Running Costs Of Bigger Tanks

[PlumbersMerchant]

In some other posts/ forum things i have mentioned that i am looking into upgrading my tropical tank from a 90litre to maybe a 240litre tank. i was just wondering if anybody knew how much it costs in running i.e. for the electricity per month.
Bit of a weird one but any help would be great

Thanks

 

[TomShootsPhoto]

Welp, that depends on where you live and how much you pay for electricity.

Anyhow, here is the power consumption for my tank (300L):
Filter (1400L/H): 35W
Lighting (91cm Glopower bulbs): 2x30W
Wavemaker: 6W
Heater: 75W (It is recommended to use 2 heaters in bigger tanks, but mine does fine with one.)
All together: 176W

And that would be it for power. If you buy something like the Juwel RIO 240, which comes with all the gear,
here is your power consumption:

Bioflow 3 filter: 6.5W
Light Unit: 2x High-Lite 120 cm 54 W
Heater: 200W
Pump: Juwel Ecoflow 6.5W
All together: 321W

Now, for water. (If you change about 25% of water every third weak)
Lets take a tank with the size 100*50*50 cm's (250L). The gravel is 3 cm's thick. There are ornaments at the size of 12 dm[sup]3. [/sup](about the size of 20cm*30cm*20cm, like a solid block)


Now. With this setup, there is about 233 liters of water in the tank. 25% of that is 58.25 liters.

For water changes, that would give you: ~1010 liters of water every year, if we change the water every three weeks.

Calculate from there, my friend. It all depends on how much you pay for electricity and other.


Snoop around, and see what you can find. As you can see, my power consumption is 54% lower that the Juwel RIO 240. So there is a chance that you can skimp out on the price of stuff if you choose your equipment.

 

[snazy]

The filters and powerheads are very low electricity consumers and they'd be generally the only stuff that would be on all the time. The rest depends.
Keep in mind that the heater will not be switched on all the time.
In my case the heaters don't work too much and the temperature in the tanks at the moment is higher than the 25 degrees I have it set on. Seems that the room temperature is higher than than the one in the tanks. Depending on where you put your tank, what fish you'd like to keep, you can work out a temperature suitable both for your fish and your bills.
The lights also don't need to be on more than 6-8 hours a day, even if it's a planted tank.
Can't advise on the water bills as water here is for free and I do 50% water changes weekly on 4 tanks.

 

[N0body Of The Goat]

The two obvious areas of savings are from...


Keeping fish that will be comfortable at your room temperature so a heater will not be required, temperate fish do not have to be dull, far from it! Zebra Danios; Paradise Fish; Redline Torpedo Barbs; Rosy Barbs; Odessa Barbs; Peppered Corydoras; White Cloud Mountain Minnow; Opsarius spp.; Ilyodon spp.; Persina killifish etc. Our flat is staying amazingly warm this winter after the new insulation and so I have 5 tanks all keeping at least 22C without a heater, it is saving me a packet compared to the last two winters where I had my uninsulated garage 5x2x2 running at 22C with 600W of heating.

The next most expensive outgoing is high end T5 lighting, fertilisers and carbon for demanding plants. Very few of my ~105 fish appeciate lighting anyway, the only tank with lighting is my 620T with just one of the 18W T8s keeping some Anubias; Java Fern; Windelov Fern ticking over (with bi-weekly ~4ml doses of Seachem Flourish).

Something I have become very aware of in the last few months is how some aquarium equipment can give off lots of latent heat, I have two cheap (£17) Biopro 2200 powerheads running in two of my 4-foot tanks that are rated at something like ~30W to turnover ~2000lph, which throw off so much heat into the water that the temp stays at a minimum of 24C. Some filters are very efficient with very low wattage requirements around 20W for 200+l tanks, so they will save money, but that may mean teh heater needs to come on a bit more often.

 

[The Taffy Apple]

Didn't i read on here once that every 100L was something in the regine of £10-12 on an estimated U.K energy supplier, monthly? I worked out it cost me, roughly, £8-9 per month..120L tank, lights on 2/3 hours a day, external filter, heater and small internal filter.

Terry.

 

[PlumbersMerchant]

Tom shoots photo, what does the 176W actually mean ? is that like per hour ?

Thank you everbody for the posts, given me lots to consider. better not tell the wife as she thinks the only extra outgoing is the tank ! ha ha

 

[eaglesaquarium]

176 W = 176 Joules of energy used every second.

I don't know how you are charged in the UK, but in the US, we are charged per kWhr (kilowatt*hour).

So, 176W would theoretically end up being = 176 W * 24 hours * 30 days = 126720 W*hr or 126.720 kW*hr/month. In the US, I pay something like $0.09 per kW*hr... Which means it would cost me roughly $12 per month.

But, those estimates are high, since the lights wouldn't be on constantly, nor would the heater be. You could probably estimate that for the full month.


Lights are about 4 hours per day - 120 hours a month
Heater probably about 6 hours a day, maybe more in the winter, certainly less in the summer, but roughly 6 hours a day, I would guess on the average = 180 hours a month

So, that means:
Lights: 120hours a month*60W = 7.2 kW*hr
Filter: 720 hours a month*35W = 25.2 kW*hr
Heater: 180 hours a month*75W = 13.5kW*hr

= 45.9 kW*hr That would be about $5 a month for me...

 

[PlumbersMerchant]

Thank you