Posted on 01/04/2008 10:12:27 AM PST by Leisler
"There is nothing wrong with your thermostat. Do not attempt to adjust the temperature. We are controlling your power consumption. If we wish to make it hotter, we will turn off your air conditioner. If we wish to make it cooler, we will turn off your heater. For the next millennium, sit quietly and we will control your home temperature. We repeat, there is nothing wrong with your thermostat. You are about to participate in a great adventure. You are about to experience the awe and mystery which reaches from the inner mind to... SACRAMENTO!"*
Building codes and engineering standards are generally good things. Updating and improving codes and standards better protect us against earthquakes, for example, as we better understand the weak points and failure modes of existing construction techniques. Requirements that ensure proper handling of sanitary wastes can be largely credited with the increased life spans in industrialized countries through the reduction of communicable diseases.
In California, we have 236 pages of state-mandated standards for building energy efficiency, known as Title 24. This prescribes methods for calculating the sizes of your home windows, the capacities of your air conditioner and heater, the thickness of the insulation in your attic. A small cottage industry has sprung up to perform these engineering calculations that are required for any new commercial or residential construction or major change to existing structures. While I've never personally been involved in this branch of retail professional engineering, I've had colleagues who would moonlight doing Title 24 calcs. It is now just part of the mandated paperwork involved in the construction business these days in California.
A new revision to Title 24 is in the works for 2008[2] and it includes a number of improvements and enhancements that are largely good sense items and should be non-controversial. For example a new swimming pool will probably need larger diameter pipes between the pool, the filter and the pump than was former practice. This will reduce the fluid friction losses that your pump must overcome and hence reduce the pump's consumption of electricity, albeit at a minor increase in first cost for the larger pipes and fittings. Another good idea is a requirement for lighter colored shingles, the "Cool Roof Initiative." That is intended to reduce heat loss over cold winter nights by emission and heat gain on summer days by absorption. My neighbor and I both recently discovered that it is difficult to get roofers to NOT use dark colored shingles for some reason. Having a little state muscle behind us will help, especially for renters.
What should be controversial in the proposed revisions to Title 24 is the requirement for what is called a "programmable communicating thermostat" or PCT. Every new home and every change to existing homes' central heating and air conditioning systems will required to be fitted with a PCT beginning next year following the issuance of the revision. Each PCT will be fitted with a "non-removable " FM receiver that will allow the power authorities to increase your air conditioning temperature setpoint or decrease your heater temperature setpoint to any value they chose. During "price events" those changes are limited to +/- four degrees F and you would be able to manually override the changes. During "emergency events" the new setpoints can be whatever the power authority desires and you would not be able to alter them.
In other words, the temperature of your home will no longer be yours to control. Your desires and needs can and will be overridden by the state of California through its public and private utility organizations. All this is for the common good, of course.
In some technocratic worldview, it does have a justification. California's population growth and its affluence have strained the state's electric and natural gas resources. Famously, rolling blackouts have occurred due to shortages of electrical generation during peak periods. Unbeknownst to most citizens, short supplies of natural gas during cold weather have resulted in curtailments of delivery to industrial and large commercial customers. Those last kilowatts tend to be very expensive kilowatts and tend to drive up the average cost of electricity for all.
But the discomforts of compliance will fall unevenly across the state. Come the next heat wave, the elites might be comfortably lolling in La Jolla's ocean breezes or basking in Berkeley by the Bay, while the Central Valley's poor peons are baking in Bakersfield and frying in Fresno. California's coastal climate, where the elites live, seldom requires air conditioning. I've lived a middle class life style in Mill Valley, San Francisco, San Luis Obispo and now San Jose, and never have I lived in a home with air conditioning. Even in relatively warm San Jose, separated from the Pacific Ocean by the Coast Range, ceiling fans will get a family through the worst.
