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General Category => General Discussion => Topic started by: Richard230 on November 04, 2021, 07:57:26 PM
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I received my PG&E (Northern and Central California utility company) power bill yesterday and now my blood pressure is up and I need to rant. :'(
I use a low amount of electrical power each month (151 kWh shown on the current bill) and am on the lowest tier of PG&E's rate system. My power bill for August showed an electrical cost of $0.26071 per kWh for the entire month.
Starting with the current billing cycle, PG&E has instituted a new rate system that charges more for "peak" hours of the day (4pm to 9pm, I believe) and less when electrical power is used at other times during the day or night. The reasoning behind this billing concept has to do with California generating a lot of its electrical power from solar which goes offline when the sun goes down. That power then has to be made up by using more expensive sources such as gas turbines. OK, that makes sense, but it is sure going to screw their customers over during the summer when AC is needed and during the winter if they generate heat using electrical power - as the state government would like everyone to be doing.
Back to my electric bill: For the period between August 27 and August 30, the rate increased from 26 cents per kWh to a "peak" charge of $0.41972 per kWh and an "off-peak" charge of $0.35628 per kWh. :o That seems like quite an increase to me. >:( For all of October the "peak" charge dropped (relatively speaking) to $0.32264 per kWh and the "off-peak'' charge was $0.30531 per kWh. This is still a substantial increase over the previous month's $0.26 per kWh.
For both months I was given a "baseline credit" of -$0.07575. At the end of the bill I got an "Adjustment" for the "California Climate Credit" of -$17.20, whatever that is. But I do believe that credit only shows up once or twice a year, typically when electric costs go up in order to disguise the rate increase a bit so it helps this month but likely not from now on. ???
I feel as though I am at a magic show and am watching electrical prices come and go to a point where most customers will have no idea what is going on. I give PG&E credit for coming up with a unique billing system that will completely confuse their customers, but it sure is not "customer friendly" - especially for anyone with a weak heart. And raising prices like that is certainly not going to do anything to promote the sales and usage of electric vehicles. :(
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I feel your pain brother.... We are paying for all of the fire damage that PG&E is on the hook for.... AND now they are talking about suing PG&E for scheduled power outages causing traffic accidents due to signal failures !!!! AND don't get me going on property taxes or water rape !!!! NOT my America....
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Besides the fire liabilities, there's massive inflation. It's why the stock market is skyrocketing, housing prices are up across the country, restaurants including fast food are through the roof, utilities are way up, wages are ballooning, etc. Cash is not king and no interest is given. Any money saved but not invested is rapidly losing value. The rapid money printing alone has taken $0.25 off the dollar since 2020Q1.
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I received my PG&E (Northern and Central California utility company) power bill yesterday and now my blood pressure is up and I need to rant. :'(
No, you need to move. Here in Reno, NV Energy charges 11.7 cents per KWH.
And no state income tax.
And your house there will probably buy a few houses here.
-Don- Reno, NV
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Starting with the current billing cycle, PG&E has instituted a new rate system that charges more for "peak" hours of the day (4pm to 9pm, I believe) and less when electrical power is used at other times during the day or night.
That sounds like the PG&E EV plan I have in Auburn. Peak starts at 1500 hrs (3 PM) and ends at 2200 hrs (10 PM). I pay a lot less after then, but a little more during the peak hours.
So now everybody will be on the same plan?
It works well for those who charge EVs in the night or morning.
You just need to buy an EV that draws many KWs, like the 12KW my Tesla draws and charge it automatically at night. Or early morning.
-Don- Reno, NV
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I feel your pain, our PG&E bill went up by 15% compared to last year. Really need to remember not to start laundry till after 9pm.
The new Peak rates make me happy I live on the coast where it's cool. I hate to think what inland customers bills will look like when summer comes.
You might want to see if one of the other rate plans might be a better option. Looks like they have a tool that allows you check your energy usage costs on the various plans.
https://www.pge.com/pge_global/common/pdfs/rate-plans/how-rates-work/Residential-Rates-Plan-Pricing.pdf (https://www.pge.com/pge_global/common/pdfs/rate-plans/how-rates-work/Residential-Rates-Plan-Pricing.pdf)
They also have 2 plans aimed at EV owners that provide late night savings for charging.
https://www.pge.com/en_US/residential/rate-plans/rate-plan-options/electric-vehicle-base-plan/electric-vehicle-base-plan.page? (https://www.pge.com/en_US/residential/rate-plans/rate-plan-options/electric-vehicle-base-plan/electric-vehicle-base-plan.page?)
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It wasn't the concept of charging more depending upon what hours you were using power, but the fact that the company's per kWh charges increased between 23% and 61% (if my calculations are correct) within just one month. I had anticipated that the electrical rate would increase a little between 4pm and 9pm and might be cut slightly (what a dreamer! :'( ) during the early morning and during the day. But jumping from 26 cents to between 30 and 42 cents per kWh within just one month, really shocked me. Plus, unlike previously, when I was being charged a flat rate, the power cost now seems to float around based upon some parameters that appear to be hidden from the customer. How can you plan your budget when bills can fluctuate like that? >:(
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It's happened everywhere... our electricity rates have gone up ~50% in the last 6 months here in the UK too. Solar getting closer and closer to "no brainer" installation.
Cas :)
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It's happened everywhere... our electricity rates have gone up ~50% in the last 6 months here in the UK too. Solar getting closer and closer to "no brainer" installation.
Cas :)
Until the power company gets the regulators to authorize them to charge the customer a fee each month when they install solar, like PG$E did. If you install solar and connect it to the grid so that any excess power goes back into the grid and spins the meter backwards, Pacific, Graft and Explosion (or is that "Extortion"?) charges customers using solar like that $70 a month for the privilege of doing so. Apparently, it helps when you have the Public Utility Commission members firmly located in your pocket. ::)
While it is possible to use solar and cut yourself out of the grid, doing so requires a big house or a large property, as well as a battery storage system, to make the system work (as well as lots of investment), something that most people do not have. :(
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Everyone's favorite utility company that we love to hate is doing it again:
In my newspaper today was a "Notice of Public Forums regarding PG&E's 2023 General Rate Case Application". Their proposal to be submitted to the CA PUC is to raise both electric and gas rates by 18% over the next four years. The proposed new rates will increase their income by $3.56 billion in 2023, $930 million in 2024, $590 million in 2025 and $381 million in 2026. These are general increases and likely will be supplemented by additional special rate increases, as was done last January and in the next two weeks. :o
As near as I can tell from reading the legal notice, they are raising their rates because they can. >:(
It sure seems as if electric rates in California are going up a lot faster than gasoline costs with no end in sight. :'(
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9% rate hike today for PG&E.
