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Personally my main takeaway from the article is less that renewable energy sources are a good alternative to the grid but more that the monopoly Hydro One conne

Personally my main takeaway from the article is less that renewable energy sources are a good alternative to the grid but more that the monopoly Hydro One connection fees are outrageously high. $25 - $80k connection fees seem like extortion in rural Ontario where the average annual income is probably around $80k. I wonder if they'll do a follow-up article next year to report how the solar systems performed over the long Northern Ontario winter...

giantg2 5y ago
Connections costs for utilities can be high like that in the US too. Running electric, sewer, and water is easily over $25k in many locations.
- Ekaros 5y ago
  25k doesn't sound entirely unreasonable. If it includes running them to where services run and connecting them. Just for connecting it is high.
  - giantg2 5y ago
    It's not entirely clear to me in the article. Does the utility exist at the property already? My understanding this that if you're on a rural road and build a house past the last one built, the electric company will try to make your connection fee cover them extending the lines on their side to your property. Then you still have to cover the lines on your property.
koheripbal 5y ago
Do you have any idea how much it costs to run a rural line and maintain it? Even at 80k, the govt is still losing money.
- sbarre 5y ago
  That should be the cost of doing business when you're a government-sponsored monopoly that provides an essential service to your tax-paying citizens (not customers). It's literally what the government is for.
  - giantg2 5y ago
    And where else should the government get that money then?
    - rexreed 5y ago
      Isn't that why the government has the power of taxation or the ability to levy fees? Not that I'm a fan of government reach, but if the single, monopoly, private corporation can't provide necessary services at a rate that their customers can afford, and there isn't any competition to "naturally" reduce rates, then this is a place where governments usually step in. They step in the form of subsidies and grants, the sources of income of which are usually taxation or fees levied to other constituents. And electricity, running water, and sewage are considered to be essential necessities, not luxuries. This is an area where monopolistic practices should have limits, even if such costs are "necessary". This is where governments have the positive ability to help.
      - giantg2 5y ago
        My comment was based on the understanding was that the government was already involved with the company and proving subsidies already. "Isn't that why the government has the power of taxation or the ability to levy fees?" My point was that some taxation is based on usage, so charging those using the utility would make sense. This would mean still charging the people connected. Otherwise, who would the government tax to subsidize these other citizens?
        rexreed 5y ago
        In this case, government grants to individual homeowners looking to connect to the public utility makes the most sense. It's also easy to quantify since you can see how many people are interested in connecting to the grid who aren't currently. Governments can find multiple ways to source funds for those grants. Homeowners would apply for those grants and get funds for the connection. If funds aren't provided directly they are often provided as credits against property tax. The gov pays the utility directly. I've seen it done this way for many different projects.
- pridkett 5y ago
  This is why governments have passed incentive acts to help. In the United States, that came from the Rural Electrification Act[0]. It was a recognition that rural areas are critical to our urban areas because they provide food and resources, in addition to an occasional oddball university location or something to stare at on a transcon flight. Although the law is nearly 90 years old, it continues to be foundational for supporting rural communities. In 2014 it was updated to provide support for rural electric and telephone cooperatives to supply gigabit internet. And that’s why the north woods of Minnesota often has better internet than large swaths of Minneapolis and St Paul. [0]: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rural_Electrification_Act https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rural_Electrification_Act
  - kaesar14 5y ago
    Seems like providing the north woods of Minnesota better internet than the Twin Cities is a rather poor investment of resources
    - lotsofpulp 5y ago
      What is poor is not providing the Twin Cities with fiber to the home internet. No need for it to be one or the other.
  - analog31 5y ago
    It's interesting that 90 years ago, supplying your own electrical power was unthinkable. Also, there were communities that existed in advance of electrification, so there was at least some population density to justify wired power. For people moving into a relatively unpopulated area, in a different country, it might make more sense today, to let people bring in their own power generation, maybe subsidize it a bit if needed.
- SturgeonsLaw 5y ago
  > Even at 80k, the govt is still losing money. Government shouldn't be run for profit, frankly it should pay for the entire connection. If the government is going to insist on making money, then it should operate nationalised utilities, which provide a baseline service and cost, and if private enterprise can compete with that by offering a better product and/or cheaper service, then all the more power to them. Having a situation where a single commercial entity has a monopoly position seems to be the second-worst option, just above "no service at all".
  - newsclues 5y ago
    Electric utilities in Ontario were public until the mid 90s when they started privatization.
