3 ms·

It encourages you to use more electricity though, which is not good.

zbrozek 5y ago
The current system in PG&E territory encourages me to prefer gas to electricity everywhere I'm able to make the choice. That's surely worse.
- Panzer04 5y ago
  Only if it means you’d prefer resistive heaters to heat pumps. In home gas is more efficient than a resistance heater.
  - zbrozek 5y ago
    False; the heat pump is still more expensive. You need COP of >=4 with baseline rates, and it only gets worse from there (the baselines are tiny, and TOU is also bad). Heat pump water heaters only barely scratch 4 under ideal conditions, so you'll generally do worse with a HPWH than with a condensing gas one. Arithmetic is about the same for home heating systems. Basically around here (PG&E) you should only electrify if you can also get your electrons from not-the-grid.
sokoloff 5y ago
Encourages you in what way? Your bill is still higher the more energy you consume, just increasing more slowly than if the rates were higher. Many believe (and I’m inclined to agree) that encouraging a switch from locally burned fossil fuels to electricity is better even if that electricity is currently* generated partially from fossil fuel. The theory is the electric plants could more easily become cleaner than if millions of home need to have their heating equipment upgraded. The problem where I am is that natural gas is so cheap (though less than previously) that it’s hard to make electric heating competitive. * no pun intended
- cool_dude85 5y ago
  It encourages you in the sense that the marginal cost of turning your heat up to 75 in the winter instead of 70 is much lower, or that buying a 4000 sq. ft. house will not come with as big an increase on your monthly costs as it does now.
secabeen 5y ago
There are ways around that though; you could give a small rebate on the meter fee for low-use customers, to encourage conservation. (My water bill is that way, the full meter charge is around $50/month, but if you use less than 700 Cubic-feet of water a month, the meter fee drops to $30/mo.) Is a little less pure than just charging a fair rate, but seems a reasonable hybrid approach.

The current system in PG&E territory encourages me to prefer gas to electricity everywhere I'm able to make the choice. That's surely worse.

Panzer04 5y ago
Only if it means you’d prefer resistive heaters to heat pumps. In home gas is more efficient than a resistance heater.
- zbrozek 5y ago
  False; the heat pump is still more expensive. You need COP of >=4 with baseline rates, and it only gets worse from there (the baselines are tiny, and TOU is also bad). Heat pump water heaters only barely scratch 4 under ideal conditions, so you'll generally do worse with a HPWH than with a condensing gas one. Arithmetic is about the same for home heating systems. Basically around here (PG&E) you should only electrify if you can also get your electrons from not-the-grid.

sokoloff 5y ago

Encourages you in what way? Your bill is still higher the more energy you consume, just increasing more slowly than if the rates were higher. Many believe (and I’m inclined to agree) that encouraging a switch from locally burned fossil fuels to electricity is better even if that electricity is currently* generated partially from fossil fuel. The theory is the electric plants could more easily become cleaner than if millions of home need to have their heating equipment upgraded. The problem where I am is that natural gas is so cheap (though less than previously) that it’s hard to make electric heating competitive. * no pun intended

cool_dude85 5y ago
It encourages you in the sense that the marginal cost of turning your heat up to 75 in the winter instead of 70 is much lower, or that buying a 4000 sq. ft. house will not come with as big an increase on your monthly costs as it does now.

secabeen 5y ago

There are ways around that though; you could give a small rebate on the meter fee for low-use customers, to encourage conservation. (My water bill is that way, the full meter charge is around $50/month, but if you use less than 700 Cubic-feet of water a month, the meter fee drops to $30/mo.) Is a little less pure than just charging a fair rate, but seems a reasonable hybrid approach.