5 ms·

Firstly, how would you keep consumers honest about what’s essential? Secondly, I think “essential” will depend on the duration of the blackout. For a blackout

Firstly, how would you keep consumers honest about what’s essential? Secondly, I think “essential” will depend on the duration of the blackout. For a blackout of a few hours, keeping WiFi running so that work from home can continue probably is more essential than heating a water boiler. If the blackout takes a few days, that may change.

bombcar 4y ago
There will always be some cheaters and “lifehack - do this dangerous wiring and keep the wifi on” but in general people leave things alone. We already have interconnect devices for A/C and water heating and car charging in some locations.
sp332 4y ago
Well, threaten them with blackouts if they dont cut enough usage.
toast0 4y ago
Charge higher rates for essential. Offer rebates for certain users with life safety requirements for uninterrupted power.
- kennend3 4y ago
  > Charge higher rates for essential. This makes ZERO sense.. I live in a cold climate.. Our furnace is "essential" to prevent my family and i from freezing to death. Under your plan we should pay more for this? And those who cant afford it? Let me guess, government rebates, making a complex program even more complex? Any time your solution requires "rebates".. it is flawed from the start.
  - Someone 4y ago
    You can also write “Charge higher rates for essential” as “Offer cheaper electricity that has lower quality of service guarantees”. If seen that way, you wouldn’t pay more; you would have to he choice to get cheaper electricity. I foresee high demand for electronics that seamlessly switch from the lower quality of service feed to the ‘essential’ one when that cheaper feed stops working, though.
    - toast0 4y ago
      You could have tarrif rules that the essential meter charges at the regular rate if the regular meter is energized, or near the regular rate. That would have the benefit of letting the power utility accurately forecast the essential load, and would disincentivize the transfer switches.
  - toast0 4y ago
    It would make sense to have say your stage 1 heating that could keep your house livable but rather cold on essential, and your stage 2 heating which made things comfortable on the less available feed. I'd also put refrigerators and minimal lighting on essential. The alternative as presented was some sort of compliance program hoping people wouldn't just run everything off the 'essential' feed regardless of need, or rolling blackouts as currently practiced. It seems you agree that 'essential' loads have much more value to you and others, but you're not willing to pay the value?
    - derefr 4y ago
      > It seems you agree that 'essential' loads have much more value to you and others, but you're not willing to pay the value? In a similar sense that I'm not willing to pay more for "essential" food than for luxury food; or in the same sense that it seems unfair to have to pay for life-saving medical treatments. It is both unethical and pointless to exploit inelastic demand — the whole meaning of the word "inelastic" being that changing the price of it won't incentivize people to use any more/less of it. Inelastic demand should, at the very least, be subsidized. This is why public healthcare exists; why food stamps exist; etc. But better yet, inelastic demand — because it is so predictable — should be optimized heavily for by suppliers (for power plants, this is "building out base-load capacity") such that economies of scale enable the supply for inelastic demand to be satisfied with lower cost than the supply for elastic demand.
      - kennend3 4y ago
        > It is both unethical and pointless to exploit inelastic demand WELL PUT.. the logic on this debate is astonishly bad.. "Charge more for essential services" just sounds terrible and you are correct, inelastic demand needs to be affordable, and subsidized if it is NOT affordable. i dont understand how someone would advocate that "essential services has higher value to me and should cost more". Essential services like heating my home does not have a higher value, it is an absolutely essential service to prevent death from cold temperatures.. This person should try living in -24C without heat and see if it changes their views.
  - nasmorn 4y ago
    Your furnace will either use very little electricity if it burns something else or it is exactly the kind of thing to shut off since your home can already buffer heat quite effectively. Allowing room temperature to drop by 1 or 2 degrees is preferable to blackouts.
- Someone 4y ago
  Sounds like a good idea, but would, IMO, split less along the essential/non-essential line than along the richer-poorer line. Richer people likely also would counter this with battery or diesel powered backup power (already happens a lot in countries that have irregular blackouts). If they use batteries, their power usage would even go up dues to losses in the charge/discharge cycle.
redleader55 4y ago
A blackout is not just "someone shutting off your lights". It means the grid is down. And to bring the grid back up, there is a lot of effort (and energy use). If you're lucky the part of the grid with problems is just separated from the rest, but if you get 2-3 zones separated, you might end up with islands and then it will take hours and maybe days to bring it back up. Bringing up the grid from a blackout might not be possible/hard with a majority renewable power in the grid - the power source is just not reliable enough, for example the wind might stop blowing when you need the power to connect with the neighbouring region and obtain frequency sync.
parkingrift 4y ago
Just cap the electricity output and let consumers decide for themselves to what to turn on. Turning on too much will flip the breaker. They’ll figure it out for themselves.
fleetingmoments 4y ago
A self-resetting breaker at the power box in the street rated for 10A (220V) or so?

