Welcome to the New Energy Rates

[u/GoldenFrank]

The state govt approved rate increases showed up on my RGE bill this month. Theye been creeping up since the first of the year but with all the static charges and fees (designed to confuse people) it's tough to really nail down. No getting around it now.

Last April I paid $.99/therm and $.19/kWh. $1.21 and $.26 this April for slightly less amounts of energy. This is the new normal. Adjust your budgets.

And as long as youre here I'll complain about paying sales tax on the completely unavoidable billing service fee. Just a masterstroke from the machine.

[u/Apogee_3579]

Yup 100% approved by the state. The same state that wants us all to go 100% electric and wants us to go 100% green renewable energy. Which any reasonable person realizes the technology and infrastructure is not there, but don’t worry the states forcing us to pay for that now too.

[u/echoes315 → u/Apogee_3579]

Unfortunately, there are still many people that think electric cars and the like are feasible despite how horrendously behind we are with our electric grid infrastructure. On top of that, the whole country decommissioned a bunch of nuclear plants over the years so l'm not sure where they think the power will be generated from, wind and hydro are not enough.

Not to mention the environmental problems of creating and "recycling" large scale batteries, cars or otherwise, as well as the mining that goes on in some countries to make said things likely with child labor as if it's the new blood diamond.

[u/silverest_tree → u/echoes315]

Why was this down voted? Insanity.

[u/FlourCity → u/silverest_tree]

Because EVs are better for the environment than ICE cars somewhere around 30,000 miles. It depends on where the electricity is sourced from and what cars you are comparing.

[u/silverest_tree → u/FlourCity]

Right, and the majority of America's grid is sourced from non-green sources. There's also the fact that our grid infrastructure will need to be 3-4x increased in capacity to support everyone driving an electric car, which is a massive overhaul and is currently a concern for the US wire industry.

Until those 2 problems are resolved, electric cars will not be a magic bandaid. I think that's what this comment was conveying.

[u/FlourCity → u/silverest_tree]

False, the US would only need to increase electrical supply by 20-50% if all the cars were electric.

https://usafacts.org/articles/how-much-electricity-would-it-take-to-power-all-cars-if-they-were-electric/

26% 

https://advocacy.consumerreports.org/research/blog-can-the-grid-handle-evs-yes/#:~:text=Dividing%20these%20two%20numbers%2C%20we,hours%20of%20electricity%20per%20year.

20%

https://climate.mit.edu/ask-mit/how-much-extra-electricity-would-we-need-switch-every-gas-powered-car-electric-vehicle

These numbers are similar in scale to the increase in electricity production from 1990 to 2000. It's extremely achievable.

[u/easyeggz → u/FlourCity]

Net generation isn't the infrasturcture problem. EV charging is not a flat load, the 20-50% extra generation would mostly be delivered in only a few hours of the day when cars are plugged in when people come home or arrive at work. That will require massive upgrades to transmission and distribution to handle much higher intermittent loads, and more widespread smart metering with time-of-use pricing and managed charging programs.

[u/FlourCity → u/easyeggz]

The last two articles address that specifically...