Utility Co. seeking approval to charge for peak use

[mobile_bob]

Our local electric company here in kansas, Westar has applied to the kansas corp commission for approval
for the ability to charge customers for peak power usage, that being residential customers.

i knew this was only a matter of time, as the company replaced all the old spinning disk meters, with smart meters a couple years ago, and the fact that they have bought about 20% of their installed generating capacity in windfarms. couple these two events and you have the ability and the want to charge for peak use with your residential customers.

the example related in our local paper, goes like this

if on june 1st, it is hot as hell, and your airconditioner is humping its hiney off, the wife is using the oven to bake a big cake for a graduation party,  you have several girls curling their hair, and because there is a party every light in the house is on... well of course your  peak use is going to be high, unusually high.

the meter then logs this and the company moves you to a higher cost tier for the remainder of the month.

the expected increase to average customers will be something on the order of 30-60 bucks added to the monthly bill.

now in my way of thinking, here we go again!  another opportunity!

an opportunity to develop and possibly realize the ability to amortize a cogen system to good effect.

it has always been almost impossible to compete with the power company on a dollar vs kw basis, in all but generally the colder times of the year and under very specific control philosophies and operations.

now we are handed approx $450 per year in additional incentives, in a weird way of looking at it.  kind of like trump getting mexico to pay for the way.

so i am thinking of getting back to the drawing board, and rethinking, or rather rediscovering what we learned and were working toward maybe 10 years ago.   another advantage is with passing time, there are more things to work with that were not as widely available 10 plus years ago.

so spitballing here:

what we need is a control system that monitors the big power surge consumers, such s the A/C, refer's, kitchen appliances (if electric), domestic hot water (if electric) etc.  then...

the system monitors and prioritizes the loads, and services those pesky peaks with our alternative power sources, beit generators, battery/inverters, or whatever.

such a system might work like this.

1. poll the loads, and wait for a demand call for power.
2. when such a demand is called for, check priority
3. if the load has priority then it is removed from the grid and connected to the alternate source for startup
4. once started the controller switches back over to the grid, thus avoiding the peak being serviced by the grid/utility

i believe that a good quality dpdt relay can switch fast enough to get from alternate power supply to the grid without
something bad happening like the A/C compressor stalling and having to restart...  i think there is sufficient inertia in the compressor rotor/motor to cover several milliseconds of switching time.

i think i can test the theory of operation with such a relay using the grid/mains, simply by using the mains to supply both switch positions of the relay and using a manual switch to toggle between states.

my thinking is there are millions of motors, some driving compressor that use start relays to switch from start winding to run windings, so apparently the switching is fast enough to get the job done without stalling the motor.

i haven't done a cost/benefit analysis on this, but first blush it appears that as the utility companies find creative ways of charging more, they are closing the gap for those of us that have been long thinking, working and/or living with alternate power sources.   what was once a prohibitively large financial gap is sure to continue to narrow in our favor in my opinion.

this narrowing allows more folks more options in my thinking.

thoughts?

bob g

[LowGear]

I like it when you whisper "opportunity".

Isn't this kind of what the battery backup people are currently selling?  Fill your battery during low consumption times and use that power during high consumption times. 

Some house rules would also help:

     Electric hot water - Timers that schedule topping up the heat during the early morning - 2:00 to 5:00 AM.
     Electric clothes dryers - Start the dryer when you go to bed (assuming you're a night sleeper).
     
Or changing these two appliances to gas or at least solar boosted.

the expected increase to average customers will be something on the order of 30-60 bucks added to the monthly bill.

Stop being average.  So those of us that hang around this site and LEF to mention a few are not "average".  So we need to get less.

now we are handed approx $450 per year in additional incentives, in a weird way of looking at it.

And annualizing (not the dictionary definition but rather forecasting the annual cost based on a monthly one) in the same post.  Wow, no wonder I read this blog most mornings.  I once mussed to a cell phone sales person "$720 a year is a lot for a phone." and she replied "No, it's $60 a month not $720 a year."  America can be great again with this deep thinking.

[BruceM]

I like you idea of a power management controller to take over load management, Bob.  I was thinking more of using a GTI on a small battery/PV with generator to solve this problem.

I suspect some GTI vendor will come up with a peak load shaving GTI (grid tie inverter) with modest batteries(for handling the peak just long enough to start the genny), PV, and generator if these monthly peak rate plans get common and expensive enough.

In Japan some folks have implemented home peak shaving in a different, primitive manner- they just move all loads to 2 or 3 breakers;  that limits their peak. They then quickly learn to not use more.

[uber39]

Hi Fellas, here in southern Australia we get hammered for electricity , $0.37 for daytime $0.20 for nighttime( 11pm-7am) and $1.30 a day just to have the wire on the house !! so solar and battery work well and battery is easy to charge from any source. also one GTI inverter we have access to can be set to peak shave thou only used for commercial at the moment, how long before they do the same for domestic use.
 

[Thob]

I haven't tried this, but it seems to me that one of those inverters that offers "generator assist" is just what you need.  You would put the utility power into the generator input, and program the inverter to "assist" at a certain load point, so it auto-magically shaves your peak load.  During light loads, the inverter would charge the battery.  No relay needed, just a smart inverter (and smarter operator).

[glort]

There is a lot you can do to save power but there are 2 main drawbacks to it.

First, having a completely automatic system is not easy. 2ndly, that automatic and related equipment even like plain old Lead acid batteries are not cheap and when you work it all out, still probably cheaper to buy grid power.
As exy as it is, I don't know of any way of providing power 24/7 cheaper than the grid anywhere in the world.
Solar is one thing and works well through the day but if you want to keep going once the sun goes down......  You are up for more in $$ than you can buy grid power for no matter how exy it is.

Maybe what would work is a limited supplemental feed system. Something that is capeable of supplying say 2Kw for 2 hours just to get you over the hump useage.
What would be really helpful would be a modern version of a start o matic.

But it all comes back to cost. How much is it worth you spending to save that $1-2 per day?
This is where the power companies get you. they do their homework and know what the breaking point for most people is. As long as they don't exceed that they know they can screw you up to that point and make a fortune without loosing many customers at all.

[mobile_bob]

my main point was this

as we know and as others have alluded to (glort...) it is hard to generate power to compete with a power company, however
some years ago, i determined that with a carefully controlled cogen setup, and using the waste heat effectively, one could get much closer
to parity with the power company.

now with them wanting what is in effect a surcharge, i can only imagine that the spread is narrowing and might be such that one
can compete favorably enough to justify such a system, in narrow applications where things are engineered to best effect.

from memory, and it isn't as good as it once was
the 195 generating electricity with pump diesel came out to about .45 cents/kw hour back in around 2007 based on diesel prices at the time
which i think were north of $3.50/gallon and i could buy power from the utility company for about .13cent/kw/hr  with the addon charges included.
which of course made it near impossible to compete in a heads up kw to kw basis

however once you harvest the heat and put it to use, (again iirc) the cost per kw/hr came down to around .20cents per kw/hr generated.

so i think, that with this new charge the company is seeking, it might be that this will narrow the difference to parity.

however,  one has to have a good use for the excess heat, and around here in the summer time i have little use for this heat
that is one of my driving interests in absorption cooling,  and one day i hope to get around to that area to see what can be done.

i really do think we are getting closer than we used to think we were to being able to be much more competitive with the utility company

of course a tiny house philosophy sure helps in this arena, smaller footprint and smaller needs for power narrow the spread even further.

if only one had the time!

bob g