Per-household limiting is not necessarily a bad technology. Especially if everyone gets one, they can create fairness. But beware misuse. And it's nothing new.

Per-household limiting is not necessarily a bad technology. Especially if everyone gets one, they can create fairness. But beware misuse. And it's nothing new. I saw them out in Portugal. I stayed in a small town up in the southern mountains and everyone had 10kW cap. The reason was the limited pylon capacity. If everyone decided to use their oven and washing machine at the same time the lines would fry and the whole town would go out. This emotionally charged article about the plight of a Canadian mother with kids raises many hostile responses about the power company because it's being used in an economically punitive way, which is wrong. Overall this sits well with American commentators who say "Fair play. You don't pay, you don't get". But that same attitude usually runs to "If you can pay you should be allowed more than your fair share". Is that fair? So now I see similar logic playing out in California over water. Why should some commercial consumers get to use the lions share of the water while others have to watch every drop? In traditional language it's "rationing". But if we add some smart-metering technology, and some progressive marketing, then now additional factors than economic power can be used to set limits. Where will this end up? I think that's what the article is really asking. There is an uneasy relation between technologies that ostensibly "save energy" and them being used to squeeze out more profit and enact more social control.