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Saturday, December 01, 2007
Duke Energy: Big Brother is Watching You?
Posted by The Dean of Cincinnati
In an age where it is fashionable to go green, Duke Energy’s new money saving offering—the Power Manager—seems like a great steal. Here’s how it works: Duke puts a “switch” on the outside of your house, and during periods of peak energy consumption, they turn off your air conditioner for a few minutes each half-hour. The program is incentivized monetarily, as a way to lure people into using the service. But while this might help save energy consumption, is giving control of your home to a corporation the best solution?
To understand the lack of control the installation of this switch promotes, check out this exchange from the FAQ:
Q: What if I don’t want a Power Manager event to occur on a certain day?
A: You may opt out of a Power Manager event one day per calendar month – May through September.
Once you hand over control of the switch to Duke, they only give you the option of regaining control once a month—and only then with 24 hour notice!
Check out this one:
Q: What if my heating and air conditioning company’s service technician recommends that I have my switch disconnected or removed?
A: Please have the service technician call 1-877-392-4848 before allowing them to proceed.
So if you decide you don’t want the switch, you apparently have to call for permission!
Also, the idea of a vaguely defined “emergency” seems strange to me, too:
Q: At what times will my AC be cycled?
A: Power Manager is designed for summer days when demand for electricity reaches a peak. When these cycling events occur, they are most likely to be; Monday through Friday, mid-morning to early evening during the summer months of May through September. Your switch will not be activated on weekends or holidays, except in the event of a system emergency.
What is a “system emergency”?
As I said, I love the idea of a technical solution to reduce energy consumption, but I don’t understand why the switch should be controlled remotely by Duke Energy. It seems like they could just install switches and let home users decide for themselves how to set the timer.
(Hat tip to Citizens for a Better Norwood.)
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01 Dec 2007 at 12:18 pm | #
Jason,
Once again you’re raising alarms where they aren’t necessary. First of all, this isn’t anything close to “Big Brother.” Nobody is watching you, and as anyone who has bothered to actually look at their energy bill already knows, Duke already monitors your energy consumption. How else would they bill you?
This does seem like a very good service for working people who are not home during the day. Many digital thermostats are already designed to turn your A/C off at a certain time to save energy and money during the day, but hell, if Duke wants to do it on their own and give me a credit, I’d might be open to that. Frankly, I think this is a great thing for my parents. They have a digital thermostat, but gave up on programming it when they couldn’t figure it out.
You are not ceding any new information to Duke. Yes, you are ceding some control, but remember, this is voluntary, and I hate to break it to you, buddy, but they already have the power to turn off your power when there’s a system emergency. The only downside is the 24 hour notice. That’s just poor design and customer service. If I got sick and had to stay home from work, I’d probably make that decision with less than 24 hours notice. That also goes into the one day per calendar month deal. I probably wouldn’t opt in, myself, because I already know how to use my digital thermostat. Frankly, though, if the credits were high enough to provide some incentive, it’s something I might consider. I think a good compromise would be some sort of system override that could, in theory, forfeit your claim to a credit for that month. This wouldn’t make your bills or consumption higher for the rest of the month, though, since you still wouldn’t be running the air conditioner for the days the switch was set.
And as far as a system emergency, I think you’re really over-playing your ignorance, there. Do you really not know what would constitute a system emergency in a time of record energy consumption and prices, droughts, and global warming? Have you not seen any news from California in the last few summers? Have you not heard of things like “rolling blackouts,” and overloaded grids?
01 Dec 2007 at 12:49 pm | #
The downside? There are several. The first, as I understand it from Duke Energy who called to solicit me for this program, my reward for giving up control would be a one-time rebate of $35. $35? Ridiculous. When I leave for work I turn my thermostat up or down or off depending on the weather. In addition, an article I read questioning this program, noted that the amount of energy/fuel it would take to bring the temperature back to comfortable in the home, after being off during peak periods, would be more than was saved. This seems like an idiotic idea and those that use the most, certainly won’t be enticed to conserve by $35 or $100 or any amount. Now, I don’t know if that $35 was specifically for me based on useage or if that’s the flat fee for everybody, but that’s what I was offered.