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We're looking at a 50% increase next month, and likely similar again in the autumn. My annual leccy/gas combined bill is going to be in the region of £4000-£5000 ... and this is before the Ukrainian situation is taken into account.
Cas :)
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We're looking at a 50% increase next month, and likely similar again in the autumn. My annual leccy/gas combined bill is going to be in the region of £4000-£5000 ... and this is before the Ukrainian situation is taken into account.
Cas :)
Ouch! :o That has got to hurt! >:( And here I was crying about California's energy prices. It does seem to be a race to the bottom when it comes to energy affordability all around the world. :-\
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I pretty urgently want to get solar installed. Unfortunately I've been unemployed for months and haven't a bean to my name.
Cas :)
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I pretty urgently want to get solar installed. Unfortunately I've been unemployed for months and haven't a bean to my name.
Cas :)
My daughter and her husband contracted with Sun Power to have solar panels installed on their roof, along with a backup battery system. They have been waiting almost two months for the design to be completed and submitted to the county for a permit. So far nothing has happened. My guess is that the demand for solar is so great that the companies that install these systems are overwhelmed with orders. Either that or solar power parts are in short supply. ???
BTW, I am really sorry to hear that you are out of beans. :(
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It's quite weird being skint, I had thought that 30 odd years of being a programmer would make me useful to someone, especially as I hear there's a shortage or something.
Cas :)
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It's quite weird being skint, I had thought that 30 odd years of being a programmer would make me useful to someone, especially as I hear there's a shortage or something.
Cas :)
I was still under the impression that there's a lot of demand. Since Covid you should even find that location is less important. Many of those London roles have opened up to remote working. I live in the UK but I'm now working for my previous empoyer's parent company. My office is now in Amsterdam and I'm 100% remote. They were so keen to retain coders that when my previous project came to an end they went out of their way to find something else for me in a totally different area.
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It's quite weird being skint, I had thought that 30 odd years of being a programmer would make me useful to someone, especially as I hear there's a shortage or something.
Cas :)
I was still under the impression that there's a lot of demand. Since Covid you should even find that location is less important. Many of those London roles have opened up to remote working. I live in the UK but I'm now working for my previous empoyer's parent company. My office is now in Amsterdam and I'm 100% remote. They were so keen to retain coders that when my previous project came to an end they went out of their way to find something else for me in a totally different area.
My son-in-law's company has gone 100% remote. Everyone is very happy with that. :) They have 180 employees and used to lease a two-story office building in San Francisco for big bucks. Now the company is saving that monthly cost (not an insignificant savings in a city like SF) and the employees no longer have to commute to work across a toll bridge (or take expensive and slow public transit), pay for expensive parking each day in the city and hope their vehicle doesn't get broken into by the homeless or thieves. Plus, when working at home you can take breaks when needed to attend to other matters on the spur of the moment, such as taking the kids to school or waiting around for a repairman to arrive during their 4 or 8-hour window. ::)
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A couple of days ago it was announced that the CEO of PG&E received a total "direct compensation" of just over $51 million, in spite of all of their problems. Seems like a nice job if you can get it. Plus, the job typically comes with a large and comfortable "golden parachute" should you need to leave the company in a hurry. ::)
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Didn"t PG&E go bankrupt primaraly because the government fixed what they could charge but their price to purchace power was market. I believe California was the only place Exxon actually made any money. In that general time frame. Is it some re designed entity from prior?
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A couple of days ago it was announced that the CEO of PG&E received a total "direct compensation" of just over $51 million, in spite of all of their problems. Seems like a nice job if you can get it. Plus, the job typically comes with a large and comfortable "golden parachute" should you need to leave the company in a hurry. ::)
I never could understand why CEOs often get large bonuses when the company is going downhill for mismanagement. Not uncommon at all.
-Don- Auburn, CA
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BTW, in CA, do Zero motorcycles qualify for the EV lower rate (https://www.pge.com/en_US/residential/rate-plans/rate-plan-options/electric-vehicle-base-plan/electric-vehicle-base-plan.page) before 1500 hrs? I have that here, but I used my Tesla for that since it has a CA plate. The plate has to match the state in CA.
They also have the same type of deal in Reno, but electricity is so cheap there at 11.7 cents per KWH, I don't even bother with it and there I charge up any time.
-Don- Auburn, CA
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BTW, in CA, do Zero motorcycles qualify for the EV lower rate (https://www.pge.com/en_US/residential/rate-plans/rate-plan-options/electric-vehicle-base-plan/electric-vehicle-base-plan.page) before 1500 hrs? I have that here, but I used my Tesla for that since it has a CA plate. The plate has to match the state in CA.
They also have the same type of deal in Reno, but electricity is so cheap there at 11.7 cents per KWH, I don't even bother with it and there I charge up any time.
-Don- Auburn, CA
My understanding is that only EV cars get the lower nighttime charging rate, not motorcycles. Keep in mind that the EV rate plan was likely formulated by PG&E after being squeezed by the Governor and the legislators to give EV cars a break and then they got their friends on the CA PUC to approve it. No politician gives a rats behind what happens with motorcycles, which is why we pay the same tolls as cars and two-axle trucks to cross bridges outside of car pool hours. >:(
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My understanding is that only EV cars get the lower nighttime charging rate, not motorcycles. Keep in mind that the EV rate plan was likely formulated by PG&E after being squeezed by the Governor and the legislators to give EV cars a break and then they got their friends on the CA PUC to approve it. No politician gives a rats behind what happens with motorcycles, which is why we pay the same tolls as cars and two-axle trucks to cross bridges outside of car pool hours. >:(
Your understanding is NOT correct. I get a cheaper rate when I run a clothes drier or an air conditioner or anything else before 1500 hrs. It makes no difference what it is, but includes EVs. There are a couple of different EV plans and they are NOT the same.
