voting heavily

That’s not how that works.

Lesser, greater, middling.

Force ranked choice voting by… loudly supporting them no matter what they do?

Force is a relative concept, it seems

I agree though, fuck private providers

If it was a public utility i’d feel very differently.

From the pov of the utility, sure. But in terms of absolute energy use it’s possibly the only way to account for that fluctuation.

This is why this debate is so frustrating - producing energy from solar is of huge benefit, but instead of talking about how best to put that production to use, we’re talking about the problem it creates for utilities who don’t want to adapt to the distributed production.

Essentially, yea. That, and reduced demand from people setting their thermostats to relax their cooling temps while they’re away from home. We should honestly be grateful that we’re able to produce so much more energy from solar than what we need for active cooling. It’s a good problem to have.

I’m not really saying that the curve itself is changing (sorry, I was really not clear), only that those other variables reduce actual energy demand later in the day because of the efficiency gains and thermal banking that happens during the peak energy production. The overproduction during max solar hours is still a problem. Even if the utility doesn’t have a way of banking the extra supply, individual customers can do it themselves at a smaller scale, even if just by over-cooling their homes to reduce their demand after sundown.

Overall, the problem of the duck curve isn’t as much about maxing out the grid, it’s about the utility not having instantaneous power availability when the sun suddenly goes down. For people like me who work from home and have the flexibility to keep my home cool enough to need less cooling in the evening, having solar power means I can take advantage of that free energy and bank it to reduce my demand in the evening.

I get what you were saying now, but having solar would absolutely reduce my demand during peak hours.

I don’t know how to answer that question.

For the same reason we want to subsidize solar production in residential construction even though it’s more efficient and cost-productive to do it at-scale. Having energy production and storage at the point of use reduces strain on power infrastructure and helps alleviate the types of load surging ayyy is talking about.

It’s not a replacement for modernizing our power grids, too - it simply helps to make them more resilient.

Ok now go just one step further and ask yourself what variables factor into this.

There’s a reason that pattern exists, and it isn’t because solar and cooling hours don’t align.

This curve has changed somewhat since this study in 2016. More efficient home insulation, remote working, and energy-efficient cooling systems have large impact in this pattern. But assuming you have a well-insulated home, setting your thermostat to maintain a consistent temperature throughout the day will shift this peak earlier and lower the peak load at sunset, when many people are returning home. More efficient heat pumps with variable pressure capabilities also helps this a lot, too.

Given just how many variables are involved, it’s better to assume peak cooling load to be mid-day and work toward equalizing that curve, rather than reacting to transient patterns that are subject to changes in customer behavior. Solar installations are just one aspect of this mitigation strategy, along with energy storage, energy-efficient cooling systems, and more efficient insulation and solar heat gain mitigation strategies.

If we’re discussing infrastructure improvements we might as well discuss home efficiency improvements as well.

I’m factoring in labor. It was an extremely bad deal - they were praying on the fact most home owners do not have familiarity with solar installation pricing.

Like I said, I would love to still do it on my own, but it just doesn’t make sense for our household.

In moderate climates in the US, peak loads are typically the hottest and sunniest hours of the day since condenser units are the most energy-hungry appliance in most homes. Clouds notwithstanding, peak solar generation would typically align (or closely align) with peak load time.

Batteries would also help a lot - they should definitely be subsidizing the installation of those as well but unfortunately they aren’t yet (at least not in my state).

Sorry, maybe I wasn’t being clear.

My area has solar incentive programs that are run through the energy utility - meaning the state makes available zero-interest loans for the purposes of solar installation, but those loans are only available through an entity partnered with our utility. They limit the number of homes in each area that are eligible through this program so that solar generation never exceeds demand. Our home was eligible through the program, so I had them come out to give us a quote. Our utility is also transitioning to surge pricing and smart metering, so there’s a pretty high demand for solar installation in my area and they know that they’d lose out on a lot of revenue if everyone installed their own solar systems.

A part of that process was them asking for the last year of energy bills, along with taking measurements and doing daylighting analysis on our roof area. At the end, they gave us a quote for a 15 year loan for the equipment and installation, and it just so happened that the monthly payment was the same as our average energy bill. I work in AEC and I know what solar panels cost, and they had inflated their price by more than double what it would cost at market rate.

Of course I could install my own panels, but it would be out-of-pocket and I would have to seek out and apply for out-of-state incentive programs myself, but I can’t afford the up-front costs and the loan terms don’t make sense for how long we’ll be in this house. Id love nothing more than to do it myself, even at a loss if that’s what it took, but I have a spouse that is less spiteful than I am.

It’s separate from the main meter and connected directly at the condenser unit.

It monitors power draw and acts as a relay when the provider sends a shutoff signal. The thermostat thinks the system is still going, and the fans still push air through the vents, but the coils aren’t being cooled anymore so the air gets hot and musty.

Energy providers should install smart meters that shut off the power to AI server farms instead of residential air conditioners during peak loads.

I had my energy company remove their LVTC smart meter this week after they started using it to shut off our condenser unit during our 100 degree days

The fact that it exists at all is bad enough, but they were doing this at a time when our AC was already malfunctioning due to low refrigerant. On the day they first shut it off, our house reached 94 degrees.

The program that the previous owner signed up for that enabled them to do this gave them a fucking two dollar a month discount.

I use a smart thermostat to optimize my home conditioning - having a second meter fucking with my schedule ends up making us all miserable. Energy providers need to stop fucking around and just build out their infrastructure to handle worst case peak loads, and enable customers to install solar to reduce peak loading to begin with.

The other thing that kills me about this is that our provider administers our city’s solar electric subsidy program themselves. When i had them come out to give us a quote, they inflated their price by more than 100% because they knew what our electricity bill was. All they did was take our average monthly bill and multiplied it by the repayment period. I could have been providing them more energy to the grid at their peak load if they hadn’t tried scamming me.

FUCK private energy providers.

Gee I wonder if western media has done this with other conflicts

Lmao, “they’re a private institution they can do what they want”

No, that’s not at all what I’m saying.

I’m saying the DNC is supposed to be a neutral facilitator of primary elections, but were going out of their way to undermine the Sanders campaign by coordinating with donors and feeding stories and unflattering details of his campaign to reporters.

Could the impact of that interference be measured by some quantity of votes? Decidedly not. But did it have some impact? Almost certainly.

At the very least, the Sanders campaign was having to fight against the committee and put out fires they were starting, while they were supposed to be facilitating a ‘fair’ primary election. Even giving preferential treatment to one candidate over another calls into question the legitimacy of that primary.