Why Is My SRP Bill So High?

The average SRP bill depends on several factors like the size of your home, insulation, HVAC system, window shading, how many people live in the home and how you use the home.  That said, a good SRP bill will be no more than $100 per 1,000 sq ft.  That means your HIGHEST SRP bill on a 2,000 sq ft home should be no more than $200.  The higher your SRP bill is than $100 per 1,000 sq ft, the more room for energy savings you have.  Your home could be very inefficient with poor ductwork, old HVAC systems or low insulation, or you could be on the wrong SRP rate plan. 

We have been performing energy audits on SRP homes since 2009 and have seen all kinds of reasons why your SRP energy bill is higher than you expected. In this post we will go into the reasons why your SRP bill is high and the fixes to help lower your SRP bills but first we should talk about what the average SRP bill should be.

What Is The Average SRP Bill?

​The average SRP bill depends on several factors like the size of your home, insulation, HVAC system, window shading, how many people live in the home and how you use the home.  That said, a good SRP bill will be no more than $100 per 1,000 sq ft.  That means your HIGHEST SRP bill on a 2,000 sq ft home should be no more than $200.  The higher your SRP bill is than $100 per 1,000 sq ft, the more room for energy savings you have.  Your home could be very inefficient with poor ductwork, old HVAC systems or low insulation, or you could be on the wrong SRP rate plan. 

Why Are Your SRP Bills So High?

​The reason why your SRP bills are higher than expected can be from two reasons, one is the how much energy you use during SRP’s peak hours, and the other is the condition of the house and its components such as the air conditioner, ductwork, insulation, windows, pool pump, water heater and doors. Let’s dive into each category more.

How Much Energy You Use During SRP's Peak Hours

The first reason why your SRP bill is high has everything to do with the people living in the home. Well not everything because you may not even realize your pool pump is operating during SRP peak hours of 3-6 pm because your pool guy has it set then because that’s what’s best for a clean pool. Or you may not know how to program your thermostat to raise a degree or two during peak hours and have it set at the same temperature all day long... in fact, you may not want to change your thermostat settings at all and in this case at least you’ve been educated and know, but are willing to pay a premium for it. Well guess what? That’s fine too! At least now you know. You see, during SRP’s peak hours of 3-6 pm they are charging a very high rate for energy and any time your AC kicks on during those hours, you’re going to pay a premium for it. Here are the Top 5 SRP Peak Hour Perpetrators to watch out for in your home to help reduce your energy bills.

Top 5 SRP's Peak Hour Perpetrators

1. Air Conditioner Run Times
Notice I did not put the age of your air conditioner, yes newer units run more efficiently but it’s not as much compared to the savings realized when you shift your AC usage to 90% off peak and 10% on peak usage. If you can practice super cooling your home, it doesn’t cost anything and you’ll be amazed at how much your SRP bill drops from this one practice.

If you have two air conditioners you have even more opportunity to save money by making sure each unit doesn’t come on at the same time during SRP’s peak hours.  Every 30 minutes your air conditioners are running during SRP's peak hours will cost you more than double the rate you currently pay during off-peak hours for some rate plans.  If you are not able to raise your thermostat up a couple of degrees during peak hours, it's best to change to SRP's Basic Plan to save money.

Factors such as having the correct freon charge, a well maintained and serviced AC system, and ductwork that is free from defects also contribute to your air conditioner run times.  Ask about our Green ID air conditioner maintenance plans to make sure your system is operating at it's best during the summer months.

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2. Pool Pumps
During our energy audits we’ve found pool pumps running during the middle of the afternoon and our customers have no idea because their pool guy sets the schedule. Remember the pool man has one goal in mind and that’s to keep your pool clean. To do that he’s going to run your pool pump at the highest setting, for a longer amount of time than is needed, and during the hottest part of the day to filter out algae growth. All those strategies are overkill and will cost you a high SRP bill at the end of the month. There’s a reason we calibrate our variable speed pool pumps upon installation, your pool pump doesn’t need to turn over that much water to keep your pool crystal clean. Combine a calibration with setting run times to be during off peak hours and you’ve done all you can with the pool pump.


3. Recirculation Pumps
A recirculation pump is another hidden appliance feature that many homeowners forget they even have. These pumps are installed next to the water heater and push hot water to the furthest fixture on demand. The problem is that these pumps come with a timer feature that often gets overlooked and instead of having the pump come on a few hours a day they are set to always be on 24/7. Many people would be surprised how much energy these pumps actually use and drive up the SRP energy bills. The cardinal rule is to shut these pumps off during peak hours and during the evening to save energy.