But one thing PG&E requires for any of their plans is for you to own an EV and it must have a CA plate and be on their list of EV models. I do not recall if Zero is on that list. I would look for you, but since I already have it, the website does weird things when I try to look, as I need to put in the same old info to look.
You will need your PG&E account number, the VIN number of any EV you own with a CA plate and your zip code and other such info. It will ask you what type of EV you have and IIRC, you must select from their list. IIRC, Zero is on it in CA, but NOT in NV. And that is why I never got the plan in NV. My Tesla and Energica have CA plates. I have two Zeros, one with CA & the other with a NV plate. I am sure I had the problem in NV, not CA, as Zero was NOT on their list then. Perhaps it is now. But at the full rate of 11.7 cents per KWH in Reno, I figure I will just forget the entire thing and not have any concern about what time it is.
But CA juice is very expensive, as you know.
So start the on-line application and see what happens. You could save a bundle, but only between 0000 and 1500 hrs, seven days a week.
-Don- Auburn, CA
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I guess things have changed since the EV nighttime discounted rate plan was announced. A couple of years ago I received a random letter from PG&E announcing their new EV rate option for electric vehicles that I could sign up for. In the letter they mentioned that electric motorcycles were not approved for the program. In any case I typically do my charging during the early morning starting at 5:30am before I go for a ride a few hours later. The power rates are a little lower before 4pm each day.
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I guess things have changed since the EV nighttime discounted rate plan was announced. A couple of years ago I received a random letter from PG&E announcing their new EV rate option for electric vehicles that I could sign up for. In the letter they mentioned that electric motorcycles were not approved for the program. In any case I typically do my charging during the early morning starting at 5:30am before I go for a ride a few hours later. The power rates are a little lower before 4pm each day.
Yes, they changed things around a year ago and it was to my benefit. That doesn't happen often. I am not sure how PG&E now deals with electric motorcycles, as electric cycles have changed. These days, some motorcycles can home charge at 12KW. That's more than many electric cars.
-Don- Auburn, CA
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Didn"t PG&E go bankrupt primaraly because the government fixed what they could charge but their price to purchace power was market. I believe California was the only place Exxon actually made any money. In that general time frame. Is it some re designed entity from prior?
No, that was the old bankruptcy Grey Davis / Enron era. Part of why we got the Governator.
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Didn"t PG&E go bankrupt primaraly because the government fixed what they could charge but their price to purchace power was market. I believe California was the only place Exxon actually made any money. In that general time frame. Is it some re designed entity from prior?
No, that was the old bankruptcy Grey Davis / Enron era. Part of why we got the Governator.
And then we had a new bankruptcy in 2020, after getting a new Governor, needing even higher utility rates to pay off the latest disaster. >:(
PG&E the company that keeps on giving. ::)
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They are at it again. Two rate increases so far this year and PG&E has just applied for another one. >:(
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I received my PG&E (Northern and Central California utility company) power bill yesterday and now my blood pressure is up and I need to rant. :'(
In a few days, you may rant some more. (https://www.msn.com/en-us/money/companies/pg-e-announces-yet-another-increase-to-2024-utility-bills/ar-AA1mdGt8?ocid=msedgntp&pc=W099&cvid=e2d2ef2f053049c781f8d015e93ad446&ei=16)
I am having solar put on this house. Won't be cheaper, but at least not nearly as much of my money will go to PG&E and my power will stay on during the PG& E outages.
OTOH, at the rate PG&E is rising their rates, the solar will soon be cheaper.
-Don- Auburn, CA
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I received my PG&E (Northern and Central California utility company) power bill yesterday and now my blood pressure is up and I need to rant. :'(
In a few days, you may rant some more. (https://www.msn.com/en-us/money/companies/pg-e-announces-yet-another-increase-to-2024-utility-bills/ar-AA1mdGt8?ocid=msedgntp&pc=W099&cvid=e2d2ef2f053049c781f8d015e93ad446&ei=16)
I am having solar put on this house. Won't be cheaper, but at least not nearly as much of my money will go to PG&E and my power will stay on during the PG& E outages.
OTOH, at the rate PG&E is rising their rates, the solar will soon be cheaper.
-Don- Auburn, CA
Don't bet on it. It will be only a matter of time before PG&E starts charging you for using sunlight to produce electricity. They will say that it is not fair because they have a monopoly approved by the CA PUC and you don't. :o
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Don't bet on it. It will be only a matter of time before PG&E starts charging you for using sunlight to produce electricity. They will say that it is not fair because they have a monopoly approved by the CA PUC and you don't. :o
PG&E has had a lot of expenses lately. I often see them cutting down trees in this area.
Hopefully they will never even know I have solar, but I am not doing it to save money anyway. I just like the idea for several reasons, such as during power outages. I would not consider such a system without the batteries.
-Don- Auburn, CA
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Why anyone would have gotten a solar system without battery backup is beyond me. It's them being clueless, and the slimy bastards with the solar companies selling them a unicorn fart dream with no clue to the reality of things. The moment your system burps, all those panels go OFF line for a minimum of 5 minutes.
The prices of solar batteries, believe it or not are coming down lately. It's not hard at all to put an inverter in with a few batteries and back up your house for when the lights DO go out so you have power. OR to charge at night when the price is 20 cents a kw/hr .vs. the day when it's 50 cents a kw hour. Don't sell it back to them, fuck them, put all your generation into your batteries and then use it later on, don't even need to touch their meter OR their grid, throw the main breaker.
Here in florida, all taxes, fees etc out the door we are paying about 13 cents ish a KW hr. Im on solar, i make way more than I use and sell power to my neighbor.
Aaron
PS. why are they having planned power outages? for the wind or because of generation capability shortfalls?
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Why anyone would have gotten a solar system without battery backup is beyond me.
Because batteries double the price of something that's already a luxury, and they have a short life, and they become a literal ton of liability after that.
We use the grid with net metering as infinite "batteries", so there is no worrying and next to no maintenance. Any under-supply is automatically covered, so no self-rationing is required (besides the high price). Power failure is a disadvantage, but it's rare and I have a gas generator in case it lasts 12+ hours (CARB is forcibly interfering with that).
