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I don't think grid access fees should be equal personally. Why does someone in a condo in San Jose pay the same as someone in a remote Sierra foothill community

by s0rce 3y ago

I don't think grid access fees should be equal personally. Why does someone in a condo in San Jose pay the same as someone in a remote Sierra foothill community (ex. Omo Ranch) with extremely high fire danger which is leading to enormous utility costs. Many of those people might be able to be off-grid if there was incentive (ie. high costs of grid access). You find more off grid homes in Alaska where connection is simply not feasible due to remoteness.

s1artibartfast 3y ago
The current proposal is the exact opposite. The condo owner with higher income would be paying far more. The fundamental issue is further complicated by the government involvement in infrastructure expansions and funding. In your case, if the government passes a funding bill to bring power into remote communities, why should citizens pay again?
bequanna 3y ago
Isn't it already more expensive for remote customers? Electricity bills are typically separated into generation, transmission and distribution.
- philipkglass 3y ago
  Remote customers have to pay more to get connected to the grid in the first place, but the higher maintenance costs for low density grid service aren't passed along on an ongoing basis. The problem is that electricity prices in California historically lumped a bunch of infrastructure costs into the per-unit costs for a kilowatt hour of electricity. This was an implicit subsidy for anyone whose costs to the electricity system came disproportionately more from infrastructure maintenance than from energy consumption. It has become a growing problem in recent years as rooftop solar has proliferated, since solar households are (mostly) still connected to and reliant on the grid but are consuming much less energy from the grid. The most straightforward solution would be to split out energy consumption and infrastructure charges and bill each customer for their actual infrastructure needs and energy consumption. This is politically unpalatable because it would raise costs more than average for low-energy-consumption customers (typically lower income households). The better solution that wouldn't hurt lower income households would be to change billing like proposed above but offer state financial assistance to low-income households in proportion to the old implied subsidies. This way the economic distortion would end but low-income groups wouldn't suffer. I don't know why California didn't do this. The worse solution that California has selected is to charge households a fixed connection charge according to income rather than according to infrastructure costs. This maintains the economic distortions of the old billing system since it means that there is no incentive to avoid wasteful infrastructure. If you're affluent and you're going to be soaked on electricity service either way, you might as well live in a big sprawling rural property since you'll not get any economic benefit from living in more infrastructure-thrifty urban or suburban housing.
floatrock 3y ago
California utilities break rates down into territories, so someone in San Jose does have different rates than Sierra foothills. My understanding is this based more off weather-driven demands (Marin has much less AC needs than Davis), but still, there are regional differences in pricing. Here's the real crux of what you're suggesting though: utilities are extremely regulated in what they can do, so it's quite possible the utilities commission said they can do price discrimination off of regional load differences but not off of a more nebulous "grid impact / risk score". The latter opens up all sorts of thorny equity questions (eg is what you're describing just redlining poorer rural communities through another mechanism?)
- bluejekyll 3y ago
  It doesn’t seem that hard. Just calculate the number of end users served by transmission lines and divide the costs accordingly. Don’t even need to factor in risk. This would make denser areas less costly on a per home basis, which is exactly what you want to encourage, and in CA would also generally translate to risk as well.
- sagarm 3y ago
  Redlining was bad because it was explicit racial discrimination. Setting prices based on costs is not redlining. If we want to subsidize poorer people in rural communities, we can do that through a means-tested program just like we do for the urban poor.
autoexec 3y ago
I view safe/stable power, clean water, and waste/sewage systems as bare minimum utilities that everyone should have. I don't live in a third world country and so equal access to those kinds of utilities should be a given for everybody. I really like the idea that everyone in my state is entitled to equal access to the grid and I'd much prefer to have people on the grid rather than having people in poor/remote communities trying to create their own shitty replacements with the dangers and fire risks that'd create. I see no reason why people who don't live in cities should be punished or burdened with higher access fees, especially if those people can't afford to move/live elsewhere. It may cost a lot more to run utilities out to users in remote areas but it costs very little to run them to users in ultra-dense urban areas and that's where the vast majority of the users are so it should all balance out.
- iopq 3y ago
  I mean, it costs much more to expand and maintain access for them, why shouldn't they pay more?
  - nielsbot 3y ago
    Because electricity is a common good. Some subsidize others so we may all have electricity. Kind of like the postal service. Or insurance.
    - google234123 3y ago
      Just saying… somehow states with huge rural areas manage to have prices 3x or more lower than cali
    - lotsofpulp 3y ago
      So do it with marginal prices for electricity. The price for electricity should have nothing to do with the recipient’s income. If people want wealth redistribution, then do it with wealth taxes and cash.
    - iopq 3y ago
      No, insurance is against things that didn't happen yet that are out of your control. You can't just buy fire insurance when your house is burning down, so you shouldn't be able to have "electricity insurance" when you buy a far away house The postal service is necessary to do things like send you IRS communications, drivers licenses, jury duty, etc. When the government no longer uses paper to communicate with people we can talk about privatizing the postal service
iwontberude 3y ago
I remember living downtown San Jose last year and being charged $0.75/kWh and it was mostly due to a mandatory 50% upcharge for green power. Totally bullshit.
b112 3y ago
You're buying PG&E's lies. Hydro Quebec serves a far, far tinier population than California, and has equal fire hazard, if not more, and far more untamed nature than California. Yet Hydro Quebec doesn't have PG&E's issues, and delivers the least expensive power in North America. There are reasons for the lower costs, but my point is, they maintain their lines. They cut back brush. They deal with encroachment. The problem is PG&E does not perform the maintenance they need to. All complaints by PG&E "oh, that's so hard to do, poor us!" is just wavy hand stuff, lies, and bull. From what I've read, they just see trimming back brush and trees as "cost", and barely do it as a cost saving measure. Don't buy their bull! The problem is 100% them. Other power suppliers do not have this problem!
- happytiger 3y ago
  Roseville power and SMUD, that operate right next to PGE and deliver power at a fraction the price, kinda prove you are right.
- s0rce 3y ago
  I suspect there is a lot correct about what you are saying, PGE sucks. Hydro-Quebec is a crown corporation returning profits to the government unlike privatized PGE. However, the cost of generation is separate, Quebec has tons of hydro power and PGE doesn't generate power. It seems that numerous remote communities are diesel powered, I know this is the case in the far north (https://www.canada.ca/en/natural-resources-canada/news/2023/11/government-of-canada-announces-10-indigenous-communities-advancing-clean-energy-solutions.html https://www.canada.ca/en/natural-resources-canada/news/2023/...). Are there any communities in California not connected to the grid even in the very remote areas? I suspect the cost of electricity and everything in these communities is very high and also subsidized. A few other questions I'm wondering is how much of the rural infrastructure in Quebec relies on the connections to the various (remote) hydropower projects (https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/4/4f/Quebec_Map_with_Hydro-Qu%C3%A9bec_infrastructures-en.png https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/4/4f/Quebec_M...). Are communities very far from those connections also served. I can't find a map of actual communities connected to the electric grid. Interestingly California has over 95% of the population living in urban areas compared to 70-80% in Quebec, not really sure which that would favor. Yes, PGE sucks. However, I still think my argument stands that the infrastructure could be much cheaper if the 95% of people living in urban California weren't paying for the rural infrastructure regardless of the nature of tree trimming costs.
nullc 3y ago
Commercial rates have a demand charge, essentially a charge based on peak power usage. Meter cost plus demand charge is what would match usage to utility infrastructure cost. The weirdo progressive rates will push parties to grid detach, which will not be good for the economics of the grid.

