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#201 - Sunday, February 28, 2016 Dear Fellow Grower,
Nebula here. I know I don't normally talk much in these weekly emails, but today I wanted to write a short note just telling you how much I appreciate all of
you. Sirius and I have always been impressed by how incredibly kind and helpful the subscribers to the newsletter have proven to be over the years, not only to us as we improve the website, but also to other growers. It makes me proud to see everyone breaking the negative stereotypes about our hobby. And man you all grow some really amazing plants!
In today's issue... - Learn how to figure out how much electricity will cost for your next grow!
- Learn how to check your circuit breaker box to determine how many watts your outlets can
handle!
- Check out this week's trophy pic which features a unique experiment about curing your cannabis!
Nebula Haze & Sirius Fourside (founders of
GrowWeedEasy.com) "We forget just how painfully dim the world was before electricity. A candle, a good candle, provides barely a hundredth of the illumination of a single 100 watt light
bulb."
~ Bill Bryson
Figuring Out Electricity Cost by Nebula Haze |
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What Will My Electricity Bill Look Like?
How much electricity does it take to grow cannabis indoors from seed to harvest, and
how much will you actually be paying for electricity each month?
When growing marijuana indoors, the cost of electricity is important but it can be confusing trying to predict how much it's going to end up costing you!
Luckily it's relatively straightforward to figure it out once you have the
formula! Figuring Out Cost of Electricity
Let me teach you how to determine how much electricity you'll be using each month for your garden so you can figure out the cost. I'll also share a few estimates for the electricity cost of grow lights, fans, ACs, and more, so you'll have a ballpark figure even if you're not sure exactly how much you pay for electricity.
You need this information:
- Cost of electricity where you live - this should be on your electricity bill, and is usually measured in
kWh
- Wattage of light/fan/pump - If you're not sure, the wattage information is usually on the box. For example it might say 35W, 150W or 600W.
- Number of hours the appliance will be running - For example if it's on 18 hours a day
and you want to know how much it will cost each month, then you'd calculate 18 hours multiplied by about 30 days or approximately 540 hours/month.
Here's the formula which can be used not only to figure out the cost of electricity for the marijuana grow, but also the cost per month:
Cost of Electricity x Number of Hours x (Watts / 1000) = Total Cost
Note: You need to divide the watts (W) by 1000 to plug it into the cost formula; this is to convert
your number to kW so it plays nice with the kWh measurement you get from the electricity company. I'll show you below with a few examples.
Real-Life Example with 250W HPS Light
($161 in electricity for the light during the grow)
- Cost Electricity - $0.37/kWh (this is what we get charged for electricity, but it's more than twice the average cost nationwide so you'd probably pay far less than this!)
- Number Hours: 1,746 light hours
(total hours with 250W HPS turned on)
Veg: 41 days of 18/6 = 738 hours
Flower: 84 days of 12/12 = 1,008 hours - Wattage/1000: I used a 250W HPS light. So if I divide that by 1000 I get 0.250 kW for the
formula.
Cost Electricity x Number of Hours x
(Watts / 1000) = Total Cost
$0.37 kWh x 1,746 hours x 0.250 kW = $161
However, one thing that's very important to remember when doing any estimations is that
although your grow light may account for a lot of your electricity bill, fans and pumps and other things in your grow room also take electricity. It can really start to add up if you don't pay attention, giving you a much higher-than-expected electricity bill!
Remember to Calculate
Energy Cost for Everything That Uses Electricity, Not Just Your Grow Light!
So continuing the above example, in that same grow I also used an exhaust fan, two circulating fans, and for my hydroponic tub I
also used a water pump and an air pump. Although they seem like pretty small items, they can start to add up over the length of the grow.
Cost of Electricity for Other Items
(Additional $117 Over the Grow)
- Water pump - $6.12
- Air pump - $3.33
- Exhaust fan - $41.07
- 2 Oscillating Fans - $66.60
You can view the full breakdown here. But you can see that these other items cost 3/4 as much electricity as the grow light at $161!
Here are more examples to give you an idea of possible cost projections if your
electricity cost $0.25/kWh. This is higher than most people's electricity rate so hopefully your amounts will be lower than these! Estimated Cost-Per-Month for Common Grow Room
Items
MH/HPS Grow Lights - $20-135 per month
Popular LED Grow Light
Examples - $12-$50 per month
Exhaust Fans & Oscillating Fans - $3-23 per month Hydroponic Pumps and Accessories - 60¢-$35
per month
Air Conditioners - $61-$120 per month (for 12 hours/day)
Figuring Out Cost (Per Grow)
If it's your first grow, when it comes to figuring out an estimated per-grow cost I recommend
planning on it taking 5 months to get to harvest time (even though the average grow is usually about 3-4 months). Although you will hopefully get to harvest sooner, it's better to estimate for too much money and have it cost less than the other way around!
Five months gives you plenty of time to mess up in the vegetative stage and use a long-flowering strain but still be ready to harvest. After you get some experience you'll have a much better idea of how long it usually takes to get to harvest using your style and preferred strains. One other thing to remember is you'll use less energy in the flowering stage because your lights will only be on 12 hours a day. You can figure that time out separately if you want, but I'm
just going to pretend the lights are on 18/6 to make things simpler.
So now that you've begun to figure out your per-month prices, you can multiply them by 5 to get an estimate of how much a whole grow will cost you for each item!