Paying connection fees to PG&E is another recent disadvantage introduced by the CPUC. Everyone should have to pay a connection, fee and everyone should have to pay a "demand" fee according to their absolute peak usage. But rather than going this way, they're pursuing a socialist approach with income-based rates.
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Batteries can last 10 to 15 years, or more. People get hung up on the numbers without really understanding them.
There are places that Do recycle them, or take them for free, so disposal is NEVER going to cost you a ton more, at least it should not, unless some politician as raping you with some stupid ordinances.
If you never have power outages then ok, you don't need them, but if you do have them or are prone to hurricanes and stuff that CAN take down your grid for weeks, then batteries work. Not to mention you never get paid properly for excess power, they rape you taking it from you, and rape you selling it back to you at jacked prices. With batteries YOU keep your excess and use it when YOU want to, and don't have to pay those demand charges, you just use YOUR power you put in your battery. They don't see it, and better yet, they don't get to steal it.
speaking of, here in florida, I am told you can NOT disconnect from the grid, it's a law. They claim it's a safety issue that you have to have reliable power, well shit, my solar is a shit ton more reliable then the power out here, thats one of the reasons I GOT IT! so you can not totally disconnect, you have to pay the chicken vacuum's their monthly fee, even if you don't use one watt of power. My power company has been accusing me of stealing from them for years, because I have gone months w/o one kilowatt of useage on my system, they replaced my meter a few times now and are always snooping around. I've offered to show them my entire setup but they never want to see it! I think the harassment / intimidation is part of their plan.
I DO agree though, that if one is connected, they pay the connect fee, but the solar guy should NOT have to subsidize the other clowns power, AND the other clowns should not have to pay for the solar guys system either! Problem is greed, the power company does not want to share ANY of the pie, they want it all for themselves, so will rule over ashes rather than share with another person. The solar clowns are no better, they think the world will run off their magical unicorn farts, and the evil power company needs to pay to feed those unicorns. If only we could get the adults to sit at the table and discuss this, there ARE solutions that work for EVERYONE, without huge compromises, that are realistic, but nobody wants to hear that, it might cut into THEIR profit.
Right now, I am totally self sufficient, and have about 120 KW / hr of battery storage, I get batteries for free from a dealer that takes in factory warranty claims, and gives them to me, I open them, fix them, then reuse them in my system. Now that I have an electric bike, I have a good use for those KW's, in fact am putting together a trailer, with batteries, an inverter and my fast charger, to take the bike to the track with, so i can fast charge on spot when racing. But that extra storage, can easily, literally with one 50 amp plug, jack right into my existing system and run the house if I need... or run a neighbors house in an emergency.
Aaron
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No batteries with my installed solar. The return on investment with the solar panels is way down the road; with batteries doubling the install cost it makes even less financial sense. We rarely lose power and I too have a generator to keep the freezers running (via extension cords rather than through the house wiring). You have to be real careful about not feeding power back into the grid when the line workers are repairing downed lines during an outage. I didn't have the grid cutoff installed when they put in our solar panels.
I like the idea of batteries - particularly free ones. I can relate to free: I have nearly infinite free wood for our wood stove to heat the house.
Our PUD pays the same rate to us for uploaded power as we pay for grid power. I wish we had a bit more sun in Seattle! This time of the year we only get about 10% of our power from solar.
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That is fair for the upload / taking of power. BUT. you have to be careful. The IRS will fuck you on that. The laws are very slimy concerning that, and what will happen is, every watt you sell, for say 20 cents a kilowatt, the power company will consider that a payment of cash / cash equivalent to you, so once you sell them the magical 600 dollars of electric, viola, it's 1099 time, straight to the IRS for you to pay taxes on that 'income'.
Even if you took it right back at the same price an hour later and used it, you can NOT write that back off, and are stuck with that 'income'. you can argue that you really just used the utility as a 'battery' to hold your power for you, it was your power, and just like putting money in the bank and taking it out, and putting it back in, that is NOT another income... but it won't fly, the IRS' reply will be, well that is between you and the 1099 issuer, but WE see income that needs to be paid for.
Talk to your accountant, there ARE ways around this, an IOU is one, but you have to play by rules. Batteries eliminate all this, YOU save YOUR power to use any time YOU want and not have to pay a dime for it, except the price of the batteries, which you do get a rebate on but anyways.
prices are coming down on them, they are about 40 cents kw hr now, and so are panels. They are the safer chems too so there is not the hydrogen blowtorch thing to worry about.
at those prices, the ROI is very reasonable.
Aaron
Aaron
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My electricity bills for 2023 added up to $1172.74. I put 2205 KWH back onto the grid @$.10 per KWH - $220.50. I'm safe from a 1099. It is food for thought for people with higher rates and more sun.
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The laws are very slimy concerning that, and what will happen is, every watt you sell, for say 20 cents a kilowatt, the power company will consider that a payment of cash / cash equivalent to you, so once you sell them the magical 600 dollars of electric, viola, it's 1099 time, straight to the IRS for you to pay taxes on that 'income'.
If I had to pay taxes on solar income, then I'd write off the solar panels as a capital expenditure, depreciating asset, business loss, or whatever the logical thing would be.
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YES you can do that IF you are a business. Back in the day though, that would disqualify you from the 30 percent 'home' rebate you can get on your taxes for the panels. But that is just fixing the 'panel' cost, no matter what is going on with your electric, so it's just a small up front one time thing.
Because you took that rebate you won't be able to write off those panels that way, (their thinking is, you got a rebate that's all you need for them). If you do not take the rebate then you might be able to write off the panels, but at what real cost?, avoided tax? will your tax exceed the 30 percent you get from writing them off. Ok whatever, but you STILL are paying tax on your solar income, unless you battery it to use it and nobody has a clue how much, because it's never SOLD, it's just used, which so far is NOT taxed.
As I said, there ARE ways to get around / solve / fix this, but the laws in the states are diffferent for the way's, ie IOU as an example, so you really would need to talk to your accountant and see if it is a viable thing for you, and what hassles you will face in your specific state.
Your electric is 25 cents a KW hour? get a small power meter and an extension cord and sell power to your neighbor for 15 or 20 cent / kw. Fast easy and both of you make out. You make money, he saves money, and if you do it right you'll never backspin him so nobody will ever know.
