I've been meaning to post this for a while, alas, time seems to evaporate under the [cool these days] Mexican sun. Anyway, our last CFE bill bumped us up into the DAC range from tariff 1B here in Playa del Carmen. I was expecting this and at least in our case, the rolling 12 month average fits the experience. For those who don't know, the bimester average needs to be under 400 kW/h here in Playa to retain your 1B status. Here's a very simple use/cost breakdown between the two: Last 1B usage: 1,116 kW/h Last 1B usage bill: $3,236 MXP First DAC usage: 808 kW/h First DAC bill: $2,991 MXP So the DAC is definitely a bit costlier, even for us here in Playa, although it's not something that would make one jump off a cliff For what it's worth, we didn't use AC in the last period at all, but the net gains were smaller than hoped, which I attribute to the excessive use of the boiler - a verifiable electricity devourer. But it has been a little too chilly to go without hot showers for me!
The relatively high cost of electricity in PdeC, compared with Cancun, is not something people advertise too much (especially when marketing property in PdeC)! Your posts bring this difference into bold relief. You're still not paying much, in real terms, are you Coby? What part of that do you attribute to the electronics that you run, 24/7?
Indeed, the difference in tariffs/restrictions and subsequently overall cost aren't advertised much. But I imagine for a lot of foreigners looking to buy real estate here, the cost of electricity is a non-issue. At 1500 pesos a month for us, the cost is much less than our most expensive months back in the US, and only slightly more than the cheapest months. I would say that the net cost of electricity over a full year is still cheaper for us here than back home. Yes, sadly I run a lot of electronics which undoubtedly adds considerably to our usage. Even without using the boiler or AC, I highly doubt we could manage to stay under 300 kW/h per month.
Consumption Dec-Jan Coby, speaking about Playa del Carmen wrote: It's not impossible, it seems. We have all the usual home appliances, including a washing machine (we no longer have a dryer, now that we've moved), and run two laptops most of the time, plus a TV a few hours, each day. We've averaged 4.67 KWH/day consumption since December 1, having used the a/c very little since then (only at night, if we needed to drown out noisy neighbors). We have gas hot water heating, though.
Under 400 over a TWO month period seems a little unrealistic to me. Yes it can be done, but you have to be willing to sacrifice your living standards to do it, and you certainly can't have a household with a family unless the only appliances are small and everything else is gas. No A/C, not big TV's, no large fridge, etc....
We got sensitized to the cost of electricity in Mexico by things we read on the internet before coming here. Our actual experience with it has been better than we expected, mainly because of the generous subsidies provided during the hotter months in Cancun. Our biggest bill to date has been just over 1,200 pesos- almost nothing, when you consider it's for a two month period- and I can't recall of a single expat complaining to me about the cost of electricity, here, even those who use more electricity than we do. We don't use a lot of electricity, but it's more a matter of the small scale we operate on than doing without comforts. Our apt is not very big, we have just one TV; our only refrigerator is of medium size, and our apt comes with no disposal, freezer, garbage compactor, or other such items which you can often find in American homes. I'm sure it would be easy to use more electricity than we do if someone had a bigger, more fully equipped place, and was actively living in it with a family, as you suggested, Life. Everything would get used more, and use more! As you also suggested, the only times we've been under 400 KWH/bimester have been during cooler times of the year- now, and last spring- when we didn't need to use the a/c much at all.
In my previous post I attributed much of our economy of electrical consumption to "small scale". Now, I'm wondering if it isn't just as much, or more, about the actual use to which things are put. Here's what I mean. During the period Nov to Jan we were using electricity at just under 5 KWH/day, not needing to run the a/c much at all. We just got the bill, and as the bills show consumption at our location for the previous two years, were able to see what others had done in the same part of the year. In our apt, the prior tenants had used over 3,600 KWH of electricity, to our less than 300 KWH- ten times more! Same place, same equipment. To get there, they would have had to run all three a/cs most of the time- possible, but what an unnecessary waste of energy, and money (their bill would have exceeded 6,000 pesos).
Just to clarify -- according to my reading of the CFE tariff page, the cutoff for the change from 1B domestic rate to DAC (high consumption) rate is 400KWH per MONTH, not per billing period (bimester). Here's the link to the DAC page: Páginas
