Troubleshooting high kilowatt usage

[spurlockda]

In an aircraft hangar, the tenant has been accused by the power company of using twice as many KWs as each of the other hangar owners’ usage? He’s next to me and he asked if I could help him figure it out. He has 300w UFO high bay lights. My question has to do with the 300w designation? You know how a standard led bulb the puts out the amount of light that a 100w bulbs but may actually be 13w (or something)? His lights were purchased on Amazon but came from Hong Kong. As you might imagine, the literature wasn’t the easiest to find any useful value from it. I think I remember from the apprentice training that there was a way to reverse the calculations. But determining the watt value difference between old incandescent bulbs and led bulbs has me stumped. Thank everyone!

 

[drcampbell]

The packaging is all but useless; the marketing department was allowed to create it without adult supervision.
The bulbs themselves are often marked with the actual current & power, which often appear to not conform with the simplified Ohm's Law equations because they often have a very low (and non-linear) power factor.

 

[zbang]

Is he heating the place? Leaving the lights on all the time? Lighting may be a small part of the problem, you'll have to sniff around for all of the loads and how often they're used. If nothing else, get current readings on everything you can; not as much help for really low PF loads, but you might find something.

Also..... is your friend supplying outdoor lights? I'd expect them to to be on a common/"house" panel, but could be wired onto an individual's panel.

 

[Hv&Lv]

In an aircraft hangar, the tenant has been accused by the power company of using twice as many KWs as each of the other hangar owners’ usage? He’s next to me and he asked if I could help him figure it out. He has 300w UFO high bay lights. My question has to do with the 300w designation? You know how a standard led bulb the puts out the amount of light that a 100w bulbs but may actually be 13w (or something)? His lights were purchased on Amazon but came from Hong Kong. As you might imagine, the literature wasn’t the easiest to find any useful value from it. I think I remember from the apprentice training that there was a way to reverse the calculations. But determining the watt value difference between old incandescent bulbs and led bulbs has me stumped. Thank everyone!

How many does he have and were they recently added?
Are these the 300w UFO that are supposed to be 1000W eq?

The city airport hangars here have the 150W LED to replace the old 400w MH Hugh bay fixtures.

 

[ptonsparky]

How many does he have and were they recently added?
Are these the 300w UFO that are supposed to be 1000W eq?

The city airport hangars here have the 150W LED to replace the old 400w MH Hugh bay fixtures.

UFO in a derogatory sense, or is there another meaning?

 

[hillbilly1]

Kinda strange the power company is monitoring the power usage, not the landlord? Or are they the landlord? Does each tenant have their own flight office that is metered separately along with their portion of the hanger? If they may be leaving the A/C or heat on wide open, or a duct is blown off on top. (those offices usually have open ceilings to the hanger space)

 

[ptonsparky]

Comparably sized hangers would have comparable usage unless one is operating 24/7. I would suspect the term 'notified' vs 'accused' would be more fitting.

 

[hillbilly1]

How many does he have and were they recently added?
Are these the 300w UFO that are supposed to be 1000W eq?

The city airport hangars here have the 150W LED to replace the old 400w MH Hugh bay fixtures.

That’s what our hanger has, 400 watt MH high bays. They don’t use them a whole lot, because the airport has strict flight regulations due to the residential area built AFTER the airport. They get complaints about early and late flights.

 

[Hv&Lv]

UFO in a derogatory sense, or is there another meaning?

Don’t know how that could be derogatory...

https://www.amazon.com/CHUNNUAN-Warehouse-Industrial-6000-6500K-Waterproof/dp/B077SQ9FQ6

 

[Hv&Lv]

Kinda strange the power company is monitoring the power usage, not the landlord? Or are they the landlord? Does each tenant have their own flight office that is metered separately along with their portion of the hanger? If they may be leaving the A/C or heat on wide open, or a duct is blown off on top. (those offices usually have open ceilings to the hanger space)

We do also. It’s more of a customer service.
We have found high usage that led to water heater issues, bad heat pumps with strip heat running constantly, and of course, the occasional illegal grow house.

We contact the customer about it and our energy services people will actually help investigate high usage.
You can imagine which customers are happy and which ones are not..

It’s odd the power company is the only industry (that I can think of)that talks you out of using the commodity we sell.

 

[zbang]

It’s odd the power company is the only industry (that I can think of)that talks you out of using the commodity we sell.

Lots of water suppliers do the same.

I manage a small building on the side and got a high-usage notice a couple of years ago, with the "smart" metering I could see exactly which day the usage shot up (and that two days later, it dropped back to normal).

 

[Besoeker3]

UFO in a derogatory sense, or is there another meaning?

UFO?
And I don't mean unidentified flying object..........

 

[Hv&Lv]

Lots of water suppliers do the same.

I manage a small building on the side and got a high-usage notice a couple of years ago, with the "smart" metering I could see exactly which day the usage shot up (and that two days later, it dropped back to normal).

Ah, good to know we aren’t the only ones.

 

[hillbilly1]

We do also. It’s more of a customer service.
We have found high usage that led to water heater issues, bad heat pumps with strip heat running constantly, and of course, the occasional illegal grow house.

We contact the customer about it and our energy services people will actually help investigate high usage.
You can imagine which customers are happy and which ones are not..

It’s odd the power company is the only industry (that I can think of)that talks you out of using the commodity we sell.

Our poco doesn’t, I added an apartment to to my service, power bill has doubled for the last four months, haven’t heard a peep from them.

 

[James L]

Our poco doesn’t, I added an apartment to to my service, power bill has doubled for the last four months, haven’t heard a peep from them.

On our bill, it shows comps.
We're using 50% more than the people who lived here last, and about 35% more than our neighbors.

It's all heating and cooling related because my wife has a very narrow comfort range.

 

[James L]

There's no way to get a standard LED to incandescent comparison because it depends on the chips and drivers.

Incandescent bulbs are about 13 lumens per watt

LED lights can be anywhere from 80 to 150 lumens per watt

 

[Jraef]

That is an actual 300W fixture. A 300W incandescent lamp is roughly 3,000 lumens. That fixture says 33,000 lumens, so it would be would be roughly equivalent to a 3,000W incandescent lamp! Si=o it would fit that the actual watt use is 300W per fixture, not the EQUIVALENT of a 300W incandescent. It's 10X that much light.

 

[James L]

That is an actual 300W fixture. A 300W incandescent lamp is roughly 3,000 lumens. That fixture says 33,000 lumens, so it would be would be roughly equivalent to a 3,000W incandescent lamp! Si=o it would fit that the actual watt use is 300W per fixture, not the EQUIVALENT of a 300W incandescent. It's 10X that much light.

300w ufo is a lot of light output.
Anywhere from 24,000 to 39,000 lumens
80-130 l/w

 

[drcampbell]

None of this confusion would exist if people would stop using the watt as a measure of luminosity. It's completely wrong. Did you sleep through your entire high-school physics class?

 

[James L]

None of this confusion would exist if people would stop using the watt as a measure of luminosity. It's completely wrong. Did you sleep through your entire high-school physics class?

It used to be helpful on smaller wattage LEDs, but I'm not really a fam of comparing to incandescent anymore - especially on larger lights.

I think very few people could conceive the light output of 2,000-4,000 watts of incandescent