Without getting into long, boring to most, nitty gritty details, it is workable, even in low outage areas, batteries DO help a ton, and you CAN get some decent ROI if you do it right.
On ROI, people are hung up on that number, they don't see the big picture.
How much is NOT losing 1000 dollars worth of meat in the freezer worth when the hurricane, earthquake, etc takes your power out for a few days, a few weeks? Not losing your milk, your meds that need to be kept cool. Having AC when you live in florida and the humidity is 95 percent and the temp is 97 out? Oh but I have a generator, im good. Ok what happens when it runs out of gas, hint the gas station won't run either without electricity, and do you think that little portable thing you got is honestly going to run for DAYS? That air cooled gen is going to be just fine running days on end? umm okay..... But I have 100 gallons of gas. Which goes bad in a year, until you throw crap in it, which is costly then you might get 2 or 3 years out of it.
To each is own, some people th is wont work, but whatever you end up getting, do your homework, get the most out of it, and don't let them steal it back from you !
Aaron
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I am currently charging the Tesla on our winter super-off-peak rate of 3.1 cents per K. It's much higher in summer, 5.1 cents.
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Speaking of PG&E, they made the news again. >:(
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Page 2.
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Well, you seen that one a mile off.
Don't cut down our pretty trees, you TREE KILLER !!!!!! glare scream bark at the moon.
Overgrowth causes massive wildfires that do billions of dollars of damage.
Tree huggers sue, YOU did not do preventative forestry it's YOUR fault !!!!
Suit goes thru, now they are on the hook for billions of dollars to pay off lawsuits AND fix the stuff
hmm, where to get the money, well unlike the govt, they don't have a magic money printer so...
it comes from the customers. Whom are essentially a monopoly income provider.
rates increase 40 percent for system upgrades and other 'costs of business'.
wash rinse and repeat.
Go solar, get a battery, leave them behind.
Aaron
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Go solar, get a battery, leave them behind.
But my system has generated next to nothing for the past month. :(
Forest fires are one excuse, but California has been destroying its own energy production by regulating it into non-existence.
Water Resources Control Board has control over our power!
> California originally had scheduled all of the state’s natural gas-fired units that are cooled by ocean water to be closed by year-end 2020, a decision made by the State Water Resources Control Board in 2010. The board cited negative impacts to marine life when seawater was moved into the power plants. [Trust me, marine life DOES NOT CARE.] Oxnard, Alamitos, Huntington Beach plants closures temporarily delayed [until incumbents can be re-elected]
Redondo Beach closure:
> “It took us over 20 years,” Mayor Bill Brand said in a recent Facebook post. [He is so proud of this]
> The city celebrated the shutdown on Sunday afternoon — New Year’s Eve — with a ceremonial flip of a switch, symbolizing the plant never having to be turned on again. [And the residents cheer... higher bills and blackouts are worth whatever the gain was! Except Asia will offset the carbon savings by 10x]
> “The retirement of the AES power plant,” the city said in a recent press release, “represents a significant step towards a more sustainable and environmentally friendly future for Redondo Beach, and the entire Santa Monica Bay.” [As the plant will be replaced by mixed use residential/commercial creating more *actual* environmental damage, and more customers needing power]
> Carlsbad, Huntington Beach, Mandalay plants closed [Angela Johnson Meszaros of Earthjustice, which has pushed for the closure of the city’s gas-fired plants, called Tuesday’s announcement “an important milestone.” “But it’s not the end of the story,” she said. “A lot remains to be done.” It's a RELIGION.]
California Energy Commission
> CEC voted Wednesday to extend the life of three gas power plants along the state’s southern coast through 2026, postponing a shutoff deadline previously set for the end of this year. The vote would keep the decades-old facilities — Ormond Beach Generating Station, AES Alamitos and AES Huntington Beach — open so they can run during emergencies. [Who could have predicted decommissioning so much power would be problematic?]
Commissioner Patricia Monahan things renewables and battery are going to work.
> “We need to move faster in incorporating renewable energy. We need to move faster at incorporating battery storage. We need to build out chargers faster,” commissioner Patricia Monahan said. “We’re working with all the energy institutions to do that, but we are not there yet.” [We're going to give them $billiions to squander on fake projects like Solyndra and H2 charging stations until shit hits the fan]
Moss Landing
> Put in operation in 2002 and retired after 20 years, now being replaced by a 1.2GWh mega lithium battery storage project. [Discharge duration 4 hours] [Bet they wish they were producing at $0.48/kWh now instead.] [Battery lifetime... 10 years? These are Tesla batteries. Money for Tesla, and more money when they need replacement, and Tesla never makes any false claims...]
Diablo Canyon
> PG&E requests $1.3 billion to get rid of this clean 2.2GW power source [Newsom panics because we've already been having rolling blackouts under his watch]
Sorry for the random rant. Personally, I think all of civilization including humans will be replaced entirely with something unrecognizable by 2100, so all this global-warming-driven suffering is for naught.
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It's funny, before the moonbats were screeching about evil coal, and natural gas was the safe clean thing.
now NG is the evil and solar is the safe clean thing.
once they get that installed everywhere and power is arbitrary at best, I wonder what is going to replace the panels?
wind is shredding eagles and killing whales so, guess it's back to living in caves, waiting for lightning strikes to create fire to keep you warm.
Any electric you do manage to find will be used to run the Co2 sequestration stations to keep you happy and cooler.
aaron
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According to this article that was published in my newspaper today the home solar panel industry pretty much collapsed last year and many companies have had to lay off 50-75% of their employees to stay in business. The article points fingers at Northern California's PG&E (the largest utility company in the U.S.), the state's PUC, legislators and electrical unions as the culprits that all contributed to the industry's problems.
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Blame California? well YOU were stupid enough to put a business there, you KNEW how hostile that state is to business'
Blame the Unions, that I can absolutely see, another crowd who wants maximum pay to do minimum work all day, the US can't compete with china or any overseas panel manu's because of that, plain and simple.
on that though, there are plenty of companies selling panels. some are as low as like 28 cents a watt now and many in the 30's.
Interestingly the prices are fluctuating all over the place, they were pushing in the 50's and 60's then a new batch of lower cost panels suddenly came up. A few of them US companies too.
