[Pops]

Kub, I bought a big electric water heater (no place for a heat pump) and it has a time of day feature built in. I live in Missouri and climate change stops at our borders so there is no variable rate here. I did pay somewhat of a premium but that was based on size and insulation mostly I think.

[kublikhan]

I heard Missouri ordered the most aggressive use of time of use plans in the country. I think Evergy and Liberty have already started switching to those billing plans. Ameren are starting the switch next year.

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('', 'M')issouri’s Evergy, Ameren and Liberty residential customers may soon see their utility bills change based on when they use electricity instead of only how much they use it. All three of Missouri’s investor-owned utility companies should have a majority of their customers on a time-of-use rate structure by the end of 2025. The push for time-of-use rates comes as advocates hope to put less pressure on the power grid and give consumers more choices.

Upcoming rate structures
Evergy is the first utility company moving toward a mandatory time-of-use rate structure. Customers in Kansas City and other western Missouri communities can select from four plans.

Liberty transitioned its customers in Missouri last fall to a default time-of-use rate option that payers could opt out of. Ameren plans to move payers to a default time-of-use rate in the next year.

[Pops]

Thanks Kub!
So far we haven't seen this as yet. Our power comes from a tiny municipal system that sets the rates. I assume they will adopt it eventually as we did have smart meters installed. A google didn't find anything but general white paper stuff.
Maybe I'll get to use my fancy WH computer yet!

[yellowcanoe]

Our previous Liberal government in Ontario installed smart meters everywhere and put everyone on TOU billing. It was ok for my wife and I as we were not home during the day when power was most expensive and thus could do most of our power intensive activities such as laundry, running the dishwasher and airconditioning during off-peak times. However, the TOU billing was not popular and the off-peak rate was too generous and didn't reflect the actual cost of generating power. Our current Conservative government gave people the opportunity to either retain the TOU billing or switch to a flat rate for power. TOU rates were also adjusted so that off-peak consumption isn't as cheap as it once was. As we are now retired and are generally home during the day, it became inconvenient to move consumption to the off-peak period. Pricing for on-peak power was so high that we would have had to shift a high percentage of our consumption to off-peak to actually save any money. It made more sense to switch to the flat billing which unfortunately means the investment the province made in giving us a smart meter isn't accomplishing anything.

[ralfy]

Alternative energy is a big deal for most people worldwide because they have no choice.

[theluckycountry]

Like EV's, as more and more money is poured into the rollout less and less people can afford it. We're going back to the old serf days where the majority labor in the field so the wealthy landowner on the hill can illuminate his entire castle at night.

Of course all of this is being done on debt, like the promised US Federal program to build techy stuff at home. But what is debt? It's borrowing money from tomorrow (future decades in this case) to rollout energy systems that will be old and broken by the time the debt is theoretically repaid. So not only does it have to have to turn a profit for the company, it must turn enough to rebuild itself and pay off all the loans as well.

Coal and Gas was always going to run out, in fact a famous British scholar warned of it over 100 years ago when the system was tooling up. People laughed at him as people laugh today because they know it won't happen in their lifetime. But he was looking forward in time to the obvious and suggested we shepherd this Amazing resource.

Solar and wind are not magic as some believe, they are just ways to burn oil and coal to give us electricity at a more expensive rate. The *Magic* is that they will do this even when the oil and coal is no longer available. Is that possible? Perhaps. But at what cost? The electricity they generate now is 50~100% higher in cost, and that's using cheap oil and coal to build install and maintain them. Decommission them and cleanup the old mess? Yeah, like Hell.

Realist View



Cornucopian View

[theluckycountry]

Here's a rerun for you fans of yesteryear

Only renewables - not nuclear - could be too cheap to meter
$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('', '
')Germany's long support for wind and solar energy is delivering zero-cost electricity at times. In contrast, the UK's new energy policy seeks to underwrite the rising cost of nuclear. "Too cheap to meter": that was the infamous boast of the nuclear power industry in its heyday. It has been catastrophically discredited by history.

Yet the phrase may yet see a new life - not of course for nuclear power - but for renewable energy. As the UK government publishes its draft energy bill on Tuesday, acknowledged by all but ministers themselves as primarily an arcane way of getting new nuclear power stations built, I am sitting in Germany. Already, on one particularly windy weekend here, the surge of electricity drove the price down to zero. Very soon, due to the 25GW of solar capacity Germany has already installed, hot summer's days will see the same effect: electricity too cheap to meter.