bombcar 4y ago

There will always be some cheaters and “lifehack - do this dangerous wiring and keep the wifi on” but in general people leave things alone. We already have interconnect devices for A/C and water heating and car charging in some locations.

sp332 4y ago

Well, threaten them with blackouts if they dont cut enough usage.

toast0 4y ago

Charge higher rates for essential. Offer rebates for certain users with life safety requirements for uninterrupted power.

kennend3 4y ago
> Charge higher rates for essential. This makes ZERO sense.. I live in a cold climate.. Our furnace is "essential" to prevent my family and i from freezing to death. Under your plan we should pay more for this? And those who cant afford it? Let me guess, government rebates, making a complex program even more complex? Any time your solution requires "rebates".. it is flawed from the start.
- Someone 4y ago
  You can also write “Charge higher rates for essential” as “Offer cheaper electricity that has lower quality of service guarantees”. If seen that way, you wouldn’t pay more; you would have to he choice to get cheaper electricity. I foresee high demand for electronics that seamlessly switch from the lower quality of service feed to the ‘essential’ one when that cheaper feed stops working, though.
  - toast0 4y ago
    You could have tarrif rules that the essential meter charges at the regular rate if the regular meter is energized, or near the regular rate. That would have the benefit of letting the power utility accurately forecast the essential load, and would disincentivize the transfer switches.
- toast0 4y ago
  It would make sense to have say your stage 1 heating that could keep your house livable but rather cold on essential, and your stage 2 heating which made things comfortable on the less available feed. I'd also put refrigerators and minimal lighting on essential. The alternative as presented was some sort of compliance program hoping people wouldn't just run everything off the 'essential' feed regardless of need, or rolling blackouts as currently practiced. It seems you agree that 'essential' loads have much more value to you and others, but you're not willing to pay the value?
  - derefr 4y ago
    > It seems you agree that 'essential' loads have much more value to you and others, but you're not willing to pay the value? In a similar sense that I'm not willing to pay more for "essential" food than for luxury food; or in the same sense that it seems unfair to have to pay for life-saving medical treatments. It is both unethical and pointless to exploit inelastic demand — the whole meaning of the word "inelastic" being that changing the price of it won't incentivize people to use any more/less of it. Inelastic demand should, at the very least, be subsidized. This is why public healthcare exists; why food stamps exist; etc. But better yet, inelastic demand — because it is so predictable — should be optimized heavily for by suppliers (for power plants, this is "building out base-load capacity") such that economies of scale enable the supply for inelastic demand to be satisfied with lower cost than the supply for elastic demand.
    - kennend3 4y ago
      > It is both unethical and pointless to exploit inelastic demand WELL PUT.. the logic on this debate is astonishly bad.. "Charge more for essential services" just sounds terrible and you are correct, inelastic demand needs to be affordable, and subsidized if it is NOT affordable. i dont understand how someone would advocate that "essential services has higher value to me and should cost more". Essential services like heating my home does not have a higher value, it is an absolutely essential service to prevent death from cold temperatures.. This person should try living in -24C without heat and see if it changes their views.
- nasmorn 4y ago
  Your furnace will either use very little electricity if it burns something else or it is exactly the kind of thing to shut off since your home can already buffer heat quite effectively. Allowing room temperature to drop by 1 or 2 degrees is preferable to blackouts.
Someone 4y ago
Sounds like a good idea, but would, IMO, split less along the essential/non-essential line than along the richer-poorer line. Richer people likely also would counter this with battery or diesel powered backup power (already happens a lot in countries that have irregular blackouts). If they use batteries, their power usage would even go up dues to losses in the charge/discharge cycle.

redleader55 4y ago

A blackout is not just "someone shutting off your lights". It means the grid is down. And to bring the grid back up, there is a lot of effort (and energy use). If you're lucky the part of the grid with problems is just separated from the rest, but if you get 2-3 zones separated, you might end up with islands and then it will take hours and maybe days to bring it back up. Bringing up the grid from a blackout might not be possible/hard with a majority renewable power in the grid - the power source is just not reliable enough, for example the wind might stop blowing when you need the power to connect with the neighbouring region and obtain frequency sync.

parkingrift 4y ago

Just cap the electricity output and let consumers decide for themselves to what to turn on. Turning on too much will flip the breaker. They’ll figure it out for themselves.

fleetingmoments 4y ago

A self-resetting breaker at the power box in the street rated for 10A (220V) or so?