Example Setup ($0.25/kWh)
- 400W Grow Light - $54/month
- 2 x 6" Clip-on fans - 13W - $3/month x 2 = $6/month
- 10" tabletop fan - 35W - $7/month
- 6-Inch Exhaust Fan - 125W - $23/month
Monthly Electricity Cost: $90
Electricity Cost for 5 Months: $450
That's a total of $90/month in electricity, so if you multiply that by 5 months you get $450 cost of electricity for the whole grow.
Once you've had a grow or two under your belt it's a good idea to start looking at cost and reward to make sure you're growing what you need for the price you want.
So let's say you spend $450 on
electricity in the grow, but produce 5 ounces of buds, that means you're paying $90/ounce for electricity (plus the cost of setup and supplies). If that's a good price for you then you can celebrate a good harvest, but if you're not getting the right prices in your grow, it's a good idea to evaluate and figure out what you need to change to get the results you're looking for!
For example in my last grow I spent about $280 in electricity throughout the grow (if you add everything together). I harvested a little over 6 ounces which means I spent a little under $50/ounce in
electricity. Considering it costs $350 for an ounce around here, that's some pretty huge savings!
Another thing to consider when trying to estimate costs is how long a specific cannabis plant needs in the flowering stage before it's ready to harvest. Some plants need up to 3 months in the flowering stage, so when determining cost it's a good idea to factor in that extra time. Sometimes it's worth it to
pay more for better buds, but you should know that's what you're getting into!
Ok now that you've got a handle on figuring out your costs, let's take a brief moment to talk a little bit about electrical safety....
Check Your Circuit Breaker! |
If you're getting set up with a new grow room, or just getting started growing in this space for the first time, there's a few things you need to do before you ever plug
anything in! In addition to standard electrical safety precautions inside the grow room, you want to make sure your grow space can actually support the amount of power you need.
Once you know which plugs you're going to use for your grow, you need to calculate how much energy your grow lights and fans will need (as explained in today's article). Armed with that knowledge, you can make sure your outlets can support that much energy usage.
All electrical outlets in your house are on a circuit, and each electrical outlet in your grow room belongs to a circuit. Often the circuit breaker box has labels for which outlets in the house are on each circuit, but sometimes you need to figure it out yourself.
Once you know which circuits your plugs are on, the next step is to open your circuit breaker box and see what number is listed next to the circuit(s) you plan to use. |
Let's say you're using 120V outlets like most standard American outlets. If the circuit on your circuit breaker is labeled for 15
Amps that means that circuit can handle 1800W worth of appliances (15A x 120V = 1800W). If it's labeled with a 20 it means that the circuit can handle 2400 watts (20A x 120V = 2400W). For 30 Amps it's 3600W.
If your appliances on a circuit combined equals more than those total watt numbers, you're going to trip the circuit breaker at some point and everything on that circuit will shut off as a safety
precaution.
I have examples of different wattages listed in the main article, but consider that a 1000W light + 10,000 BTU air conditioner is already enough to go over the 1800W limit if you have a 15A circuit breaker.
Because of this we once had to power an AC with an extension cord that went to another room so
it wasn't using the same circuit as the lights and fans!
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Hi my name is Stuart I'm from the UK before I found this site I had healthy plants but struggled with yeilds. Now after adopting some of the methods explained on your site I'm starting to see the results I tried to get for so long indoors my favourite method I use is the defoliation it has helped me so much thank you. I'm a migraine sufferer since I was a child and use my buds ad medication to great effect.
Again thanks for such a great site full of good information keep up the great work.
Many thanks
Stuart
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This was so neat I had to share! I'm inspired to do some experiments of my own now! Thanks to D.B. for sharing this with us! ~Nebula
I decided to do an experiment while curing cannabis, and I got some Interesting Results!
I put WB#1 into jars too wet. I put WB#2 into jars way too DRY. Both with boveda packs. Stored them under my bed, now over a month. (rolled them in my hands occasionally to prevent lumping, but No
Burping) |
You'll notices the weight and size differences of the nugs. WB1 cured nice and dense and aromatic as hell.
Sticky Icky. The WB1 has a very dense smoke when burning, so seems stronger.
WB2 buds are light, airy, and also smell great... not as strong though, or maybe it's the density. But sticky and really kicks me on my ass. I mean, blurred vision when smoking heavy o_0 ! Love it!
Not attempting to start a pro/con of boveda packs... just wanted to show how differently they turned out. Both Awesome as hell, and better than anything I've every purchased, bar none.
Thanks to GWE website & community :)
~D.B.
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Newsletter? |
Nebula Haze:
Medical cannabis is important to me personally, and I'm dedicated to showing others how easy it is to grow their own supply of
cannabis at home.
It is my mission to educate and build growing resources to help both new and advanced growers get bigger, better yields with less time and money. We update GrowWeedEasy.com at least weekly (often even more often!) to make sure that our website provides you with all the information you need to succeed at growing! |
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Learn which seed sources are personally recommended by Nebula Haze |
Sirius Fourside:
Sirius Fourside is a hobbyist grower who has gained the bulk of his experience growing in water as a medium (deep water culture,
bubbleponics).
"Growing cannabis is a relaxing hobby in and of itself, but it also saves you money and keeps you from having to deal with shady characters. Cannabis is much
easier to grow than people give it credit for, and growing in water doesn't increase the difficulty much, if any. But whether you want to grow in water, coco, or a different medium, we'll show you how easy it can be!"
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