How will the state ensure compliance and prevent free riders? As above, coastal elites are already free riders as they will see the benefits while paying none of the costs except for the higher first cost of a PCT. For initial construction or home remodeling, it will be one of those items a building inspector will check before signing a certificate of occupancy. Replacing one's mandated PCT with a bootleg unit from Nevada should be within the skill of most homeowners. A low powered FM transmitter might easily be devised to override the broadcast commands for low cost. Even a metal wire shield around your PCT could block its FM reception. Adding a window air conditioner or an electric space heater are other work-arounds as neither have requirements for PCTs - yet. Sweating for the common good is for the chumps.
Another problem is that PCTs will obscure the price signals to power plant developers telling them that it will be profitable to build additional generation. As explained in this article, a deregulated electric market will come to resemble other commodity markets, like pork bellies, where shortages cause high prices that induce new capacity and low (or obscured) prices inhibit investment. When bacon prices are high, farmers arrange dates between their sows and their boars in hopes of future, profitable piglets. When bacon prices are low, farmers are more interested in chastity for their herds. If the state "shaves" peak loads by adjusting your thermostat during "price events," generators will not receive the higher prices. This effect will reinforce electrical shortages much like rent control discourages apartment building.
The real question poised by this invasion of the sanctity of our homes by state power is -- why are we doing this? It seems to me to be the wrong fix for a problem that we don't have to have. The common sense alternative is to build new power plants so that power shortages don't occur. Of course, they can't be coal or nuclear power plants! The coastal elites have their minds set against those undesirables. The state has wasted billions of our dollars on wind generation that hasn't helped to meet peak loads. For natural gas, offshore drilling should be considered. While we have one liquefied natural gas terminal in Mexico supplying us with Indonesian and, in the near future, Russian, LNG, another receiving terminal to be supplied by Australian LNG was rejected by the State Coastal Commission.
While nowhere in the Bill of Rights is there explicitly a right to set one's own thermostat to whatever temperature one desires (and is able to pay for), the new PCT requirement certainly seems to violate the "a man's home is his castle" common law dictum.
Californians have until January 30th to send their opinions and comments on the pending revisions to Title 24 to the California Energy Commission[1]. Legislators too[2].
*With apologies to the creators of the TV science fiction series, "The Outer Limits."
Sorry, Solson. “California continues to take steps to mitigate statewide energy crisis conditions it has encountered over the past decade such as sharply rising energy prices and rolling blackouts.” This is a purely fabricated man-made crisis resulting from the kowtowing to ultraenvirowackos and the lack of stones in any elected official to build power plants. We are NEVER going to conserve our way to prosperity. In the good old days of vertically integrated utilities and Integrated Resource Planning, utilities had a public service obligation to make sure enough capacity was built to avoid brownouts and blackouts. We are being forced back to the Carter era of cardigan sweaters by ultralibs. We need true conservative leaders who will stand up to this virulent agenda, but I don’t find many except perhaps Inhofe.
It’s obvious, too, that this is only one of many energy curtailment measures planned to comply with AB32. Right around the corner is a cap on the number of miles you will be able to drive per year (based on your needs, of course) without paying a surcharge penalty for excess emissions. This is a complete abridgment of our First Amendment right to freely assemble.
Nuclear power now. We need to build as many as possible, maybe even several per state. Then we can think about electric vehicles.
Someone once told me that the only difference between a husband and a wife was 3 degrees on the thermostat.
Anyways, with the FM radio, flush counting toilet, this will result in ‘higher prices at peak demand’( read taxes for common use ). Pamphlets will explain that by waiting say 12 hours until the next ‘flushing period’ a family can, with in reason, continue to use the toilet.( Your ‘usage’ may vary )
The creation of new power plants, or lack thereof, is also a "man-made" issue because of inability to zone, gain state and local support and inability to make it financially feasible.
Integrated Resource Planning today, especially in a non-real time pricing market, properly accounts for "virtual capacity" through Demand Response. It's tried, true, and works, especially in NYISO, ISO-NE, PJM, and ERCOT. It simply works.
There is nothing in AB32, nor any other Carbon Emissions bill that seeks to limit the amount of miles someone drives, much less the amount of energy they consume. It simply won't happen that way.
