Last week’s post ended with a suggestion to use a benefit/cost metric like that produced by ACEEE, shown in the chart. The results of ACEEE’s study indicate that energy efficiency is the cheapest resource for “producing” energy. As long as it is the cheapest source, let’s keep buying. The regulated utility business is weird. The energy efficiency business is off-the-chart weird. Why? Because we produce the ballyhooed tawagem. We produce a lack of something. Nothing. A vacuum. We save energy at a lower cost per kWh than it costs to generate a kWh, with anything.So, what does this mean? How…
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The utility business is fascinating and bizarre to me, and this can only mean I’m a hapless, pathetically boring person. But that is what it may look like to the uninformed. It’s like soccer, baseball, or Indy car racing. If you don’t like these games/sports, you just don’t get it. First off, from business and investor perspectives, utilities are not growth stocks, and they haven’t been for decades. Essentially, they are like US treasuries. I learned this in a 1989 personal finance class. Geezers invest in utilities for the steady dividend. Clearly, I wasn’t interested in a paltry 7% yield…
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