Would the electric bill be higher if the voltage to the house is lower than it should be?

Answer 1

This is something that your utility company needs to know about. One reason is you probably are not getting enough amperage to service your house. If the incomming voltage is abnormally low you need to have this checked out. About the question, it would depend if your amperage increased. You pay by the kilowatt hour. Volts X Amps = Watts Chances are the low voltage is a symptom of the true cause of your high electricity bill, not the cause itself. Driving your appliances at a lower voltage (except for modern devices with switching powersupplies) will cause them to draw less power, and therefore cause a lower bill. (Now, before you get any ideas, this will not work for switching powersupplies. That means computers, TVs, etc. It is bad for motorized appliances as they may not start in a undervoltage situation. Lights will not work as well, etc. Also, whatever you jury-rig into your feed will have to dissipate the power equal to the product of voltage across it and the current through it. So, you will not lower your bill at all as the energy not being dissipated by your appliances will be dissipated by whatever you stuck in the feed. Anyways, back to the question at hand: ) If you have a low voltage problem, either you are overloading your supply, you have a bad connection, or a short. Checking for a short is easy: * Turn off everything. * Unplug all everything and turn off all lamps. * Shut off all the breakers, including the main. * See if your meter is turning. If it is, call the electric company. * Turn on the main breaker. * See if your meter is turning. If it is, call an electrician. Don't DIY on the main feed. Save it for the branch circuits. * Turn on the breakers one by one and check the meter. If it starts turning, check that absolutely everything is off on that circuit. If everything is, you know have a general idea of where energy is leaking. Call an electrician or happy hunting. * If you can turn on all the breakers and the meter does not turn, you do not have a short in your home's wiring. Either you have a defective appliance or you use a lot of energy. If you don't have a short, the undervoltage problem is either a overloaded supply or failing wiring devices. Call an electrician, this is a serious fire hazard (something is dissipating that energy into heat, somewhere). They will have the tools to quickly track it down and fix it for you.