  - zz865 5y ago
    Its not about being run for profit. Its why should anyone build a house in the middle of nowhere and expect the govt to spend whatever it takes to get connected.
    - Ensorceled 5y ago
      This is how you destroy small farms.
      - iso1210 5y ago
        Small farms presumably already have an electrical connection.
        Ensorceled 5y ago
        True. This is a really a story of the "Fuck you, I got mine" generation. Power and phone was run for free pretty much everywhere. Now they want 80K for a line and a pole. This is the same story for internet access.
        5y ago
- AlwaysRock 5y ago
  That is what taxes are for. The government shouldnt be running a profit while providing basic services.
- Broken_Hippo 5y ago
  Governments provide services - in general - in no small part because services are almost all cost. Do you want your citizens to have electricity, as is expected in a modern 21st century country - or would you rather folks go without because of cost? If yes, then getting electricity to houses should be a priority, even if they never profit. It should also be very noted that electric companies tend to balance the rural costs out with charging urban customers a bit more to make up for the difference, much like healthcare (whether it be premiums or taxes)
  - Gigachad 5y ago
    The option is never going to be power or no power. It's going to be paying the connection fee, setting up your own power, or living somewhere already connected. Any proposal for governments to spend more on something should also come with a description of what they should spend less on to compensate for it. Why should urban citizens subsidize a lifestyle choice for others? If you want to live out in the middle of nowhere you shouldn't expect everyone else to pay you for it.
    - Broken_Hippo 5y ago
      Why should urban citizens subsidize a lifestyle choice for others? Because people that live in cities need to eat. Because we are a society. Because not everyone that lives in the country (or a small enough town) chose to live here - people get born there and turn into adults there. I shouldn't have to mention this, but farmers need infrastructure to keep making your food. Gas and groceries and utilities and grain silos and schools and doctors and a bunch more - oh, and people that operate all of this. Those people that make all that stuff run need a lot of that stuff too.
      - Gigachad 5y ago
        This sounds like something the market can deal with. If it costs a lot for farmers to set up, they can charge more for products until they are profitable again.
- motohagiography 5y ago
  I'm all for cost recovery and fiscal restraint, and the exception I'd propose in this case is that rural residential electrification is the cost of government. If you want to expand your habitable footprint as a state, it means some reciprocity for the people living there. The govt needs rural people settling remote areas more than those people need govt. Satellite internet changes a lot, as if you can do off grid renewable power with satellite internet, economic viability and mobility of populations changes radically. We've seen it post-covid with rural real estate prices matching those of cities as the result of remote work (I think). Hydro was used as a giant opaque debt slush fund by previous governments, where they levered up debt secured against revenues and then blew it on favoured groups to secure re-election. "Infrastructure," surely, but now you have a debt retirement fee on every hydro bill that is essentially a tax.
  - satyrnein 5y ago
    The govt needs rural people settling remote areas Can you expand on this? Is there a general social benefit to people settling remote areas?
    - motohagiography 5y ago
      Economic growth in diversified regions. They are the roots for growth, where in cities, the marginal value they contribute is a fraction of what they can contribute outside of one. There is a prevailing political worldview predicated on warehousing people in cities and making them dependent on public services, which values human life as managed livestock in service of an owner, and not as an engine of growth and development, but that is one I do not share.
      - stinkytaco 5y ago
        > They are the roots for growth, where in cities, the marginal value they contribute is a fraction of what they can contribute outside of one. It sounds like you are ascribing some special virtue to rural living that I just don't see. When I think about work that adds social value, very little of it requires rural living (farming, mostly) and most of it can be done anywhere (computer programming, skilled trades, manufacturing, etc.). Why is a person's contribution bigger if they are rural? What special value is there in doing these things in a place no one lives? Why do we need to increase growth in some arbitrary rural location. > There is a prevailing political worldview predicated on warehousing people in cities and making them dependent on public services And ironically, you are arguing that we should be providing these people a public service, presumably because they are dependent on it. I fail to see where the cut off should be.
- zamadatix 5y ago
  Why would maintenance be covered in the connection fee? Not only is it backwards from the usual financial game of lowering up front costs by hiding them in recurring costs but there is no way to know up front if you'll need to maintain that line for 2 years or 200.
- kumarsw 5y ago
  Overhead distribution is somewhere on the order of $100k/mile to install. Maintenance varies depending on how much tree trimming is needed.
CosmicShadow 5y ago
My parents live 15 minutes out of town in North Western Ontario and they end up paying $1000-$2000/month in winter to Hydro One for heating, even though they have a well insulated house. You are pretty much screwed. They know people who got solar and the government promised them a certain rate, and then went back on their word and those people got boned as they could no longer afford their 40k installations over 25 years. I've never heard anything good about Hydro One.
