[Sacajaweau]

We had the option to have our water heater turned off from midnight to 4 AM. Got a $4 credit every month. $48 is two weeks of groceries for me.

Not everything new is bad.

[rellimpank]

--the REA co-op in the SW corner of the state started doing that with a clock on the waterheater fifty-some years ago--the clients learned to game it by turning the clock ahead.

--when the users started gaming it by turning the clock ahead, they first went to a clock that the customer couldn't reset--as the technology became available it went to a radio signal---

[SampleMan]

We had the option to have our water heater turned off from midnight to 4 AM. Got a $4 credit every month. $48 is two weeks of groceries for me. Not everything new is bad.

How in the world does turning off your water service from midnight to 4AM help the utility in any way, unless everyones water is shut off? The feed lines continue to be pressurized. The equipment is running. There is very little usage in those hours to begin with.

[Buckeye McFrog]

Not everything new is bad.

Until the day some czar decrees your water heater will shut down between 7AM and 10:30 PM because the UN reports global CO2 levels rising too high.

[mikey_hates_everything]

"We had the option to have our water heater turned off from midnight to 4 AM."

That's strange. Why would they want to reduce load during NON-peak hours? I am being paid $40 per season so my A/C can be cut to 50% duty cycle between 2-6 PM on weekdays during very high peak loads on the grid in the summer. They did it by installing a pager controlled switch between my thermostat and compressor contactor--easily bypassable by the way.