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A year-long “smart grid” study showed consumers saved 10 percent on power bills and cut power use 15 percent during key peak hours, the U.S. Department of Energy’s Pacific Northwest National Laboratory announced.
The small-scale GridWise Demonstration Project [.pdf] involved 112 homeowners on the Olympic Peninsula of Washington. Ron Ambrosio of IBM, which participated in the study, said nationwide use of the method could save $120 billion in power plants and transmission lines that won’t have to be built…
In five years, the type of smart system used in the GridWise study will be available in 10 to 15 percent of U.S. homes, Ambrosio predicted, and in 10 to 15 years in half the country.
Once the cost of installing such systems at homes dips to $200, it will become almost universal. Ambrosio estimated that the cost is now $500, and falling.
$200 for a 10% savings in electricity costs is something any consumer can understand. That allows for a pretty quick payback on the technology.
So much for the necessity of nuclear power, huh?
Don’t ever believe saving the Power Companies any money on Investments Not Made will save YOU ANY MONEY ON YOUR BILL !!! It will ONLY GO UP AS THE FOREIGN-OWNED POWER CARTELS THAT HAVE PURCHASED AMERICAN ELECTRIC AND GAS UTILITIES KEEP ***JACKING UP YOUR BILLS*** !!! Where is our “Homeland Security” when Bush and the Repubs are selling off America, LOCK, STOCK, AND BARRELL ???
2 wingnuts down, how many to come and go?
A simple techie idea to save money for producers and consumers alike ain’t too bad in my book.
So let me see, the consumer spends $200-$500 for a device attached in their home, and the utility company saves money (keeps the profit). Yeah, that’s a good deal.
Q: If there’s so much potential money to be made ($120 billion), why arent the utility companies already building it?
On the other hand, $120 billion would pay for another month in Iraq!
Two things here….
First, I can’t believe you have such a great graphic of “Reddy Kilowatt”. My father worked for an electrical utility here in Western NY for 35 years. In the late ’50s they changed their logo to include “Reddy Kilowatt”. Brings back memories.
My other thought is my parents retired to Dunedin, Florida in the late ’70s. Some time in the ’80s Dad was excited because the local electric utility offered a program that provided a reasonable discount (can’t remember the details) for placing a controller on their air conditioning unit. When conditions required, the AC would be disabled but never for a period of time that made it uncomfortable in the home.
Should I be surprised that folks overlook reduced costs to the consumer? Ah, I see. It was too complicated to expect them to click through to the article.
I think simple and practical energy saving efforts would outdo any attached device. The problem is, many americans have trouble with relatively simple ideas, and tend to overspend their budgets and waste money, so energy saving ideas would be foreign to them. If you think I’m wrong, go to your closest trailer park and see all the large screen tvs inside the trailers.
Us intelligent, sensible car driving, energy saving, recycling, people will always be outnumbered by redneck, big old pickup truck driving, 5 kid, electric space heater, HDTV, McDonalds every day types. No matter how hard you try, there’s three or four idiots negating your efforts.
#8 Angus
Your list of “energy wasting” folks is not complete. I never understood why we demonize somebody for wanting a vehicle that will actually seat 5 or 6 adults and carry some luggage without requiring chiropractic help after the journey and we don’t seem to have any problem with the fuel that is wasted recreationaly. Monster RV’s are one thing. But drive around any lake or up and down the East or West coast and look at the hundreds of thousands of boats that run back and forth polluting the water and wasting fuel. I am not talking about your 16 or 18 foot boat with some guy fishing. I’m talking about 28′, 40′ and up. How about fuel wasted by recreational flying? Boats and aircraft, not exactly fuel efficient.
Get some serious talk going about fuel wasted in these areas and I may consider giving up my Jeep and Isuzu.
If power companies implement this scheme and don’t build additional capacity it is just a temporary fix. Sooner or later demand will exceed supply unless the supply is increased.
#9
You need to do some reading on small airplane fuel economy. A cessna 172 for instance is actually more efficient than alot of cars.
Lifted from a training site for a 172:
@55% power, best economy, 10,000 ft (fuel consumption) 99 kt/4.8 hr (38.4 pph/6.4 gph) 95 kt/5.3 hr (38.4 pph/6.4 gph) 117 kt/7.5 hr (45 pph/7.5 gph)
so:
99 knots=115 mph
115mpg/6.4gph=17.9 miles per gallon at 115 mph.