- Scoundreller 5y ago
  Wood, oil or propane not an option? All should be cheaper than resistive heating.
  - ashtonkem 5y ago
    Oil tanks are dangerous and unpleasant things to store and maintain, and very dependent on road viability for the once or twice yearly top up. I've known plenty of people in the North East that used oil for heating and they all hated it, and I bet it's easier to get an oil truck to top up your tank in Massachusetts or Maine than it is in Ontario. Oh, and the oil tank is an explosion hazard if you need to do any work on it. Wood heating is a lot of labor. It's sustainable if you have forest land, but still a ton of labor. Even pre-seasoned and delivered wood takes a lot of work. The general rule of thumb is that you need to envision literally filling your living space with wood in order to have enough to heat your home with wood burning stoves. Wood just doesn't put out the BTUs per pound that oil, coal, or other petroleum products do. Propane seems to be the go-to, but I know very little about storing and running your house off of it. I think in the future the answer is going to be geothermal, or "ground source heat pumps". They work like reversible AC units that use ground temp water to extract heat from. They're more efficient than regular ACs, allowing you to heat your home with ~1/3 the electricity of regular resistance heating, but the installation costs in suburban areas are extreme due to the deep wells needed. If you live in rural areas though you can use shallower trenches to lay the tubing down below the frost line, making this a much more viable choice.
    - 5y ago
cmrdporcupine 5y ago
A brand new septic system (bed & tank) could run you up that high, too, these days. And a well is pricey as well. Living rural is a constant money drain. Though in theory you are building systems that can sustain your independence later. In theory. In reality, rarely the case.
- Dumblydorr 5y ago
  Living urban is also a money drain. To get a decent sized place, you need to pay HoA fees, high rents, security deposits often get stolen, not to mention pet fees, parking fees, expensive QoL, exposure to pollution and noise, lack of quiet and solitude. I'm semi-rural now and while we do have to pay for well upgrades and power backup systems, we get a huge beautiful quiet piece of land for our money.
  - cmrdporcupine 5y ago
    Earlier this month the water line from my well pump to my pressure tank just... exploded. Water gushed all over my basement until I remembered where the off switch for the pump was. I'm lucky I was home, because it would have just kept running until it got to a place where it could drain out (i.e. upstairs) or the power shut off because everything shorted out. It's real bliss out here in the country, let me tell you :-) My son was home and got to hear me swear with words and tones that he'd never encountered before.
    - WaitWaitWha 5y ago
      Get an automatic line break & low pressure shutoff valve. They make DC, AC, and mechanical solutions.
      - cmrdporcupine 5y ago
        Yeah it would need to sit between the pump and the pressure tank. My existing shutoff valve is -- like most -- after the pressure tank. What I really need is something to cut the AC power to the well the moment water starts to touch the floor under the tank.
jareklupinski 5y ago
> Last summer, Timmermans's two radio stations: Great Lakes Country 103.1 and Hits 100.7 went live from their new home — in Little Current, Ont., about 90 kilometres southwest of Sudbury — the first off-grid stations in Canada. the guy was running two radio stations; i expect they quoted the price like it was a business/commercial line
SavantIdiot 5y ago
In Northern California, Sacramento & other counties subsidized utility hookups for wealthy residents (lots of local tech and flight from SanFran) who wanted to live further out in the rural El Dorado Hills area. This had long term consequences of the city always being in debt and having to sprawl to stay ahead. I see this as catering to the rich, who could have afforded it, simply because they wanted to live in palatial McMansions in the countryside and felt entitled to be accommodated. I don't think it should be the obligation of the county to provide utilities if people want to live outside city limits. If you want to live rural, you need to come up with the cash to get your utilities, otherwise too bad, live in the city limits. There are very good reasons why there is a thing called "city limits", this is one of them.
- deleted 5y ago
  [deleted]
mitigating 5y ago
Is it high compared meaning they are making a huge profit or that people can't afford it? If it really does that cost much then subsidies are possible. However it seems some people live in rural areas to save money, you hear about that often here where people would post something like "I moved to the woods in North Dakota and only pay $500 a month" is it fair to then use tax money to help keep that price low?
jillesvangurp 5y ago
The main takeaway should be that being that far north is not a show stopper for going off grid with mostly solar, a bit of wind, and batteries in a very harsh climate with limited sun hours in the winter. Anything further south is probably a lot more effective and cheaper to run. But the point of the article is that people are doing this and are saving money doing it. Of course, that is indeed enabled by a monopolist really encouraging this by discouraging new customers with unreasonable fees. But that's the other point, being at the mercy of companies like that is not great financially and there's a point where it becomes simply not worth the money in.
fred_is_fred 5y ago
In your mind who should be paying for connection fees to someone's private home?