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4. Duct Leakage and Ductwork Problems
Let’s say you are practicing supercooling but your SRP energy bills still are not going down.  I would look at your ductwork as Suspect #1.  This is especially true for homes 20 years or older.  The SRP states that most homes lose about 20% of their conditioned air from ductwork leaks.  In our experience common ductwork problems range from simple gaps and leaks, kinks and improper installation all the way to disconnections hidden behind the ductwork’s outer liner or the wrong size completely.  The only way to know what issues are occurring with the ductwork and recommend solutions is to perform an energy audit to get baseline readings of the ductwork by measuring the leakage and pressures along with a host of other tests.  A visual inspection of the ductwork can miss hidden defects with the ductwork and in our opinion is a sales call.

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5. Insulation
Low insulation or missing insulation could be a larger cause of SRP bills being high than you think. Not only does low insulation make your AC system run more frequently and for longer duration, it can magnify hot rooms and temperature differences in your home. If your home was built in the 1990’s there’s a good chance that fiberglass batts were used and installed completely wrong. If you go in your attic and notice the batts tented up along the roof trusses they are installed wrong and should be inspected by an energy auditor.

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How to Practice Super Cooling
Super Cooling is an effective and FREE Strategy where you turn your thermostat down to 70° during off peak hours of 8 PM, all night until 3 PM the next day. Then during SRP’s peak hours of 3-6 PM you raise your thermostat to as warm as you can take it or 82 to 84°. Your goal is the shift 90% of your energy usage off peak and 10% of your SRP energy usage to on peak (yes it is possible). Studies have shown that homeowners can save 60% off their current energy bills by simply practicing super cooling, and it doesn’t cost anything!

SRP’s peak hour plans
Let me back up and go over exactly what SRP’s peak hours are because these strategies depend on shifting your energy to avoid these hours during the summer.

SRP EZ3 plan
Peak hours 3-6 pm or 4-7 pm
Highlights- this plan is what most SRP customers are familiar with. It is a moderately priced peak hour plan that most homeowners can practice even if they are retired or stay at home most of the day.  $0.34 per kWh on-peak times, $0.09 per kWh off-peak

SRP Time-of-Use Plan
Peak hours 2-8 pm
Highlights- the peak hours are longer than than the EZ3 plan and energy costs are less.  $0.24 per kWh on-peak times, $0.07 per kWh off-peak

​SRP Basic Plan
Peak hours none
Highlights- use this plan if you cannot raise the thermostat during peak hours, and if you are in this category I can sympathize with you in this example.  I used this plan when my teenage daughter and I were in a constant battle over the thermostat.  During the summer when she was off school, I would program the thermostat to rise a couple degrees during peak hours and then I would arrive at home to find the AC system blasting because my daughter was too hot... I couldn’t win and eventually changed my SRP rate plan from EZ3 to the Basic Plan and ended up saving more money.  $0.12 per kWh on-peak times, $0.07 per kWh off-peak

​SRP E27 plan
Peak hours 2-8 pm
Highlights- this plan has even cheaper off peak hours but more expensive peak hours. This plan is the best plan to squeeze all the savings you can and idea if you can religiously practice super cooling during the week. $0.06 per kWh on-peak times + $9.43 per kW for the first 3 kW, $0.04 per kWh off-peak.

Common misconceptions
Many SRP customers believe their bills are high because their ducts are leaky, they are getting wrongly billed by SRP, they are not really using that much energy or they don’t understand how peak hours work.

Ductwork Leakage Misconception
Although we are in the business of performing upgrades like ductwork sealing, I don’t like performing a ductwork sealing on homes that don’t need one. Generally, homes built after 2014 don’t need a full ductwork sealing. Homes older than 20 years would benefit from a duct seal. We can always test the leakage of the ductwork by performing an energy audit and we do find AC contractors still cutting corners causing leakage around the ducts, but it is rare.

Getting Wrongly Billed By SRP
I’ve heard many times that homeowners will speak with their neighbors who have the same model home but their bills are significantly higher and they keep the temperature the same in the house. One thought is that their SRP meter isn’t getting read right and they’re getting wrongly charged by SRP. It used to be we would anyone could call SRP and they would come out to inspect the meter or perform a free energy audit but those days have passed. Of all the audits we’ve done I’ve never found SRP to be at fault wrong with charging homeowners.

One simple way to tell why your SRP bill is so high is using SRP’s detailed energy tracker on their website.  You can easily see when your energy is spiking with each hour of the day.  To isolate the spikes in your energy, start turning off, unplugging or flipping your breaker panel off for each load.  For example, try turning the breaker panel to your water heater off for a day and seeing what effect turning the water heater off completely has on your energy bills.  Look for patterns in your energy usage, for example if you notice a spike in your energy usage around 2-3 pm everyday, raise your thermostat up a couple degrees or shut your AC system off completely during 2-3 pm to see if your AC system is the culprit of high energy bills.  By isolating your appliances you can learn which ones are the highest energy users however this will not tell you how efficiently the appliances are working.
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Using some simple tools given here you have some methods of tracking down your biggest energy users and with the help of our energy auditors you can be confident that the improvements are targeted to your biggest energy users to make your home the most efficient it can be.