Try that in most cars.
http://flighttraining.aopa.org/learntofly/articles/0110.cfm
Not all that bad.
shocking
But but but…
(searching for a reason why this is bad, can’t find one… maybe if I become a Retardican.. or is it Republitard… then I could say something like “Kyoto!” or “It’s Clinton’s fault” or “We need a power ‘surge'” )
When my new AC unit was installed, I could buy electricity at a cheaper KWH rate with a separate meter where they could turn it off at peak usage times.
Then the electric companies were deregulated, so now I pay for electricity and for delivery. The cheaper rate was for electricity, not delivery. Recently when the electrical feeds were moved, I discovered when the monthly cost to have the second meter was figured in it was costing me about 12 bucks a month to save money. It was removed.
Like most good ideas, they are only good until someone figures out a way to screw you out of what your trying to keep.
Let me tell you about my water bill.
Some three years ago the water company stated that we needed to put flow control systems on the toilet. A ready made kit for 25 bucks they will send to us, or a brick. Well I went brick thanks.
The idea is that we would use less water and therefore save on our bill.
Well I saved money for 6 months. Not a lot but better than nothing. Then low and behold the water company made a deal with the county. They said because water usage was down, they were not making as much money to keep people employed or systems up to date on water handling, cleanliness and conservation projects.
So the county allowed them to raise the water rates for usage enough to offset the money lost from not as much demand.
So the untility got us to save water only to hike the prices up.
And this is what will happen as the mandates go through to save energy and probably already has in some areas of the country.
We will save, they won’t make as much, they will whine that they cannot keep staff, trucks and other infrastructure and ask for rate hikes to offset. While their comoany heads and stockholders take home record profits.
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1. so i save $5-6 per month.
2. the Electric company GETS Pre-PAID that difference for the next few years(you paid for it with the device)
3. CEO and board members are getting Less money, so they raise the cost 10%.
WHERES THE SAVINGS??
I don’t have air conditioning in my home, mostly because I refuse to live where it is needed. But if I did live in most places in the USA, the last thing I would permit is to have some outside party regulating my thermostat!
Hot running water and air conditioning are the two things that separate us from the apes! (Oh, and wall to wall carpeting).
Getting closer to how the oil companies operate. You see exactly what price you’re paying when you fill up, and not two months later mixed in as a bundle.
Having a screen that tells you the current price helps. Then devices that can be programmed accordingly also helps.
Having the power company turn off your thermostat doesn’t help, but that’s how lefties operate.
By the way, what’s wrong with an electric space heater. I thought these saved energy, heating a small room instead of the whole house?
And yet a simple map of their circuit breaker system can help you turn off your heater in the summer, your hot water heater ( if it is tank style and not on demand ) when your asleep or at work. And other simple tricks like that. It’s nice to have a $17 dollar electric bill.
Lost cause, the people who listen to their iPod, watch the TV + surf the net are not exactly going to listen.
Plus the Teen shows display things like energy saving + the environment as a loser kid thing.
And the obvious anti-christian, electricity-centric bias of the editors is clear in their choice of an illustration. Should be an image (photo?) of yahweh leaning down from the clouds pointing out the savings – which should be turned over to the mother church as a tithe.
Bowling Green, OH started doing this back in the late 90’s on the outside AC heat exchangers. They have the ability when demand is high to turn off your compressor for 5 mins at a time. They do this in cycles to cut demand across all homes.
10% savings??! wtf thats like $3/mo and under $40 per year for me.
Im not gonna install some device just to save 40 bucks.
Suck it you enviromentalists
Government inspects your hard drive? no!
Monitors your travel? NO!
Listens to phone calls? NO!
Shuts off your heat when it feels like it? Yahoo!
If one read the pdf, the device(s) was installed on dryers and hot water heaters, both electric. I wouldn’t save next to nothing with anything with the device because I only run my dryer on the weekends and have gas water heater….
This is coming sooner than you think. Southern California Edison just announced enabling their electric meters with a wireless technology called ZigBee. Over the next four years, 5.3 million houses will have this capability, and there are several other utilities that are looking at doing this.
Of course, then it is up to the users to buy equipment to plug into this new network. But because many of the utilities are looking at using the same technology, the economies of scale should drive the costs down pretty low.
Want to save MORE then 10%…
Lower prices on Energy Efficient Products.
Like your Water heater, Stove, frig, and HOME HEATERS.
Replacing THESE, would cost you a small fortune. But would probably save about 25% on ALL the OLD ones used by the poor.