Water Rate and Usage History - Interesting

A little publicized ability we have available through the city's website is access to our utility account history. This is part of the "Click2Gov" function where you can pay your utility bill on line. It's been available for about a year now. I've used it quite a few times to pay my bill with a debit card and, today, I checked out my historical water usage for the past 36 months. You can do the same for your electric use and any other item that is billed to you through your utility account with the city. In order to register and obtain access to this service, you will need your account number (which is in the upper right hand corner of your bill) and other basic personal information.

If we are all about water and energy conservation, this is a good way to track your progress towards a goal - and it can also give you an idea if there is a mistake in calculating your bill - or the impact that out-of-town guests may have on your utility usage.

I took a look at my water usage and a record of the amount billed (that information is only available for the past year.) My results appear below:

The bar graph above is the amount of water I use a month in thousands of gallons. You can see it's pretty consistent, but there are some anomalies that aren't easily explainable. Generally, I use about 3,000 gallons a month. I live alone and do not water my lawn.


The above is a bar graph showing the amount billed over the past year. You can see it's relatively consistent during 2008 - there was a spike in usage for some reason on the January '09 bill. The key thing to look at is that the "increased" rates went into effect effective with the April bill. If everything is correct, that means that I will be paying about $50 less per month for water over the average bill last year. I'll take a look at the ordinance that put the rate adjustment into effect, but low volume users may significantly benefit from the new rate structure. The more you use, the more you pay per 1000 of gallons.

By the way, an item regarding purchase of water from West Palm Beach is on Tuesday night's agenda - to the tune of about half a million dollars ($0.5 million.) The city will be getting the West Palm Beach water for about $2.50/1,000 and, according to my rate on this last bill for May, retails it to customers at $5 and change per 1000 gallons. This is making up for the shortage caused by the South Florida Water Management District restricting our draw from the aquifer (to prevent further salinization) and will supposedly carry us through to a time when we are getting water from our own reverse osmosis plant.

Let me know if you encounter any surprises if you end up checking this out yourself.