Now, whether they will stick around or was this a smash and grab at the biden ghetto buxx for solar stuff like we seen with Solynndra remains to be seen.
i just ordered a 12 pack of panels for my bike trailer and back yard booster, and also the lith storage batteries are VERY cheap now 3.6 kw I got for 1k each, high current too, they can push 200 amps. This specific battery has been around for oh i want to say 4 or 5 years now and is proving itself to be very reliable.
altenergystore.com
Aaron
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Here is a long opinion piece regarding the solar panel industry in California which was in my newspaper today that you might find interesting if you have the time to read it.
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I will read it richard, but in short, the whole industry is pretty corrupt and you better watch out.
Solyndra ring a bell?
There is fat cash just waiting to be gobbled up and they are all lining up at the trough for their feed at the piggy stables. Yes there are some reputable dealers and manu's out there but there are also so many scammers too.
The biggest scam is not having a self sustained grid, ie battery backup, even if it was just for 30 minutes. Because every time the grid hiccups, it could be as simple as the 10 am squirrel hitting the 68k transmission line, and poof ALL those panels are off line and shut down for 5 minutes before they revalidate and come back up. That huge swing in power gen is a nightmare for a dispatcher, and can actually cause other stuff to trip off line, especially when it all of the sudden all comes back on within a 3 or 4 second window as they all hit their 5 minute mark at the same time.
A battery could buffer this very easily, keep YOU safer, the grid safer, and you don't trip offline and lose generation while everything is trying to requalify to get back online.
Even a small supercap for say a 20 second ride thru a burp would make a world of difference and at todays prices, would be very cheap. I totally get the reason for the disconnect, but they really need to rethink it and redesign it, now that we had a few decades to SEE what happens when things go bad. Just my opinion.
Aaron
Edit: I read it, let me edit.
Greed and Corruption with a big fat healthy dose of communism thrown in there. Let the govt (meaning you) pay for it !! Just tax the working class, they'll get over it!!!!
How about, instead, making it more affordable, the problem, and it's been there for a good century now, not just solar but with everything is GREED. They want the entire pie and don't want to share ANY of it with anyone else. Also, if you can afford and want solar, cool, go for it, if you can't, then don't get it. The govt should not be subsidizing ANY of this crap!! That goes for everything, sugar, gas, solar, anything that has govt subsidies. if it's too expensive then either people learn to do without, or they learn to make it for less profit.
When are these Marxist assholes going to learn that no, taxing the companies does not work, they simply raise the price of their product and pass that right onto the very people you are pretending you are trying to help.
let's sue the cigarette companies, YAY we won, the next day the pack of cigs cost a dollar more. WHO really won? The lawyers won, the govt with a higher number to collect tax on, but the people. they didn't win a damned thing.
IF done honestly, with the adults sitting at the table, actually caring about the 'better good' of everyone, solar could be very doable, and with a little compromise, a little sacrifice here and there, be good for most everyone. However the adults are NOT at the table, the crooks are, and neither side is willing to listen to a thing the other has to say, because it might cost them money. Lies spin round and round, because everyone is trying to protect their little grift pool and the people pay for it EVERY TIME.
Maybe we just need a huge EMP to nuke us back to the stone age. Life was simpler, and people had to work together to survive. What a novel concept.
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Here is a long opinion piece regarding the solar panel industry in California which was in my newspaper today that you might find interesting if you have the time to read it.
One problem is that if too many have solar, it will cause PG&E to jack up their rates just to stay in business. So after they jack up their rates, more will go solar. As more go solar, PG&E must jack of their rates again and etc.
PG&E loves to convince people to use less electricity. But this world runs on BS.
But they do need to make a profit and they have a lot of expenses to deal with.
When we were MUCH younger, it was the telephone company that was the big rip-off. PG&E was then more reasonable. That reversed over the years.
-Don- Reno, NV
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PG&E should have been deep into consumer solar panels, storage, EVSEs, generators, etc. by now.
Companies that re-invent themselves in the face of adversity are the ones who survive. Netflix going from mail order to streaming, Amazon going from books to everything, Apple opening physical stores, Microsoft embracing Linux and on-line subscription, Safeway re-doing all its stores, all car manufacturers making EVs, etc.
Companies that don't adapt and go with the flow are doomed -- Sears, Rite Aid, AT&T, etc.
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Well, PG&E did invest in storage batteries to partially pick up the slack when solar and wind generation is down. However, reading this article it looks like they are paying a private company to build and operate the battery storage system, which adds another layer of profit to the cost of electricity before it hits their rate payer's monthly bills. I wonder why PG%E couldn't have built, operated and owned the battery plant itself? My guess is that it makes more profit for them when they buy the stored power from a private company, instead of owning the plant themselves as they do with their hydro facilities.
https://electrek.co/2023/08/03/worlds-largest-battery-storage-system-just-got-even-larger/#:~:text=The%20Moss%20Landing%20Energy%20Storage,of%20a%20gas%2Dpowered%20plant
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Richard,another part is it's easier to write that company off as an expense, rather than have to deal with the insurance and all that crap of an asset, and the upkeep employees etc etc. Not to mention when the lawsuits start flowing in, they can rub their hands point that way and go, it's a private company, go sue them.
Aaron
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Richard,another part is it's easier to write that company off as an expense, rather than have to deal with the insurance and all that crap of an asset, and the upkeep employees etc etc. Not to mention when the lawsuits start flowing in, they can rub their hands point that way and go, it's a private company, go sue them.
Aaron
That makes business sense. And PG$E is all about business and profits. Anyone play Monopoly? One of the nice places to own on the board is the utility spot. ::)
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Here is another article that was in today's newspaper about CA's solar industry troubles that explains how the state regulators gave them and homeowners wanting to install solar panels the shaft. Page 1.
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Page 2.
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If the wholesale market is so wonderful and abundant, then why are they having all these power crisis' Brownouts, blackouts and grid emergencies?
What happens on a shitty day and they are paying 10,000 dollars a megawatt, yet have to sell it to YOU for 200 dollars a megawatt because that is your current going rate? Yah, they don't even bring up that part when trying to justify fucking you on what they want to pay you for YOUR electricity.
I could see maybe paying 60 percent market price for it, that is fair, after all you still have to use their wires, transformers, etc to get it to the next user, however in reality the next user typically is your neighbor who is on the same transformer as you so a few hundred dollars of wire is all that is really used.