by s0rce 3y ago

s1artibartfast 3y ago

The current proposal is the exact opposite. The condo owner with higher income would be paying far more. The fundamental issue is further complicated by the government involvement in infrastructure expansions and funding. In your case, if the government passes a funding bill to bring power into remote communities, why should citizens pay again?

bequanna 3y ago

Isn't it already more expensive for remote customers? Electricity bills are typically separated into generation, transmission and distribution.

philipkglass 3y ago
Remote customers have to pay more to get connected to the grid in the first place, but the higher maintenance costs for low density grid service aren't passed along on an ongoing basis. The problem is that electricity prices in California historically lumped a bunch of infrastructure costs into the per-unit costs for a kilowatt hour of electricity. This was an implicit subsidy for anyone whose costs to the electricity system came disproportionately more from infrastructure maintenance than from energy consumption. It has become a growing problem in recent years as rooftop solar has proliferated, since solar households are (mostly) still connected to and reliant on the grid but are consuming much less energy from the grid. The most straightforward solution would be to split out energy consumption and infrastructure charges and bill each customer for their actual infrastructure needs and energy consumption. This is politically unpalatable because it would raise costs more than average for low-energy-consumption customers (typically lower income households). The better solution that wouldn't hurt lower income households would be to change billing like proposed above but offer state financial assistance to low-income households in proportion to the old implied subsidies. This way the economic distortion would end but low-income groups wouldn't suffer. I don't know why California didn't do this. The worse solution that California has selected is to charge households a fixed connection charge according to income rather than according to infrastructure costs. This maintains the economic distortions of the old billing system since it means that there is no incentive to avoid wasteful infrastructure. If you're affluent and you're going to be soaked on electricity service either way, you might as well live in a big sprawling rural property since you'll not get any economic benefit from living in more infrastructure-thrifty urban or suburban housing.

floatrock 3y ago

California utilities break rates down into territories, so someone in San Jose does have different rates than Sierra foothills. My understanding is this based more off weather-driven demands (Marin has much less AC needs than Davis), but still, there are regional differences in pricing. Here's the real crux of what you're suggesting though: utilities are extremely regulated in what they can do, so it's quite possible the utilities commission said they can do price discrimination off of regional load differences but not off of a more nebulous "grid impact / risk score". The latter opens up all sorts of thorny equity questions (eg is what you're describing just redlining poorer rural communities through another mechanism?)