The real answer is to have mandatory conservation. In Southern California, during a particularly long drought I believe in the early 80s, everyone was required to reduce their water consumption by 10%. You figured out how to do that. If it didn’t happen you were fined and the fines increased with each violation up to and including cutting off service. This included businesses. People got creative. Shorter showers, fewer flushes, drought resistent plants. Same thing could happen with fuel. Make the house 10 degrees cooler or warmer, turn down at night, etc.
01 Dec 2007 at 01:57 pm | #
This seems to be more about Duke covering their butts because they didn’t invest enough into providing adequate capacity for their customers more than being green friendly.
It also sounds kinda messed up for night shifters who are home & sleeping at different times of the day than most people.
And what about vacations spent at home ?
PS, Dean, what’s with the personal messages in the word verification thing ?
If you want to tell me something - just say it.
02 Dec 2007 at 12:25 am | #
.
We must, we must, we must conform.
How dare you question the integrity of a power utility.
Didn’t you learn anything from Enron ? Brother marketplace knows best !
When the demand goes up, so does the price ?
Duke can shut down your air when there is an emergency, say like a higher price corporate purchaser who needs your energy !
The corporations come first. Just ask those homeless folks in OTR.
You can bet there will be great demand for cooler corporate suites.
When they think you may be cheating the switch, they can watch you with the inline cameras.
You know: just like they watch those future drug dealers in the OTR hot-spots.
Guilt by location ?
Stay away from the switch, Stay away from the switch !
.
02 Dec 2007 at 08:57 pm | #
Here’s the story that should have everyone up in arms - the energy lobby in Ohio just froze the downward adjustment of our energy costs through legislation passed within the last couple weeks.
It wasn’t reported here, but up in Columbus it was a big story.
The stink was that the energy lobby froze the rate at a time when the profit margin was incredible which means that no matter what, rates will never dip below that level of profit for them, ever.
We were frozen in by legislature (Strickland tried to usurp it but...) In other words - our energy costs will never be lower than they are now
Chew on that
does dean really control the verification word?
03 Dec 2007 at 01:03 am | #
I signed up for this. Also, two or three years ago, I signed up to have a device put on my gas meter, with a modem the uses my phone to call the gas company and upload every detail of my usage. I get $25 off my bill every three months for that.
I am not afraid of the gas company. I am afraid of missing an opportunity to save a few bucks.
You do not have any privacy, and you are not in control- take a deal when you can get one.
03 Dec 2007 at 04:33 pm | #
Hell, they’re in control of our households anyhow. They know when you’re there, when you watch tv, curl your hair, surf the internet, pretty much all by your usuage.
If you have service with them, they have your name, ss# and personal info, credit report and all the details of your financial life at their disposal.
If you work for them, they also get your pee on demand, guilty of drug use or not, an extra special background check and your solemn promise to barely mention that you work there, let alone anything you might actually see or do.
I don’t like it but the few dollars in savings is tempting. A few minutes of turning off the air conditioner seems trivial in comparison to what they already have on us.
05 Dec 2007 at 11:56 am | #
Unless I’m mistaken, the reason for this power cycle option is to keep Dukergy from firing up an oil powered power plant to meet temporary residential power demands during the summer. If a lot of people signed up there would be a bit less pollution added to our already less-than-perfect air quality. Also, from what I’ve read it shouldn’t really make a difference to the monthly bill (other than the one-time credit
). Seems like a win-win situation to me. What privacy issues would there really be for turning off your air conditioner occasionally for short periods of time? What is the issue if it gets a little warm on occasion during the time I’m at home from work? Have we really got that sensitive to a bump in temperature? I know I didn’t even grow up with air conditioning at all and I survived somehow. Isn’t this an optional program for those who would not be home at certain times during the week and would like some extra cash as well as help improve air quality in the region? If someone knows why this is really a controversy please enlighten me. Seems to me to be a flag thrown by those too lazy to research and understand the program.
26 Jan 2008 at 11:09 am | #
I am not afraid of the gas company. I am afraid of missing an opportunity to save a few bucks.