How about when 'bulk market' price is 9999 because there is NO electric available, and emergency power prices are 12k per megawatt, because ther eis NO electric available, but wait, they can get it from the consumer, hey bud, sell down your battery 40 percent to us over these next few hours to get us thru the hump, and paying only retail for it instead of retail x 50. All the MILLIONS of dollars they'd save in that scenario. Oh no lets not talk about that.
Everyone wants to lie and play games because they can't share and work together, every greedy cunt want's it all for themselves, and THAT is what will ultimately destroy them.
Aaron
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The natives are restless: https://patch.com/california/pacifica/s/iuxwy/op-ed-pg-e-profits-soar-as-ratepayers-struggle-with-sky-high-bills
Attached is a photo of the newspaper article that this op-ed is based upon.
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It sure is an op-ed.
I went to Yahoofinance
https://finance.yahoo.com/quote/PCG/key-statistics
Does not look like a dividend stock to me.
This latest episode does not seem to have bumped the share price
Last Split Factor 2 2:1
Last Split Date 3 Jul 18, 1983
Was this even the same company in 1983?
Maybe you California folks should do like Connecticut and make the transmission and distribution completely seperate from the supply. Then let the government add all the redistribution of wealth stuff in line items.
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Fran, that would greatly simplify the billing, and let the people know exactly where the money is being spent.
You have generation, (this would include purchase agreements as well, maybe we should call it acquisition), transmission and distribution basically. They like to keep them bunched up and murky so they can keep scaring you into believing their bs and adding more Tariffs every time you turn around.
Right now the big kerfluffle is going to eventually be paying people with solar fairly for what they put back on the grid.
Of course the power companies don't want to pay much of anything for it, they want it for free.
of course the people want full retail rate for it
Of course any mention of ANY sort of compromise, you get glared at from both sides because they just can't comprehend the concept of sharing / or working together, maybe I should use the catch phrase, the common good, how about.. let EVERYONE get a little bit of the pie. Nope!!
The power plants love to give their bullshit how they can get electric for pennies on the megawatt, but they conveniently forget to add in the times when they are paying tens of thousands of dollars per megawatt because there just is NO spare electric out there and when buying at emergency prices, well, anything goes, but oh hey that lowly customer who is selling at market rate, well his power is 100x cheaper than ANYthing currently available. Shush you, you'll ruin our swindle.
Back to the article. How can they call that profit, didn't they just lose a few billion in the previous year or three due to fire damages, and a 20 billion or something obscene like that from lawsuits? Don't they have like thousands of miles of wire to bury so it's no longer a fire hazard, and that was going to cost a trillion dollars or whatever goofy amount they said it would?
You would think that after the shitstorm that the entire state went thru concerning electricity, fires, and culpability, they'd be real careful about throwing around the word profit. Call it cutting losses, call it, making progress on our fire hardening program, something, but profit? Yah, not a good word to use there.
At the end of the day though, that one magic word, shareholders, is how they get away with it. By law, they are in the game to make money, PERIOD. If they are a corporation, they LEGALLY have to make as much money as they possibly can for their shareholders or they can be held in negligence. Yes we could cut a deal that would help the customers, but we answer to the SHAREHOLDERS, who want to see a PROFIT, more than we answer to the customers, so making the customers happier, at the expense of the shareholders ROI, well, that's a lawsuit there.
Ive been doing solar since 1986, and worked for the power company for close to 20 years. Ive been all in and out and upside down in the solar thing, trying to find someone to talk to, to pitch a good deal for our entire city, (my opinion, but strongly backed by hard numbers)_ Nobody is interested. Solar is expensive, and no money in it for them, the power companies are NOT interested. There COULD be money in it for them IF they did it correctly, but as usual, they ALL get dragged to the table kicking and screaming, and nothing good for YOU is ever going to come out of that. If anything they do shit to punish you for making them comply. Just like EPA compliance, rarely if ever will you see proactive, it's always reactive or damage control from them. Why? Because PROactive costs money.
Are you starting to see a pattern here?
Aaron
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BTW. PG&E a few years ago started billing separately for electric generation and transmission costs. Even if you don't use any electricity you still get billed for their maintenance and the value of their transmission infrastructure. I am on their "Trier 1" rate plan and last month I was billed $.515 per KWh with more PUC approved rate increases in the pipeline. >:(
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Just a bit more. It is a motorcycle forum anyway. When they made the electric company which is now Eversource, it was CL&P (Connecticut light and power) and maybe more in between divest their power plants the customer got the choice of choosing their supplier or have the electric company do it. This led to much tele marketing as other entities woud offer less price but only guarantee it for 6 months. And there were (and are you are not locked in the way I understane it) eco-friendly generation company to choose from. I think the end user is kind of insulated from the peak fees. I just stayed with not picking a supplier.
I read on a sort of competing forum about I think it is in Washington state that has resevoirs and hydro generators. They can pay well for electricity put back into the grid because it is essentially more water in their resevoir which they use to play the peak market as much as they can. This will make other places expect the same treatment with any surpllus solar they might have during sunny times. Last sentence my reasoning.
I was in Northwestern Ohio pretty close to indiana and saw lots of towers with wind turbines. I tried to find out what it was on the intenet. Best I can describe here is that they found a buyer for the electricity, it was an university and the amount they paid was to me shockingly small. Quite likely that contract has ran out and they may will sell it somewhere else now.
How to get the dc from solar panels up to the high voltage lines on the poles along the road and get it in phase seems pretty hard to envision. No one need try it is an electric motorcycle forum.
Edit: In Ct say it costs $15 to be connected and have your meter read once a month. Residential, overhead wires and transformers for each residence or a few residences per transformer for what difference that makes. All other lines on the bill have a per kwh decimal fee, including the ones I am calling wealth redistribution. Hope I am not in error not looking at a bill now. There may and probably are ways if you are low income to have your bill somewhat different.
Double edit" Gee Richard do you mean there isn't a seperate distribution charge and transmission charge like in Ct? I am not like Don who keeps telling of all his houses and travels, but I do have a few meters fed by the Willow Island coal plant and now there is a low head hydro on the Ohio river, and it costs $6 a month to be hooked up and 11 cents per kwh. Admittedly I have right of ways and poles with two wires the hot being the top one as the wires don't always follow the road. Probably the ash dump is subsidized somehow.