bluejekyll 3y ago
It doesn’t seem that hard. Just calculate the number of end users served by transmission lines and divide the costs accordingly. Don’t even need to factor in risk. This would make denser areas less costly on a per home basis, which is exactly what you want to encourage, and in CA would also generally translate to risk as well.
sagarm 3y ago
Redlining was bad because it was explicit racial discrimination. Setting prices based on costs is not redlining. If we want to subsidize poorer people in rural communities, we can do that through a means-tested program just like we do for the urban poor.

autoexec 3y ago

I view safe/stable power, clean water, and waste/sewage systems as bare minimum utilities that everyone should have. I don't live in a third world country and so equal access to those kinds of utilities should be a given for everybody. I really like the idea that everyone in my state is entitled to equal access to the grid and I'd much prefer to have people on the grid rather than having people in poor/remote communities trying to create their own shitty replacements with the dangers and fire risks that'd create. I see no reason why people who don't live in cities should be punished or burdened with higher access fees, especially if those people can't afford to move/live elsewhere. It may cost a lot more to run utilities out to users in remote areas but it costs very little to run them to users in ultra-dense urban areas and that's where the vast majority of the users are so it should all balance out.

iopq 3y ago
I mean, it costs much more to expand and maintain access for them, why shouldn't they pay more?
- nielsbot 3y ago
  Because electricity is a common good. Some subsidize others so we may all have electricity. Kind of like the postal service. Or insurance.
  - google234123 3y ago
    Just saying… somehow states with huge rural areas manage to have prices 3x or more lower than cali
  - lotsofpulp 3y ago
    So do it with marginal prices for electricity. The price for electricity should have nothing to do with the recipient’s income. If people want wealth redistribution, then do it with wealth taxes and cash.
  - iopq 3y ago
    No, insurance is against things that didn't happen yet that are out of your control. You can't just buy fire insurance when your house is burning down, so you shouldn't be able to have "electricity insurance" when you buy a far away house The postal service is necessary to do things like send you IRS communications, drivers licenses, jury duty, etc. When the government no longer uses paper to communicate with people we can talk about privatizing the postal service

iwontberude 3y ago

I remember living downtown San Jose last year and being charged $0.75/kWh and it was mostly due to a mandatory 50% upcharge for green power. Totally bullshit.

b112 3y ago

You're buying PG&E's lies. Hydro Quebec serves a far, far tinier population than California, and has equal fire hazard, if not more, and far more untamed nature than California. Yet Hydro Quebec doesn't have PG&E's issues, and delivers the least expensive power in North America. There are reasons for the lower costs, but my point is, they maintain their lines. They cut back brush. They deal with encroachment. The problem is PG&E does not perform the maintenance they need to. All complaints by PG&E "oh, that's so hard to do, poor us!" is just wavy hand stuff, lies, and bull. From what I've read, they just see trimming back brush and trees as "cost", and barely do it as a cost saving measure. Don't buy their bull! The problem is 100% them. Other power suppliers do not have this problem!

happytiger 3y ago
Roseville power and SMUD, that operate right next to PGE and deliver power at a fraction the price, kinda prove you are right.
s0rce 3y ago
I suspect there is a lot correct about what you are saying, PGE sucks. Hydro-Quebec is a crown corporation returning profits to the government unlike privatized PGE. However, the cost of generation is separate, Quebec has tons of hydro power and PGE doesn't generate power. It seems that numerous remote communities are diesel powered, I know this is the case in the far north (https://www.canada.ca/en/natural-resources-canada/news/2023/11/government-of-canada-announces-10-indigenous-communities-advancing-clean-energy-solutions.html https://www.canada.ca/en/natural-resources-canada/news/2023/...). Are there any communities in California not connected to the grid even in the very remote areas? I suspect the cost of electricity and everything in these communities is very high and also subsidized. A few other questions I'm wondering is how much of the rural infrastructure in Quebec relies on the connections to the various (remote) hydropower projects (https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/4/4f/Quebec_Map_with_Hydro-Qu%C3%A9bec_infrastructures-en.png https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/4/4f/Quebec_M...). Are communities very far from those connections also served. I can't find a map of actual communities connected to the electric grid. Interestingly California has over 95% of the population living in urban areas compared to 70-80% in Quebec, not really sure which that would favor. Yes, PGE sucks. However, I still think my argument stands that the infrastructure could be much cheaper if the 95% of people living in urban California weren't paying for the rural infrastructure regardless of the nature of tree trimming costs.

nullc 3y ago

Commercial rates have a demand charge, essentially a charge based on peak power usage. Meter cost plus demand charge is what would match usage to utility infrastructure cost. The weirdo progressive rates will push parties to grid detach, which will not be good for the economics of the grid.