However, if you choose to use a crapload of power at peak times, the MARKET, the REAL energy MARKET, should appropriately charge you more.
It's all a supply and demand game as you know. Factor in real time pricing into any market and you will have market based incentives to reduce use during peak times. It's smart, makes sense, and is easy to do.
AND IT'S VOLUNTARY!
Anyways, with the FM radio, flush counting toilet, this will result in ‘higher prices at peak demand’( read taxes for common use ). Pamphlets will explain that by waiting say 12 hours until the next ‘flushing period’ a family can, with in reason, continue to use the toilet.( Your ‘usage’ may vary )
I’m a builder.
Like all builders I need to have a permit before I can begin construction, and that includes meeting the energy code.
Long story short: I was required to install a furnace of a certain small size in a new house. It was 20 below the morning I went in to plead the case for a larger furnace.
The code outlined that I could have a 60 degree temperature rise, and so I asked the code guy “So, you want me to install this furnace, and the house will be a stable 40 degrees inside in weather like we had last night?”
Total silence.
He graciously ‘allowed’ me to install a two stage furnace to get around the code..
Wrong temperatures, sorry.
It was 10 below that night, not 20, the allowed temperature raise is 60 degrees, the stable inside temperature would be 50 degrees.
In theory, there could be just one single little plant, and people could bid and you would consider that a ‘market’ system.
It would be market if you had competition, offering consumers a variety of choices. As it is, it is politics. Consumers are limited, on purpose, options by law.
I don’t call forced limitations of choice ‘free’.
That’s my argument with it. Not the generation/use part, but the elitist electrical fascism of it.
All permits will have to be filed by the third week in January for the 'scheduled' upcoming work for the year. And...so forth.
I STILL wouldn’t buy the house.
We rarely use our central air and heat anymore. Since the price of natural gas went so high, I have found it is less expensive to heat whichever room we are in with an electric space heater. We also have a real fireplace in the den and a pellet stove in the living room.
For summer we put 2 large Mastercools on our house. One is for the front living areas and the other is for the back bedrooms. We usually only run 1 at a time dependent on where we are in the house.
I am sure PG&E hates my guts now since in the summers our electric bills went from $600 a mnth to less than $200.
In the winter our electric bill went from $200 and a $200 gas bill to about $150 for electric and $20 for gas.
Happiest I have been about our utility bills in a long time, they were killing us.
ping
“I’ve got no doubt this is nothing but a prelude to a complete ban on wood heat because, as we all know, envirowackos will NEVER EVER be satisfied with the environment until all humans are exterminated.”
Remember the ‘70’s? Wood burning was touted as being “environmental” by the hippies.
Let them ban wood. I will merely collect their shite, dry it, and burn it right under their noses. Wouldn't be as much work as putting up 6 cord of rock maple every year.
Also there is a way to heat your home by burning only at night, when the enviro whackos are all home tucked into their cozy little liberal Utopian cocoons.
Of course, you ABSOLUTELY KNOW THAT THE “ELITES” WILL NOT BE SUBJECT TO THESE RESTRICTIONS.
Of course. Look at the Pope Algore's new palace. We are told how much less energy he is now using. Actually his consumption isn't going down much. His consumption is being divided between the local power plant AND HIS OWN power generation from solar cells, etc.
So his full use is no longer publicly monitored. He's still using the power. If it is so viable, he should generate all of his own energy.
Unless I’m quite confused, the “temperature rise” is the difference between the intake and outlet temperatures. Take your house at 10 below and turn on the furnace. Intake air is 10 below, outlet temp is 50. After a while the intake air begins to rise in temperature and so does the outlet temp. A few hours later the ambient air temperature inside stabilizes at a nice 70 and the thermostat shuts down.
The only way you would have a stable 50 at the conditions you mention is if you were stupid enough to draw all your intake air directly from the outside.
Your results may vary depending on size and insulation of structure and size of furnace.
This is off topic but, I`ve been off line for a while and am having trouble posting a thread.How do you get to that page?
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