[GHung]

Hello all! I only recently discovered that this board is active again and wanted to check in.
Regarding renewables - we are still happily off grid, here in Western NC (since @1999), going on 25 years having not paid a single utility bill, and have greatly reduced our reliance on fossil fuels over the years. While our vehicles are still gasoline powered, and our small farm tractor is diesel, alternatives can't be justified because we just don't drive or mow as much. We have re-wilded much of the property, letting nature have its way, and we drive much less than we used to. We also use about 200 gallons each of gasoline and propane per year for things like cooking, clothes dryer, and a generator when I'm in the shop (compressor, welder, lighting,, all that), when the sun doesn't cooperate.

I've made some updates/upgrades to our off grid systems - newer, more efficient, inverters, added a few more kW of panels; good lightly used higher wattage panels that are performing well, and best of all, I sourced some lightly used industrial grade LiFePo4 batteries (@32kWh storage) and said goodby to lead acid batteries. Huge improvement, that. They came from a test facility in AZ and are performing at/near their rated capacity after over 5 years.

Before folks make the usual comments about embedded energy, sustainability, resource usage re production of those things, I stopped doing that math years ago. Excepting balance-of-system equipment, virtually all of our system was sourced second hand, and personal resilience was top of our list. The way things were going 25 years ago, a priority for retirement was: no debt (no mortgage, car payments, credit locked, no power bill, no water bill, no sewer bill ....), Staying that course. And, yes, we have retired since I last posted here. Health is ok beyond things like my arthritis and minor age-related annoyances. We live well on a very modest income having paid so many things forward.

Our earth-bermed south-facing passive solar home has been nothing short of remarkable to live in. Just required some adaptations over the years which became second nature long ago. I also installed an evacuated tube solar water heater some years back which works well to keep our big hot (warm) water storage tank happy. We heat with wood (deadfall off the property) when needed. Surplus hot water warms the floors as well.

I realize that most folks can't/won't live this way and feel damned lucky to have had the opportunity and know-how to get where we are, considering the state of things. Due to covid/hurricanes/overshoot, our small community has been inundated with new arrivals, mainly from Florida. What used to be an annual migration has become a full-time invasion (infestation?), bringing their consumption habits and far-right politics to what used to be a remarkably balanced community. Lots of complaints about shortages of services and housing these days. Rentals and home prices sky high. The small hospitals in the area are generally overwhelmed. So there's that. We're content being the happy old hermit and his mate.

I reminisce about the early Oil Drum days and our discussions with remarkable people like Greenish, Randy Udall, so many others. I see Ron, Old Farmer Mac and some others are still drumming over at Peak Oil Barrel, and follow Nate Hagens on YouTube, though I'm even less interested in solving humanity's problems. Fully convinced nature and reality will take care of that. Too many humans. Not enough Planet.

Cheers! Hoping this finds you folks well. Hunker down. It's going to be an even wilder ride.......

[theluckycountry]

Sounds like you took the peakoil message onboard GHung and made the big transition when it was still unpopular. So the rural migrations are an issue for you. No one ever talked about such a thing in the old days but a little extrapolation and you could have seen that coming I suppose. That will only get worse too I suspect.

GHC heavily influenced my thinking on the matter, I transitioned from city to a 100 acre property but after thinking through his opinion on small towns sold up and moved into one of those. There was a crime trend developing on rural properties, at least those not owned by the traditional locals, and I found the drive to get supplies and whatnot was a drag, even though it was only 1/2 an hour. That's one thing I wanted when I moved, easy access to modern shops, healthcare, all that. Picking the town wasn't easy, I did a couple of years research on demographics, crime, etc etc before I settled on one in a mixed food growing region with a good local water supply. Because all the land around the town is farmland it's expensive, and developers don't build here unless it's high-end little estates, no deadbeats.

It's a bit different down here in Oz, we don't have a lot of the security issues you guys have and nowhere near the population pressure but as times get tougher (the long emergency) I know we'll be seeing more trouble. I went with grid-connect solar and it pays me well with the excess I export. I also have a modest offgrid system that can provide the basics but am considering a full house battery system since the state government is going to be subsidizing them next year. Given the longevity of batteries and their cost it just doesn't pay when you live by the grid. My grid solar system cost $8k and has 3/4 paid for itself in 4 years, soon I will be generating an overall profit which is rare these days.

It sounds like your home is super efficient energy wise, that's the way the builders should have gone from the 70's onward but pine frame boxes hungry for electricity became the standard. In 100 years most of modern suburbia will be a wasteland of ruin IMO.

