How to work out the electrical power cost for your pond pump
Most people never consider the actual running cost when they buy a
pond pump yet this is more important than the actual purchase price of
the pond pump in most countries
As you have discovered it is important for any pond pump used in a
fish pond to run all day every day throughout the year except when a
pond freezes. The basic reason, just to recap, is to keep the pond
filter bacteria alive so they can continue to purify the pond water.
These bacteria need oxygen dissolved in the pond water which is
circulated by the pond pump.
I know how many Watts my pond pump uses ... what do I do next?
In this case calculating the annual running cost for your pond pump
is quite simple.
However first you need to find out how much a unit of electricity
costs in your area (and it can vary a lot by area). A unit of
electricity is normally expressed as a kWattHour or kWhr and it the
amount of money required to run an item consuming 1,000 Watts for 1 hour
or 60 minutes. This information can be obtained by reading your utility
account (electric bill). In USA it varies between about 6c per kWhr and
20c per kWhr. In my country it rarely costs more than 6c per kWhr.
Pacific States USA typical costs in
2004 ... for other states click this
link to website about water
heaters and you will see cost of electric power for each state in USA
-
Alaska
12.75
-
Hawaii
16.59
-
California
11.87
-
Oregon
7.06
-
Washington
6.24
You can see therefore that the running cost of a pond pump in Hawaii
is far more important in economic terms than the same pump running in
Oregon. In fact let's do a comparison over a period of 1 year and
remember a good pond pump will last for about 6 years so total cost of
running a pond pump over 6 years is significant. For this exercise
assume the pond pump rated power is 90 Watts ... such a pond pump would
cost about $90 to $120
Hourly power used = 90 Watts = 0.09 kWhr
A complete day's consumption for this pond pump = 24*0.09 = 2.16
kWhrs
After running non-stop for 1 year the pond pump has consumed 2.16 *
365 = 788 kWhr
In Hawaii this would cost 788 * $0.1659 = $130.80 whilst the same
pond pump doing exactly the same job in Oregon would only cost 788 *
0.0706 = $55.66
Over 6 years the same pond pump could cost anything between $785 and
$334 ... this is a big difference and especially when you consider the
pump cost about $90 only
I do NOT know the Watts of my pond pump but I do know the
Amps. What do do?
All you have to do in this case is find out what voltage the
pond pump is running at. In USA this is normally 110 volts and in UK and
Europe between 220 and 240 volts. If you know the amps you can calculate
the Watts as follows ...
My pond pump is rated at 0.81 amps
My pond pump voltage is 110 volts
Then the Watts for the pond pump are 110 * 0.81 approximately = 90
Watts
Now all you need to do is follow the example in the first part of
this web article to find out the annual running cost for your chosen
pond pump.
Most pond pump boxes will show Watts and Amps ... if no Watts shown
you can bet the pond pump uses a lot of power.
To compare the method for choosing
between 2 or more pond pumps click the link
Sump pumps use lots of power and this is
one good reason why sump pumps should NOT be used in garden ponds Choose low cost reliable supplier on-line
I suggest you look a both suppliers and compare prices and shipping
costs ... take note that both suppliers offer specials at times and these
often appear in right hand border of this website.
These suppliers do sell other makes of pumps also of high quality and
performance which you might want to investigate and you can search the
websites for the model you want ...
Florida based
supplier specializing in very wide range of garden fish pond equipment
including pond pumps filters and UV lights ... just click the link
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