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efficiency programs

Aug 27
Love1

Efficiency – With Tectonic Power and Pace

By Energy Rant One Comment
I am no mountaineer, but without looking, I know the Himalayan range is growing taller. How do I remember this? Because the earth’s crust is made up of tectonic plates that are always moving. The edge of tectonic plates forms fault lines for earthquakes. Did you know, that at some point, coastal California will be neighbors with Alaska? It’s true. A hell of a lot of earthquakes will happen in between, giving “bumpy ride” new meaning. In Southern Asia, the plate that India sits on is slamming into Asian landmass, thrusting Everest higher, adding roughly 2.4 inches per year to…
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Jul 30
Love0

The $900 per Gallon Avoided Kilowatt Hour

By Energy Rant No Comments
Texas broke six daily electricity records in one week, ending July 20. Alectra, serving Southern Ontario, broke its peak electricity demand record on July 5. More than 80,000 customers in Southern California lost power due to excessive electric demand earlier this month. If that didn’t make your eyes pop, maybe this will: Alectra’s record surged by 8.3% to 5,056 MW. The Electric Reliability Council of Texas reported its record increased by 3% over the previous record to 73,259 MW. Restoration Power is Highest Still more interesting, when the circuits are at risk of overload and are shut down, as they…
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Jun 18
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trailing loads and forecasts

Mindbender: Efficiency Thrashes Supply

By Energy Rant 2 Comments
A couple months ago in Outside the Boxer, we considered efficiency as a resource to be compared with supply-side resources. In May, we challenged minds with We All Un-Bundle, suggesting that utilities get markups for services delivered over their infrastructure. Let’s advance these concepts! Efficiency – A Utility Perspective Utilities are slow to change for many reasons: Every interest group and intervenor wants more from them. They are rewarded for 30-40 year investments and not breakthroughs like iPhones. Customers demand reliability, resilience, and low cost above all else. Utilities have captive customers with few (but growing) options. They deliver a…
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Apr 23
Love0

The Kilowatt-Hour is Dead, Eh?

By Energy Rant One Comment
The subject line is a response to a recent article in Public Utilities Fortnightly, written by Mark Gabriel, the Administrator and CEO of the Western Area Power Administration. Mr. Gabriel discusses what he sees coming for the utility industry. I am sure he is far more qualified to predict the future than I am, but I can provide my Lilliputian commentary in response to his projections. I may be playing a little loose with Mark’s article, but he seems to indicate the utility industry is on the verge of upheaval. He states the stalwart concerns of utilities, including the strength…
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Apr 02
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Energy Resources from an Outside the Boxer

By Energy Rant 3 Comments
Since you are reading this, you are probably on board with the theory that ratepayer funded efficiency programs help keep energy costs lower than with the status quo: building generation transmission, and distribution for whatever quantity and whenever millions of customers in aggregate want to use the resource. The “what and when” generates a load curve. We will discuss load shape management in future posts. For now, I will share some insights from a true thought leader in the industry. Costs and Benefits of Efficiency Tom Eckman worked for years with the Northwest Power and Conservation Council as a resource…
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Feb 26
Love0

Powering Lives at Lowest, Convenient Cost

By Energy Rant No Comments
I spent last week at the Association of Energy Services Professionals (AESP) National Conference in New Orleans. Our industry is in transition once again. Substantial changes are on the horizon. Let’s recap some highlights and lowlights in the utility and demand side management industries the past few decades. As nuclear power was going to be too cheap to meter in the 1970s, the oil embargo, Jimmy Carter sweater speech, and the Three Mile Island nuclear accident resulted in a radically different direction for our energy future. On the heels of the above, and the global cooling threat (check out the…
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Feb 19
Love0

Efficiency – Balancing Customer and Shareholder Interests

By Energy Rant 2 Comments
As the name would imply, the Energy Rant bypasses the pompom lines of energy efficiency spirit squads. This week I feel a sudden, robust, burning urge to sway images of efficiency. When I think of the role and reason for efficiency programs, the phrase “obligation to serve” comes to mind. From where did that come? Is it folklore, a slogan as with marketing, or is it rooted in something official or even legal? I investigated and found the roots to be interesting. The End Results Doctrine If I were a betting person, I’d put all chips on a bet that…
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Jul 31
Love0

Program Evaluation – Most Excellent Avocado Practices

By Energy Rant No Comments
Everyone has applied for health insurance, and many of you have applied for life insurance. Anyone over, oh, 40, 50, or for sure 60, knows health flaws start to accumulate like the dumpster’s worth of unwelcome gifts, used shoes, and outdated clothes for those of you who stay current with the style trends of the day.Come to think of it, all you digital natives, back in the day before weddingregistry.com (where you shop and make other people fill your house with stuff you want), we just took whatever the aunts, uncles, or more especially, great aunts and uncles, decided to…
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Jan 30
Love0

Behavioral Economics, Deep Thoughts of the Irrational Mind

By Energy Rant No Comments
I promised two weeks ago that I would discuss the results of our survey concerning behavioral economics this week. Delivered. Why explain something when you can just find it on the pure, and always correct, internet. Behavioral economics is defined in the graphic below, courtesy Google search.It would be wonderful if everyone understood that nothing (nothing) comes without a cost, that the cost may be higher than one thinks, and certainly higher than the value of benefits. The following are two examples. Health Insurance and Care Everyone reading this has complained about healthcare between one thousand and one million times…
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Aug 22
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Suffolk Sheep

Utility Scale vs Small Distributed Generation – Protection by Savage Suffolks

By Energy Rant No Comments
The June issue of Public Utilities Fortnightly (PUF) featured a supplemental, special report in collaboration with Navigant Research. One of the interesting articles in that publication is Impacts, Threats, Opportunities of renewable energy production. It compares utility scale to distributed renewable power generation. To refresh your memory, or perhaps for new subscribers, see my post on the Bogus Energy Internet of Things where I describe, in relatable terms, that distributed dinky power supply compared to the grid makes very little to no sense. The PUF/Navigant article backs this with the prices of wind and solar renewable energy generation for distributed…
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We talk a lot about energy – from the serious to the satirical.

All things energy. That’s our jam.

We talk a lot about energy – from the serious to the satirical.

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