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In much of California, electricity prices are high enough that you shouldn't get an EV and you shouldn't electrify your space or water heating because gasoline

In much of California, electricity prices are high enough that you shouldn't get an EV and you shouldn't electrify your space or water heating because gasoline and natural gas are cheaper per delivered utility. When my marginal cost of electricity dropped to zero at my single-family home thanks to solar+battery, I dramatically increased my consumption. I got an electric car, two electric laundry units, an induction cooktop, an electric oven, a heat pump pool heater, and am about to switch over to electric space and water heating. I'm using about 4x more electric energy than I did prior to having solar panels, and it's definitely going to keep going up. Note that the winter off-peak rate in PG&E territory is $0.49541 per kilowatt*hour. That's ludicrously high. The summer on-peak rate is $0.62647. See the tariff sheet: https://www.pge.com/tariffs/assets/pdf/tariffbook/ELEC_SCHEDS_E-TOU-C.pdf https://www.pge.com/tariffs/assets/pdf/tariffbook/ELEC_SCHED... And in case anybody doesn't believe me, check out a Bolt vs an ICE vehicle at current electricity and gasoline costs (about $5/gallon in my area): https://zlnp.net/serve/bolt-vs-ice.png https://zlnp.net/serve/bolt-vs-ice.png Any ICE that gets about 35 MPG or better will beat a grid-powered Bolt. So if you don't self-generate in northern CA, get yourself something like a Prius.

dgacmu 2y ago
Sure, But there's still decreasing utility to you for each additional kilowatt hour of power you consume. At some point, you are maintaining maximum comfort and convenience in the house, have switched everything over to the cheapest energy source, your driving cost is entirely determined by the price of tires. I guess you could operate an aluminum smelter at home... :) Using a cs metaphor, it's amdahl's law applied to one part of an overall cost and happiness equation. After a while, the other factors dominate and there's no point in using more energy.
- zbrozek 2y ago
  That's certainly true, but the grandparent was suggesting that there was little demand elasticity. My personal micro-economic experience leads me to think otherwise.
  - dgacmu 2y ago
    Nah, definitely is in places that are using nat gas for heating in particular. But I'm sympathetic to the ggp because the trope of "people will just use more" is a little over-broadly applied as an excuse not to improve efficiency. Like, reducing the energy use of your dishwasher doesn't cause much of an uptick in total dish washing.
  - Retric 2y ago
    Your still talking about a ~5x price change resulting in a ~2x change in usage, that’s seriously inelastic demand.
Retric 2y ago
Edit: Never Mind much of the state isn’t stuck with those prices but wow.
- zbrozek 2y ago
  Unfortunately $0.20/KWH hasn't been a thing for a long time. Since January 2017, in fact. Here's a graph that I made: https://zlnp.net/serve/pge_rates/pge-electric-rates-tou.png https://zlnp.net/serve/pge_rates/pge-electric-rates-tou.png Here's the historical data if you want to double check my numbers: https://www.pge.com/tariffs/en/rate-information/electric-rates.html#accordion-a84c67dc1e-item-e10eec0cc5 https://www.pge.com/tariffs/en/rate-information/electric-rat...
  - Retric 2y ago
    Holy shit that’s insane.

dgacmu 2y ago

Sure, But there's still decreasing utility to you for each additional kilowatt hour of power you consume. At some point, you are maintaining maximum comfort and convenience in the house, have switched everything over to the cheapest energy source, your driving cost is entirely determined by the price of tires. I guess you could operate an aluminum smelter at home... :) Using a cs metaphor, it's amdahl's law applied to one part of an overall cost and happiness equation. After a while, the other factors dominate and there's no point in using more energy.

zbrozek 2y ago
That's certainly true, but the grandparent was suggesting that there was little demand elasticity. My personal micro-economic experience leads me to think otherwise.
- dgacmu 2y ago
  Nah, definitely is in places that are using nat gas for heating in particular. But I'm sympathetic to the ggp because the trope of "people will just use more" is a little over-broadly applied as an excuse not to improve efficiency. Like, reducing the energy use of your dishwasher doesn't cause much of an uptick in total dish washing.
- Retric 2y ago
  Your still talking about a ~5x price change resulting in a ~2x change in usage, that’s seriously inelastic demand.

Retric 2y ago

Edit: Never Mind much of the state isn’t stuck with those prices but wow.

zbrozek 2y ago
Unfortunately $0.20/KWH hasn't been a thing for a long time. Since January 2017, in fact. Here's a graph that I made: https://zlnp.net/serve/pge_rates/pge-electric-rates-tou.png https://zlnp.net/serve/pge_rates/pge-electric-rates-tou.png Here's the historical data if you want to double check my numbers: https://www.pge.com/tariffs/en/rate-information/electric-rates.html#accordion-a84c67dc1e-item-e10eec0cc5 https://www.pge.com/tariffs/en/rate-information/electric-rat...
- Retric 2y ago
  Holy shit that’s insane.