giantg2 5y ago

Connections costs for utilities can be high like that in the US too. Running electric, sewer, and water is easily over $25k in many locations.

Ekaros 5y ago
25k doesn't sound entirely unreasonable. If it includes running them to where services run and connecting them. Just for connecting it is high.
- giantg2 5y ago
  It's not entirely clear to me in the article. Does the utility exist at the property already? My understanding this that if you're on a rural road and build a house past the last one built, the electric company will try to make your connection fee cover them extending the lines on their side to your property. Then you still have to cover the lines on your property.

koheripbal 5y ago

Do you have any idea how much it costs to run a rural line and maintain it? Even at 80k, the govt is still losing money.

sbarre 5y ago
That should be the cost of doing business when you're a government-sponsored monopoly that provides an essential service to your tax-paying citizens (not customers). It's literally what the government is for.
- giantg2 5y ago
  And where else should the government get that money then?
  - rexreed 5y ago
    Isn't that why the government has the power of taxation or the ability to levy fees? Not that I'm a fan of government reach, but if the single, monopoly, private corporation can't provide necessary services at a rate that their customers can afford, and there isn't any competition to "naturally" reduce rates, then this is a place where governments usually step in. They step in the form of subsidies and grants, the sources of income of which are usually taxation or fees levied to other constituents. And electricity, running water, and sewage are considered to be essential necessities, not luxuries. This is an area where monopolistic practices should have limits, even if such costs are "necessary". This is where governments have the positive ability to help.
    - giantg2 5y ago
      My comment was based on the understanding was that the government was already involved with the company and proving subsidies already. "Isn't that why the government has the power of taxation or the ability to levy fees?" My point was that some taxation is based on usage, so charging those using the utility would make sense. This would mean still charging the people connected. Otherwise, who would the government tax to subsidize these other citizens?
      - rexreed 5y ago
        In this case, government grants to individual homeowners looking to connect to the public utility makes the most sense. It's also easy to quantify since you can see how many people are interested in connecting to the grid who aren't currently. Governments can find multiple ways to source funds for those grants. Homeowners would apply for those grants and get funds for the connection. If funds aren't provided directly they are often provided as credits against property tax. The gov pays the utility directly. I've seen it done this way for many different projects.
pridkett 5y ago
This is why governments have passed incentive acts to help. In the United States, that came from the Rural Electrification Act[0]. It was a recognition that rural areas are critical to our urban areas because they provide food and resources, in addition to an occasional oddball university location or something to stare at on a transcon flight. Although the law is nearly 90 years old, it continues to be foundational for supporting rural communities. In 2014 it was updated to provide support for rural electric and telephone cooperatives to supply gigabit internet. And that’s why the north woods of Minnesota often has better internet than large swaths of Minneapolis and St Paul. [0]: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rural_Electrification_Act https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rural_Electrification_Act
- kaesar14 5y ago
  Seems like providing the north woods of Minnesota better internet than the Twin Cities is a rather poor investment of resources
  - lotsofpulp 5y ago
    What is poor is not providing the Twin Cities with fiber to the home internet. No need for it to be one or the other.
- analog31 5y ago
  It's interesting that 90 years ago, supplying your own electrical power was unthinkable. Also, there were communities that existed in advance of electrification, so there was at least some population density to justify wired power. For people moving into a relatively unpopulated area, in a different country, it might make more sense today, to let people bring in their own power generation, maybe subsidize it a bit if needed.
SturgeonsLaw 5y ago
> Even at 80k, the govt is still losing money. Government shouldn't be run for profit, frankly it should pay for the entire connection. If the government is going to insist on making money, then it should operate nationalised utilities, which provide a baseline service and cost, and if private enterprise can compete with that by offering a better product and/or cheaper service, then all the more power to them. Having a situation where a single commercial entity has a monopoly position seems to be the second-worst option, just above "no service at all".
- newsclues 5y ago
  Electric utilities in Ontario were public until the mid 90s when they started privatization.
- zz865 5y ago
  Its not about being run for profit. Its why should anyone build a house in the middle of nowhere and expect the govt to spend whatever it takes to get connected.