[Newfie]

GHung,

Good to see you stopping in and reporting. It is interesting having the longer term history.

Our life has taken a different road. Once retired we have found we are drawn to undeveloped places. When we pass back through our old haunts and see hie they have “developed” it make us very sad indeed.

We now live on our old English steel sailboat for 5-6 months a year. That has wind and solar and we get by with 4 Golf Cart batteries, replacing about every 5 years. We burn some diesel getting around, the wind does not always cooperate, and we cook with pressurized kerosene. But boat maintenance is expensive and I am not getting younger, so there is that expense.

In summer we travel to Newfoundland where we have a small cabin in a rather remote area. A supermarket is an hours drive. But there is no visible government, the scenery is perfect and we have lots of family.

Both the Caribbean and Newfoundland are economical backwaters. Struggling to maintain a population. Yet wooing rich outsiders, thinking some of that money will rub off.

In any case we get to hang out with real people, generally not caught up in the Western rat race, and that is a blessing.

[theluckycountry]

Progressive Lawmakers Line Up Behind Costly Fix For Error They Made In Renewable Energy Plan

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('', 'O')opsie.

When Congress voted to spend hundreds of billions to switch electricity production to solar and wind, it forgot something: transmission lines. New ones will be needed going to the locations of the new power sources, but nobody bothered to figure out who will pay for it or how much it will cost.

Congressmen Sean Casten (D-IL) and Mike Levin (D-CA) introduced a bill last month to fix their omission, largely at your expense. The bill has already picked up 76 co-sponsors, including eight from Illinois.

Grab your wallet. Here are the details:

In 2022, Congress passed the mislabeled Inflation Reduction Act (IRA), which will cost an estimated $1.2 trillion, far exceeding initial claims. The IRA actually was the largest energy bill in U.S. history. Tax credits for renewable energy production, among the biggest elements of the law, are estimated to cost $263 billion.

No cap was placed on those tax credits and they were generous – 30% of project costs. That’s part of the reason for the cost overrun but it also means that new solar and wind production projects are underway. All the better, say IRA supporters.

Now, however, there’s widespread, bipartisan recognition that those projects are futile without transmission linking them into the electrical grid. Progressive economist Paul Krugman, for example, cheered the IRA but wrote despairingly in the New York Times that “we may need a third, bureaucratic miracle to fix the electricity grid and make this whole thing work.”

Casten, also an avid IRA supporter, now admits to the gravity of the problem saying that “80% of the clean energy progress we made with the Inflation Reduction Act will be lost unless we reform transmission and permitting.”

[Tanada]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('theluckycountry', '[')b]Progressive Lawmakers Line Up Behind Costly Fix For Error They Made In Renewable Energy Plan

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('', 'O')opsie.

When Congress voted to spend hundreds of billions to switch electricity production to solar and wind, it forgot something: transmission lines. New ones will be needed going to the locations of the new power sources, but nobody bothered to figure out who will pay for it or how much it will cost.

Congressmen Sean Casten (D-IL) and Mike Levin (D-CA) introduced a bill last month to fix their omission, largely at your expense. The bill has already picked up 76 co-sponsors, including eight from Illinois.

Grab your wallet. Here are the details:

In 2022, Congress passed the mislabeled Inflation Reduction Act (IRA), which will cost an estimated $1.2 trillion, far exceeding initial claims. The IRA actually was the largest energy bill in U.S. history. Tax credits for renewable energy production, among the biggest elements of the law, are estimated to cost $263 billion.

No cap was placed on those tax credits and they were generous – 30% of project costs. That’s part of the reason for the cost overrun but it also means that new solar and wind production projects are underway. All the better, say IRA supporters.

Now, however, there’s widespread, bipartisan recognition that those projects are futile without transmission linking them into the electrical grid. Progressive economist Paul Krugman, for example, cheered the IRA but wrote despairingly in the New York Times that “we may need a third, bureaucratic miracle to fix the electricity grid and make this whole thing work.”

Casten, also an avid IRA supporter, now admits to the gravity of the problem saying that “80% of the clean energy progress we made with the Inflation Reduction Act will be lost unless we reform transmission and permitting.”

[theluckycountry]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('Tanada', ' ')In addition all 15 could have been constructed at existing Coal power production locations eliminating the need for new distribution infrastructure and eliminating 30, 750 MWe coal burning station in the process.

