If you are planning to build a custom home in a rural setting and your plan includes placing your home a fair distance away from the road then you should think about central metering.
Central metering is when you install your hydro meter next to a hydro vault instead of placing the meter on the side of your new home.
There are a couple of things that this allows you to do;
• You do not have to worry about finding a place for the hydro meter on the side of your new home. They are not the prettiest piece of equipment.
• If your home is to be built a long way from the main power lines that are at the road then it can help save you money. The primary cable that comes from the hydro pole to feed your property is very expensive to buy and have installed. If you install a “vault” (basically a large steel junction box placed on a concrete base near your driveway) that’s where the primary electrical cable ends. You install smaller secondary electrical cable to the house that is cheaper to buy and easier to install.
• You can run multiple secondary electrical lines out of the vault, depending on the amount of out buildings you require to have electricity. You can run secondary cable to the house, garage, barn, drive-shed, shop, stables, wood shop, pool house or a secondary residence. All that is required at the other end is an electrical panel with breakers.
• It allows the electricity company to easily read the meter without having to drive all the way to your house, this is can be a problem if the home is a seasonal property and the road isn’t always maintained in the winter months.
• If there is ever a problem with either the primary line or the secondary then you only have to replace it up to the vault instead of all the way to the road.
• Allows you to add more out buildings that require electricity later on, all you do is dig to the vault instead of to the finished house with all its landscaping.
If nobody has brought up central metering in your preconstruction meetings then maybe you should, it’s easier and cheaper to do before the house is backfilled and the electrical lines are ordered or installed.
Rob Abbott
Operations Manager
Village Builders Inc.
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