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Ok, I have a question.

Shouldn’t I be able to pull energy off the grid between 11 to 6 am for use through the remainder of the day?

If this were about ‘redistributing loads’ the utilities would show you how to do this.

This is about control, pure and simple. They want to decide when you can or can’t use your heat or your electricity.

I froze this winter as we had our heat turned off. -40 winter as I live in an apartment where I don’t have control over these things.

They want to extend the ‘joy’ of apartment living to detached houses.

"Shouldn’t I be able to pull energy off the grid between 11 to 6 am for use through the remainder of the day?"

Yes, you should, but it is not a responsibility of the company: you can charge batteries at night and use electricity during the day. "I froze this winter as we had our heat turned off. -40 winter as I live in an apartment where I don’t have control over these things."

I am sorry for your predicament (it must have been really terrible), but it is probably the faulty of your landlord.

Right now, the US grid is a situation where the supply follows demand - Always. And, there are not good ways to store energy. There are some ways, like thermal ice storage or combined heat and power systems with chillers to "store energy" and use it in other ways.

But it's not simple and it's not cheap.

It IS about distribution of power, not load. Load happens where it happens. But how power gets to that load is an extremely complicated, and inefficient system. It's complicated and inefficient because of the lack of data around the loads - what the loads are, the type, quantity and quality of power needed, etc. - doesn't exist without bi-directional communication from a meter to distribution point to substation to generation and all around.

It's interesting to see the reaction to what are, for all intensive purposes, common needs to improve the power systems. There isn't a bogey man around every corner and believing there is reduces the ability to stop those efforts which truly can be detrimental to freedom.