[kublikhan]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('', 'F')eb 12, 2024 - In the U.K., the government is investing in the assessment of the potential for old coal mine sites to be converted into renewable energy hubs. As many governments around the globe aim to phase out the use of coal, researchers are exploring the potential for old mining sites. Rather than be left abandoned, ex-coal production sites could be used for a multitude of purposes, from solar energy to geothermal operations, supporting a green transition and reinvigorating the economies of previous energy hubs.

In the U.K., the metro mayor for the west of England, Dan Norris, is investing £1.5 million in the exploration of over 100 coal mines in Somerset and South Gloucestershire to explore the potential for supplying renewable heat sources in the region. The mines in this region were emptied of coal and then closed and flooded, as the pumps were turned off. The water in the mines is heated by geothermal energy, with heat coming from the Earth’s core, allowing it to reach temperatures of around 20oC. The idea is that the water is extracted, and the heat is separated from the water to be used in heat pumps in homes and businesses across the country. New geothermal operations in existing coal mines could provide vast amounts of low-carbon heat. In addition, the water is pumped back into the mines to be recycled, making it a highly efficient process.

And it’s not just the geothermal energy potential that researchers are exploring when it comes to repurposing old coal sites. With many coal operations covering vast amounts of land, they are ideal for conversion into solar farms. Installing solar energy infrastructure on degraded lands like mining sites and landfills is a low-cost way of transforming the sites into clean energy hubs. Using ex-mining sites can help save time and costs associated with project development, as many sites already have vital infrastructure, such as transmission lines and roads. It can also revitalise the economy of former energy hubs, creating jobs and providing clean energy for communities.

Daniel Kestner from the Virginia Department of Energy explained, “In the coalfield region, there are about 100,000 acres that’s been impacted from mining… better to build on a lot of these mine sites than some prime farmland or some areas that maybe don’t want solar in their community.”

As governments look to increase their renewable energy capacity and reinvigorate former energy hubs, the repurposing of coal sites could provide the perfect opportunity for transformation. There is huge potential for the development of both geothermal and solar energy operations, which could help bring jobs and revenue back to long-neglected mining communities, as well as support a green transition.

[theluckycountry]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('kublikhan', 'T')he mines in this region were emptied of coal and then closed and flooded, as the pumps were turned off. The water in the mines is heated by geothermal energy, with heat coming from the Earth’s core, allowing it to reach temperatures of around 20oC. The idea is that the water is extracted, and the heat is separated from the water to be used in heat pumps in homes and businesses across the country. New geothermal operations in existing coal mines could provide vast amounts of low-carbon heat. In addition, the water is pumped back into the mines to be recycled, making it a highly efficient process.

And it’s not just the geothermal energy potential that researchers are exploring when it comes to repurposing old coal sites.

[theluckycountry]

Feasibility analysis of using mine water from abandoned coal mines in Spain for heating and cooling of buildings https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/a ... 8119310742
$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('', '
')Conclusions:

Mine water from three closed coal mines, located in the ACCB (NW Spain) and is presented as an interesting option for local geothermal energy generation. The temperature of the stored mine water was found to be 20–23 °C ...The results obtained show that 20 MW of thermal energy is available for heat recovery from mine waters, compared to 4 MW of electrical power committed

[kublikhan]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('theluckycountry', '')$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('kublikhan', 'T')he mines in this region were emptied of coal and then closed and flooded, as the pumps were turned off. The water in the mines is heated by geothermal energy, with heat coming from the Earth’s core, allowing it to reach temperatures of around 20oC. The idea is that the water is extracted, and the heat is separated from the water to be used in heat pumps in homes and businesses across the country. New geothermal operations in existing coal mines could provide vast amounts of low-carbon heat. In addition, the water is pumped back into the mines to be recycled, making it a highly efficient process.

And it’s not just the geothermal energy potential that researchers are exploring when it comes to repurposing old coal sites.

[nocar]

ground source heat pumps are nothing new in Sweden. We have heated our 1944 house that way since 1999. I think that is one of the most common heating methods in Sweden. Works very well.

[theluckycountry]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('kublikhan', 'Y')ou are the perfect example of the Dunning–Kruger effect. You learn a little bit about a topic. Then you think you know everything. You walk around absolutely certain of your conclusions. Then you think people who have come to a different conclusion on the topic ignorant fools.

[theluckycountry]

The critical flaw in all your thinking kub is that you attribute the technology and lifestyles we enjoy today as being the result of mankind's big smart brains. But it is the oil and coal that got us here, not our brains. All our brains achieved was a million ways to waste it.