  - Ensorceled 5y ago
    This is how you destroy small farms.
    - iso1210 5y ago
      Small farms presumably already have an electrical connection.
      - Ensorceled 5y ago
        True. This is a really a story of the "Fuck you, I got mine" generation. Power and phone was run for free pretty much everywhere. Now they want 80K for a line and a pole. This is the same story for internet access.
        5y ago
AlwaysRock 5y ago
That is what taxes are for. The government shouldnt be running a profit while providing basic services.
Broken_Hippo 5y ago
Governments provide services - in general - in no small part because services are almost all cost. Do you want your citizens to have electricity, as is expected in a modern 21st century country - or would you rather folks go without because of cost? If yes, then getting electricity to houses should be a priority, even if they never profit. It should also be very noted that electric companies tend to balance the rural costs out with charging urban customers a bit more to make up for the difference, much like healthcare (whether it be premiums or taxes)
- Gigachad 5y ago
  The option is never going to be power or no power. It's going to be paying the connection fee, setting up your own power, or living somewhere already connected. Any proposal for governments to spend more on something should also come with a description of what they should spend less on to compensate for it. Why should urban citizens subsidize a lifestyle choice for others? If you want to live out in the middle of nowhere you shouldn't expect everyone else to pay you for it.
  - Broken_Hippo 5y ago
    Why should urban citizens subsidize a lifestyle choice for others? Because people that live in cities need to eat. Because we are a society. Because not everyone that lives in the country (or a small enough town) chose to live here - people get born there and turn into adults there. I shouldn't have to mention this, but farmers need infrastructure to keep making your food. Gas and groceries and utilities and grain silos and schools and doctors and a bunch more - oh, and people that operate all of this. Those people that make all that stuff run need a lot of that stuff too.
    - Gigachad 5y ago
      This sounds like something the market can deal with. If it costs a lot for farmers to set up, they can charge more for products until they are profitable again.
motohagiography 5y ago
I'm all for cost recovery and fiscal restraint, and the exception I'd propose in this case is that rural residential electrification is the cost of government. If you want to expand your habitable footprint as a state, it means some reciprocity for the people living there. The govt needs rural people settling remote areas more than those people need govt. Satellite internet changes a lot, as if you can do off grid renewable power with satellite internet, economic viability and mobility of populations changes radically. We've seen it post-covid with rural real estate prices matching those of cities as the result of remote work (I think). Hydro was used as a giant opaque debt slush fund by previous governments, where they levered up debt secured against revenues and then blew it on favoured groups to secure re-election. "Infrastructure," surely, but now you have a debt retirement fee on every hydro bill that is essentially a tax.
- satyrnein 5y ago
  The govt needs rural people settling remote areas Can you expand on this? Is there a general social benefit to people settling remote areas?
  - motohagiography 5y ago
    Economic growth in diversified regions. They are the roots for growth, where in cities, the marginal value they contribute is a fraction of what they can contribute outside of one. There is a prevailing political worldview predicated on warehousing people in cities and making them dependent on public services, which values human life as managed livestock in service of an owner, and not as an engine of growth and development, but that is one I do not share.
    - stinkytaco 5y ago
      > They are the roots for growth, where in cities, the marginal value they contribute is a fraction of what they can contribute outside of one. It sounds like you are ascribing some special virtue to rural living that I just don't see. When I think about work that adds social value, very little of it requires rural living (farming, mostly) and most of it can be done anywhere (computer programming, skilled trades, manufacturing, etc.). Why is a person's contribution bigger if they are rural? What special value is there in doing these things in a place no one lives? Why do we need to increase growth in some arbitrary rural location. > There is a prevailing political worldview predicated on warehousing people in cities and making them dependent on public services And ironically, you are arguing that we should be providing these people a public service, presumably because they are dependent on it. I fail to see where the cut off should be.
zamadatix 5y ago
Why would maintenance be covered in the connection fee? Not only is it backwards from the usual financial game of lowering up front costs by hiding them in recurring costs but there is no way to know up front if you'll need to maintain that line for 2 years or 200.
kumarsw 5y ago
Overhead distribution is somewhere on the order of $100k/mile to install. Maintenance varies depending on how much tree trimming is needed.