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PG&E has so many charges and fees that make up my electric bill it makes my eyes glaze over. But the two big ones seem to be power purchases and transmission infrastructure charges. My daughter has gone all electric and just had her gas meter removed. She used to pay $5 a month to have her electric and gas meter read manually. When PG&E started installing "smart" meters, she didn't trust them and starting paying a fee to keep her dumb meters and having someone come buy once a month to read them. However, when she went all-electric, with solar, backup batteries, electric induction stoves and heat-pump everything, she finally had to have a smart meter installed. It took her months, but she finally got the company to remove her gas meter and stop billing for it even though she was not using any gas.
Unlike me, she also gets her power from a local county system that buys wind, solar, geothermal and hydro power directly from the producers and she pays a little more for the "green" power, which is then sent to her home via PG&E's transmission and billing system, which adds on the power that she buys from the county purchasing system and charges to transmit it. In my case, I don't use much power, compared with anyone else in my neighborhood, and have stayed entirely on the PG&E power generation system.
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Ideally, electricity, the price should fall in 3 general categories.
1. Generation / Procurement. How much does it cost to generate it, or buy it.
2. Transmission - This refers to long distance transference of it. move it across the country, across your state, or just across your town, the very high voltage side of it
3. Distribution - Ok, the high voltage lines are outside your little neighborhood, now there is a transformer which steps down the voltage to run down the street in front of your house, and then finally, the pole, or pad mounted transformer to step it down one final time from the distribution voltage to the voltage you need in your house to run your stuff. ie the 240 / 120 vac in the US, and whatever, elsewhere.
Electricity is an instantaneous commodity, you need to generate it on the spot when you need it, it really can not be stored in it's natural form that you use it. You can't store AC, you can convert to DC, then chemically convert it and store in batteries, or convert to DC and store in huge supercaps, but then it needs to be re chemically converted back to DC, in a battery .. and/or the DC back to AC to run your home. Storing electricity is expensive, unlike say, storing water, where, ok it's sunny out, we are making a shit ton of power, lets pump the water tower full during the day, using solar to run the pumps, then at night, when solar is no longer generating, use the water we put in the tanks earlier. Also remember that there are always losses in any storage sytem.
People paying more for green power. It's all a scam really. The power you are using is probably made from coal, natural gas or whatever is running at 3 am. All that means is that sometime during the day, when someone was making solar, you paid them to put that on the grid, for whomever to use, then when it was YOUR turn to use electricity, you used the amount you paid for, pretending it was green, but in reality it came from whatever was generating it at the moment you used it. Unless you actually use it at the moment it is being generated, you can not guarantee it was green, even IF you use it at that moment, you can NOT really track what motive force was used to energize those electrons you specifically utilized.
Unless you have a grid that is entirely powered by 'green power' there is no way to guarantee it's 'green'. An interconnected grid is not going to give you that.
Most people don't know this, or have a clue how to figure it out, just drool, hit the I believe button and pay whatever their power company tells them to pay and pretend they are doing 'their share' to save a planet that has been thru ice ages, volcano's meteor impacts, yet humans think they are actually significant on it and can somehow control it. Now lets throw in a company that is only interested in making a profit, so will hide any and all of this, so that those few percent of their customers who actually DO have the ability to understand this stuff, don't catch on as easy and tell the others what is really going on.
The more complicated we can make shit, the easier it is to slip in an extra fee, tariff, judgement, adjunct, tax, levy, stipend, etc to squeeze even more money out of the customer. Welcome to the power industry!
The TLDR tards that are being bred today, make this kind of tactic even more simple to pull off. Ignorance is not only bliss, it is also very profitable!
Aaron
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Speaking of power production, an article in my newspaper yesterday reports that the city of Oroville, CA, is trolling for an $18 million grant to construct a "microgrid" with solar panels and battery storage so that their city emergency infrastructure can be independent of the PG&E system during outages and emergencies. The city council has awarded a $5K contract to a Santa Cruz consultant company, Our Energy, asking them to apply for a grant to fund the project. Our Energy CEO stated that the city of Oroville is "uniquely qualified for the grant because of its rural and fire risk status."
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This morning I heard a 30-second news report on my local CBS radio station that a city in the San Francisco Bay Area (I don't recall which one) has passed a law that would prevent large storage battery facilities from being constructed within its jurisdiction for the next couple of years due to their concern that the the batteries might catch on fire and release noxious fumes and other nasty chemicals into the environment. I assume that they aimed the regulation at PG&E. I was relieved that they didn't try to outlaw home battery storage systems (yet).
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Richard, they are going to hit a bit of a snag when they try their we are independent thing and the PGE says, oh but WAIT!! you are using OUR lines, OUR transformers, OUR wire etc etc, put your own in, or lease it at very obscene rates. (yep that's been tried before in other places). Grant or not, the people there are going to see their electric rates skyrocket very soon afterwards, that also happens with these projects as well, they cost money to keep running, gee whuda thunkit!!
Another problem with solar is resiliency (and btw I am a supporter of solar), one hailstorm and that plant is wiped OUT! It can take a better part of a year to get it back online, whereas a regular power plant, short of an F5 tornado wiping it off the map or an earthquake splitting it in half, a week or so at worse case and it's right back online making power again.
BTW, those panels, turns out the unicorn farts they manufacture them with are quite toxic to dispose of as well. A gas station, or a jiffy lube catching on fire is going to put nasty smoke into the air as well, so will an ICE vehicle, and pretty much any other building they got around or business. However there is one new tech on the market now that while still expensive, might alleviate some of that. Supercaps are coming mainstream now and are looking VERY interesting and VERY doable, even on a large scale.
Aaron
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Aaron, the situation that you mention with the power company wanting to charge local public utility companies for using their transmission and distribution facilities is already happening in the city of San Jose, CA. They are trying to ween themselves off of the PG&E system to the point where they are planing to build their own transmission lines. Needless to say, they are running into push-back from PG&E who is tossing roadblocks in front of their plans. Right now things are moving very slowly as it is tough to get past PG&E and the state's PUC that they control.