Panels & power
Load calculations and capacity in Woodside, NY
This is the cheapest page on this website and the one most likely to save you money. Before anybody sells you a service upgrade, somebody should do the arithmetic that says whether you need one.
A load calculation is a standardised piece of arithmetic that works out how much current a building will actually demand. It accounts for floor area, the fixed appliances, heating and cooling, the range, the dryer, the water heater, any car charger, and the diversity between them — because a house never runs everything at once, and the calculation is built around that fact.
It exists precisely because intuition is bad at this. People dramatically overestimate what modern houses draw, and this trade has every commercial reason not to correct them. A calculation costs $340 and takes an afternoon. A service upgrade you did not need costs five figures.
What the answer changes
If the calculation shows you have headroom, then a panel replacement at your existing service size is a complete job, an EV charger goes on a properly sized circuit, and nobody touches the mast or the meter. That is thousands of dollars and a working day of no power that you do not spend.
If it shows you are at or over the limit, you now know that before you commit to a kitchen, a heat pump or a charger — rather than three weeks into the work when somebody discovers it. And you know by how much, which determines whether the answer is a service upgrade or something smaller, such as load management on the one circuit that is causing the problem.
The EV charger question, specifically
This is the most common reason people ask us for one, and the answer surprises people in both directions. Plenty of Woodside houses with gas heat and gas cooking will take a Level 2 charger on an existing 100 amp service without difficulty. Plenty of all-electric houses will not.
There is also a middle answer that gets left out of the sales conversation: a charger set to a lower current, or one on a load-management device that sheds when the house is busy, will often fit where a full-current charger will not. That is a real engineering choice with a real trade-off — a slower charge overnight — and you should get to make it rather than have it decided for you.
You can take the result somewhere else
The calculation is written up and it is yours. If you take it to another contractor and they quote the work cheaper, that is a good outcome for you and we will not be offended. If somebody has already told you that you need a service upgrade, this is the cheapest way to find out whether they were right.
If you go ahead with us, the $340 comes off the price of the work in full.
There is no box that makes electricity cheaper. We do not sell energy-saving boxes, power-factor correction units, or anything else that plugs into an outlet and promises to cut your bill. A home meter bills real power in kilowatt-hours, and no device plugged into a receptacle changes how much of that your refrigerator, your dryer or your air conditioner uses. Lighting retrofits do save money, and the saving is arithmetic we will do in front of you with your own fixture count and your own rate — not a percentage off a marketing sheet. If the arithmetic does not pay back, we will say so, and you should not do the job.
Included as standard
What the job actually includes
A survey of what is actually there
Service size, panel, existing circuits and the fixed appliances, measured rather than assumed.
The standard calculation
Worked properly with the applicable demand factors, not a rule of thumb off a forum.
The result in writing
What you have, what you need, and the headroom between them. Yours to take anywhere.
The options if you are short
Including the smaller answers — load management, a reduced-current charger — not only the expensive one.
Credited in full
Against any work you go ahead with, so it costs nothing if we do the job.
When to call us
Signs this is the job you need
- Somebody has quoted you a service upgrade and you want to know if it is necessary
- You are planning an EV charger, a heat pump, an induction range or electric heat
- A kitchen or a whole-house renovation is being planned
- A basement or attic is being converted to living space
- The main breaker has tripped under heavy load
- You are buying a house and want to know what its service will support
Load calculations and capacity — what it costs
- Credited in full against the work if you go ahead with us.$340
This is the range this job actually lands in, not a headline figure. The low end is a straightforward version of the work; the high end is one with a hard access problem, an old service, or something that has to be opened up before anybody can be certain. We tell you which one you have after we have looked, and the written quote says where the price could still move and why.
Questions we are actually asked
Load calculations — frequently asked
Why does this cost anything if it is just arithmetic?
Because the arithmetic is the easy part and the survey is not. Getting the inputs right means going through the house, identifying what is actually connected, and checking what the service really is rather than what the label says. That is an afternoon of a licensed electrician's time.
Will you tell me I need an upgrade when I do not?
No, and this page exists partly so you can hold us to that. The result is written down and it is yours. If it says you have headroom, it says so in a document you can show to anybody.
How long does it take?
An afternoon on site, and the written result within two working days.
Related work
Often needed alongside this
Service upgrades
Taking a house from 100 amps to 200, including the mast, the meter pan and the utility coordination.
$5,200 – $11,500
Panel upgrades
Replacing a tired or undersized load centre with a modern one — filed, inspected, and done in a day and a half.
$3,400 – $6,800
EV chargers
A Level 2 charger on a dedicated circuit, filed and inspected, with the load calculation done first.
$1,150 – $3,200
Appliance circuits
Ranges, dryers, wall ovens, mini-splits and window units, each on the circuit its nameplate actually asks for.
$520 – $1,800Somebody who does the work will come and look
Book a visit
Telephone the shop and you will get an electrician rather than a call centre. For defined work — a panel, a charger, a lighting scheme — the quote is free. For a fault, the visit is the diagnosis and it is $165 for the first hour, credited against the work if you go ahead the same visit. Either way we will tell you on the telephone which one it is.