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Too bad that low cost is invisible for the consumers. California has one of the most, if not the most, expensive electricity in spite of years of investment in
by albertop 6y ago
Too bad that low cost is invisible for the consumers. California has one of the most, if not the most, expensive electricity in spite of years of investment in renewables.
- Knufen 6y agoSame here in Denmark, taxes on my last electricity bill were 6x the price for electricity
- HighlandSpring 6y agoWhy is this? Is there no competition?
- weaksauce 6y agothey are geographical monopolies.
- jellicle 6y agoCalifornia deregulated electricity and in the absence of regulations, electricity providers discovered that they could collude in reducing capacity until prices went nice and high, and make continuous windfall profits from then forward.
- pdonis 6y ago> California deregulated electricity "Deregulated" is something of a misnomer here. They removed restrictions on prices and collusion, but did not remove the state-enforced monopolies that different electric providers have in different areas of the state. So they combined the worst aspects of deregulation with the worst aspects of regulation.
- WalterBright 6y agoThe source of that problem was the price for consumers was fixed by the government, while the utility was obliged to pay whatever the wholesale price was.
- coredog64 6y agoPart of this was that CA’s “deregulation” outlawed long term pricing in favor of spot pricing. So it created a situation where providers could “discover” that they needed to take a plant down for maintenance at peak, only to “accidentally” raise the price of electricity. AIUI, long term contracts were seen as opaque, whereas spot pricing wasn’t.
- deleted 6y ago[deleted]
- BurningFrog 6y agoCalifornia is rich enough to afford incompetent governance :)
- jariel 6y agoThe state has no incentive to give you something for free that used to cost a lot. Why would they do it? Votes? The 'carriage' fee, ie the fee used to transport the electricity will grow quite a lot as the entity in charge of that finds reason to charge that much more and gov. will find reasons to tax. There's the cost of electricity - but also distributors and government in that equation. If the cost of making parts for the Google Phone were $1, and there were only 1 type of phone in the US and everyone had to have one ... would Google drop the price of the phone? Probably not. They would capture more surpluses. This will be the same everywhere. If electricity were purchased at 'independent stations' etc it would be another story entirely. As energy got cheaper, power usage would increase, and efficiency of households would go down.
- lambda_obrien 6y agoThe cost of electricity in CA is mostly the cost of the distribution infrastructure maintenance, which is a value approved on several levels of government, and the actual electron cost is hidden from the end user behind layers and layers of contracts. The cost of electricity, then, is based on some fixed costs of infrastructure: we still haven't figured out how to make more electrons go down less metal wire than in the past. Any savings will result in lack of maintenance, aka: fires.
- albertop 6y agoSubsides for the green energy were/are significant factor in energy prices in CA. If we got to the point that the green energy is price competitive we should see the decrease either because we do not need to subsidize or because the generation is cheaper.
- hypertele-Xii 6y agoI live in Finland next to a hydroelectric dam. Electricity is, at worst, like 200 bucks a month. More than half the cost is transport. The dam is less than 15km out. What a ripoff. Privatizing the electric grid would make electricity cheaper, they said.
- jpollock 6y agoEven though you're 15km from a primary source, the network is built to provide you electricity even if that source is down. That requires connections to generators much further away. It's the uptime that adds costs.
- hypertele-Xii 6y agoThe privatized electric grid companies were granted permission to raise prices for funding grid expansion. A later audit discovered that they pocketed 90% of the raise. (the expansion cost only 10%) Even closer than the hydro dam there's a waste incinerator plant 3km from my home. Even if the hydro wasn't 100% reliable which of course it isn't (the channel is drained occasionally for maintenance), they can burn trash at any time to make up the difference. On some days there's a funny smell in the air. It's greed that adds to these costs.
- spurgu 6y agoPrivatization as its finest.
- magicalhippo 6y agoHere in Norway it's because we sell our cheap hydro overseas, so that we can buy back more expensive energy when hydro is low. The owners make a ton of cash, and us consumers can only say "thank you". Sure something something more reliable, but don't come here and say the cash they skim isn't a strong motivation in this equation. At least a lot of the hydro is owned by local municipalities and counties, so most of it goes back into the local communities. But not all.
- outworlder 6y ago> California has one of the most, if not the most, expensive electricity in spite of years of investment in renewables Some municipalities have improved a lot on that issue. See Santa Clara, Silicon Valley Power. Prices are most lower than PG&E.
- albertop 6y agoWhat are their prices?
- outworlder 6y agoSee links below. https://www.siliconvalleypower.com/residents/rates-and-fees https://www.siliconvalleypower.com/residents/rates-and-fees https://www.siliconvalleypower.com/svp-and-community/about-svp/area-rate-comparison https://www.siliconvalleypower.com/svp-and-community/about-s...
- albertop 6y agoThat is very good. Thank you!
- jes5199 6y agothis is why rooftop solar, which has the highest LCOE of any power generation, still ends up making sense for consumers. Because it doesn't have to compete on the open market, it just has to be plausibly cheaper than your utility bill
- albertop 6y agoRooftop solar still have 5+ years ROI. Recently utilities changed billing plans to make it even less attractive.
- outworlder 6y ago> Rooftop solar still have 5+ years ROI Why is that a problem? Most people take multiples of that time just to pay off their mortgage. Maybe if you are house flipping, but even then this tends to increase their value.
- albertop 6y agoSeems like an elitist point of view. Just pointing out the for the middle class family putting a lot of money to maybe get even after 5+ years is not very attractive.
- aoeusnth1 6y agoYou can get a zero-down loan or a lease the panels with payments lower than your power bill. This has nothing to do with liquidity.
- scsilver 6y agoBut even if you dont stay in the house, the next owner can use it. I expect most houses will be lived in for atleast 30 years if they are getting mortgaged.
- yurishimo 6y agoI think the average home ownership in the US is 5-7 years. Depending on the size of your solar setup, you very well may not break even before moving for whatever reason. That said, it does make sense if you do plan to stay for 10+ years I think. As new houses get built, hopefully with requirements for solar, the housing stock will eventually all be upgraded to include some form of solar generation. I would expect the price to further come down and the majority of homes in the 1st world to have residential solar of some form within the next 30 years.
- spenrose 6y agoCalifornia has high rates, like the Northeast[1], primarily because it pulls some externalities onto the bill. Red-state residents not paying for the cost of pollution doesn't eliminate the cost! But California has moderate bills due to decades of work on efficiency. (Climate helps somewhat, but there is a huge AC load in 30m-inhabitant SoCal.) [1] https://www.eia.gov/electricity/state/ https://www.eia.gov/electricity/state/
- hcurtiss 6y agoThat's not what my family in California tells me. Their bills are exorbitant for a more modest lifestyle, and this is in contrast to Oregon.
- hooloovoo_zoo 6y agoI don't agree with this externality justification. I could get a 100% renewable backed plan in Houston for 1/3 the rate I pay in San Jose.
- imtringued 6y agoDoes Houston have a carbon tax that prices the externalities into your electricity bill? If not then that's why fossil fuels are still cheaper. They don't have to pay for the externalities.
- bagacrap 6y agoGP was comparing price of renewables, not fossil fuels.