CosmicShadow 5y ago

My parents live 15 minutes out of town in North Western Ontario and they end up paying $1000-$2000/month in winter to Hydro One for heating, even though they have a well insulated house. You are pretty much screwed. They know people who got solar and the government promised them a certain rate, and then went back on their word and those people got boned as they could no longer afford their 40k installations over 25 years. I've never heard anything good about Hydro One.

Scoundreller 5y ago
Wood, oil or propane not an option? All should be cheaper than resistive heating.
- ashtonkem 5y ago
  Oil tanks are dangerous and unpleasant things to store and maintain, and very dependent on road viability for the once or twice yearly top up. I've known plenty of people in the North East that used oil for heating and they all hated it, and I bet it's easier to get an oil truck to top up your tank in Massachusetts or Maine than it is in Ontario. Oh, and the oil tank is an explosion hazard if you need to do any work on it. Wood heating is a lot of labor. It's sustainable if you have forest land, but still a ton of labor. Even pre-seasoned and delivered wood takes a lot of work. The general rule of thumb is that you need to envision literally filling your living space with wood in order to have enough to heat your home with wood burning stoves. Wood just doesn't put out the BTUs per pound that oil, coal, or other petroleum products do. Propane seems to be the go-to, but I know very little about storing and running your house off of it. I think in the future the answer is going to be geothermal, or "ground source heat pumps". They work like reversible AC units that use ground temp water to extract heat from. They're more efficient than regular ACs, allowing you to heat your home with ~1/3 the electricity of regular resistance heating, but the installation costs in suburban areas are extreme due to the deep wells needed. If you live in rural areas though you can use shallower trenches to lay the tubing down below the frost line, making this a much more viable choice.
  - 5y ago

