hayward SP3400VSP EcoStar VS Variable-Speed Pool Pump Energy Star Certified
That’s a savings currently of 10,900 watts per day or 10.9 kw. 10.9 x 30 days = 327 Kwh. My tiered electric plan would put the cost of this at $0.14 per Kwh so my savings is roughly 348 x $0.14 = $45.78 per month or $549.36 per year. I still plan on fine tuning the speeds and amount of time on each speed. I’m also planning on shortening the time the pump is on when there is cooler weather. I am anticipating savings of up to $720 in my first year. This doesn’t even include savings of using less chemicals because the water stays clearer longer. I can have up to 4 different speeds and multiple changes throughout the day. I’m currently only running two. I’ll be looking for the more energy efficient settings so that my pool stays clear. I have a feeling I can get my savings eventually closer to $60/month.
This was the original graph of my usage (the green is my solar panel production for a sunny day). You can see the pool pump kicked on at 8:30 AM and ran until 8:30 PM. The sharp up and down movements on the graph are my A/C coming on and back off. You can see at 12:30 pm , my polaris kicked on and ran until around 4:30 pm.
This is a new graph after my pump was installed. I don’t even notice the pump running on low speed 24/7 though, the lowest line of usage stays roughly the same around 1kW. You can see when the pump kicks on higher speed though around 10:00 am and then runs until 4:00. The Polaris kicks on around noon and runs until 3:00 pm. If you look at the energy usage when my pump kicks on now versus the old, you’ll see about an 750W difference. This is the beauty of this monitor, I can see in real-time my actual usage. I know that I’m saving money and my bills should start reflecting it.
The best part is that I paid $868 for the pump, plus $160 for installation. I get a $300 rebate from the city and should have that check back any day now. The total cost of this new pump was $728! I can pay for this pump with just one year of usage! This is a much better payback than even the solar system I bought, that takes about 7 years. I just wish I had known this sooner.
So there you have it, another way I’m saving more money each month!
Looks like some stereotypical first world problems. Glad you’re cutting back on power usage!
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Wallet,
Sorry it’s taken so long to reply to this. I guess I missed it. Anyways, you are right. I likely wouldn’t have added a pool to my house had it not already come with it. Since I do have one now though, I’m trying to make it more efficient. Every bit counts!
Cheers!
It is sensible to make these type of changes such as switching to solar power and updating the pool pump. Saving energy is good for the budget and the world around us. It feels great across the board.
My friend has a pool in his backyard. He is thinking about getting a new pool pump. His pool is a little bit outdated right now. I’ll have to share this with him and tell him all about the benefits of getting something solar powered.
I admit that I am not the most knowledgeable person in the world. Are the rates per kW different with each provider? I would want to know this because I feel like doing this math would help me find the cheapest rate.
Ava Laurie,
Yes and they should be on your monthly statements. I’m currently on a tiered program sort of like taxes.
Thanks for stopping by!
It’s pretty incredible that you were able to create graphs of your usage so you could see exactly how much energy you were using. It’s also interesting to see that you were able to save so much energy just by changing out the pool pump. I think it’s good to find ways to save energy. If everyone could do what you did by measuring your energy usage, they could probably save money in other areas of the home.
Hi Gerald,
That energy monitor I used was included with my solar system but is available for anyone to buy and use. It comes with a power over ethernet cable so it connects to your router through the electric outlet. I was already using one of these anyways to connect my internet through the living room since the house wasn’t fully wired for ethernet so it connected easily to my system. It’s a great tool and worth while looking into a monitoring system to find ways to save money.
Thanks for stopping by!
It is interesting that your pump was using so much energy! This summer our power bill has been a bit high, and it is probably because we use the pool so much. It would be really interesting to look at new pumps to see if we could find a more efficient one. I am sure that this would help keep costs down, and it would probably keep the pool cleaner. I will probably look into the pump that you got and compare it with a few others to see which one would be best for our pool!
Hi Julie,
I was amazed how much of an energy hog my pool pump was. The new pump was running longer and using just a fraction of the energy. Good luck in your search but I’ve been really happy with this new one so far.
Cheers
My power bill was high, so I had my friend come test the wattage of my pool pump. Turns out that it was using way more electricity than it needed to. We tinkered with it a little, and now it saves me money each month. So glad that I took a look at this, I feel so much better now.
Hi Gus,
That’s awesome! I couldn’t believe how much energy my pool pump was using. It was literally using as much as my A/C system before I changed out the pump. It’s a great feeling when you can do small things like this to not only help the environment but also save money.
Cheers!
That is so cool that your solar electric usage report can let you know how to save energy on your pool usage. Installing a new, more efficient pool pump was a good idea. The change in watt usage from 20,800 to 4,500 watts is astounding. I will have to look into these energy saving solutions.
It’s amazing how monitoring your energy can really open your eyes.
We use solar powered pumps for the garden pond, it’s a shame they haven’t come up with cheap pool pumps running purely on solar. That would really save you some money!
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That’s incredible how much a new pump could save you so much energy. Those graphs are really telling! I think that I need to get a new pump for my pool. I really want to get a new one if I can get the kind of results that you got.