cmrdporcupine 5y ago

A brand new septic system (bed & tank) could run you up that high, too, these days. And a well is pricey as well. Living rural is a constant money drain. Though in theory you are building systems that can sustain your independence later. In theory. In reality, rarely the case.

Dumblydorr 5y ago
Living urban is also a money drain. To get a decent sized place, you need to pay HoA fees, high rents, security deposits often get stolen, not to mention pet fees, parking fees, expensive QoL, exposure to pollution and noise, lack of quiet and solitude. I'm semi-rural now and while we do have to pay for well upgrades and power backup systems, we get a huge beautiful quiet piece of land for our money.
- cmrdporcupine 5y ago
  Earlier this month the water line from my well pump to my pressure tank just... exploded. Water gushed all over my basement until I remembered where the off switch for the pump was. I'm lucky I was home, because it would have just kept running until it got to a place where it could drain out (i.e. upstairs) or the power shut off because everything shorted out. It's real bliss out here in the country, let me tell you :-) My son was home and got to hear me swear with words and tones that he'd never encountered before.
  - WaitWaitWha 5y ago
    Get an automatic line break & low pressure shutoff valve. They make DC, AC, and mechanical solutions.
    - cmrdporcupine 5y ago
      Yeah it would need to sit between the pump and the pressure tank. My existing shutoff valve is -- like most -- after the pressure tank. What I really need is something to cut the AC power to the well the moment water starts to touch the floor under the tank.

jareklupinski 5y ago

> Last summer, Timmermans's two radio stations: Great Lakes Country 103.1 and Hits 100.7 went live from their new home — in Little Current, Ont., about 90 kilometres southwest of Sudbury — the first off-grid stations in Canada. the guy was running two radio stations; i expect they quoted the price like it was a business/commercial line

SavantIdiot 5y ago

In Northern California, Sacramento & other counties subsidized utility hookups for wealthy residents (lots of local tech and flight from SanFran) who wanted to live further out in the rural El Dorado Hills area. This had long term consequences of the city always being in debt and having to sprawl to stay ahead. I see this as catering to the rich, who could have afforded it, simply because they wanted to live in palatial McMansions in the countryside and felt entitled to be accommodated. I don't think it should be the obligation of the county to provide utilities if people want to live outside city limits. If you want to live rural, you need to come up with the cash to get your utilities, otherwise too bad, live in the city limits. There are very good reasons why there is a thing called "city limits", this is one of them.

deleted 5y ago
[deleted]

mitigating 5y ago

Is it high compared meaning they are making a huge profit or that people can't afford it? If it really does that cost much then subsidies are possible. However it seems some people live in rural areas to save money, you hear about that often here where people would post something like "I moved to the woods in North Dakota and only pay $500 a month" is it fair to then use tax money to help keep that price low?

jillesvangurp 5y ago

The main takeaway should be that being that far north is not a show stopper for going off grid with mostly solar, a bit of wind, and batteries in a very harsh climate with limited sun hours in the winter. Anything further south is probably a lot more effective and cheaper to run. But the point of the article is that people are doing this and are saving money doing it. Of course, that is indeed enabled by a monopolist really encouraging this by discouraging new customers with unreasonable fees. But that's the other point, being at the mercy of companies like that is not great financially and there's a point where it becomes simply not worth the money in.

fred_is_fred 5y ago

In your mind who should be paying for connection fees to someone's private home?