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Earlier quoted context omitted.
If you look at the PGE bill that is visible before article gets cut off, his electricity use went way up year over year and his natural gas use went down. I'm guessing he got an electric heat pump to replace his gas furnace, and just pays a lot more per kWh for electricity than he was paying per therm or cuft or whatever of natural gas.
He said this himself in the article.
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>I like pedantry as much as the next person but that feels like a pointless distinction here. One is a payment you receive, the other is a bill you don't receive. They can be similar to your bottom line, but they are definitely not the same thing especially if there is a middle area where you wouldn't have paid the extra tax anyway, so you aren't even getting an advantage.
I don't think the OP is talking about an income like tax but a tax built into every kWh you pay for...
Personally i save about 75% with my heatpump over my old gas furnace. We used around 1500m3 - 1800m3 worth of natural gas per year, and for the past couple of years we've used between 4000kWh and 5000kWh on the heat pump per year. Granted, natural gas is expensive in Denmark, and while electricity is also normally expensive, if you have electrical heating you're excempt from paying taxes on electricity usage above 40…
I want the nuclear future with practically emission free power that's 'too cheap to meter'. I want to stop caring about SEER ratings and be able to leave windows cracked all seasons to bring in fresh air. I want power companies that keep brush and trees away from their lines. Until that happens, I'll hang onto my gas furnace and water heaters.
The biggest barrier in the end is that if we scale up nuclear by an order of magnitude or two, the heat output will cause global warming effects that approach that of CO2 emissions.
There are panels that can radiate the heat directly to space. But then you have the same area usage problems as solar power.
While some nuclear can be good I think the path to abundant energy is solar, geothermal and energy storage. There is more than enough solar and geothermal energy all around us to cover all our needs, and more. Solar will eventually mostly be in forms that also provide useful shading or act as roofs. Agrovoltaics is a field that’s growing very rapidly.
Going back to nuclear, one path to potential extremely abundant and cheap nuclear power is Helions fusion reactor. It should require a lot less cooling for a given output of useful electric power.
This is both hard to explain to people and hard to get them onboard even once it's been explained and understood. I think more people should think about things this way: I'm building a house now, so am I betting that in 30 years the price of gas will decrease or increase? Will electricity decrease or increase in price? Anyone who has seen a graph of solar, battery, wind, and other renewable power grid solution costs…
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> while electricity is also normally expensive, if you have electrical heating you're excempt from paying taxes on electricity usage above 4000 kWh per year :) So it can be done with state subsidies, but worldwide even the one time bonuses for EVs are being canceled. States aren't likely to give up on even more revenue.
It’s not a subsidy, but a hold back from taxation. It’s usually in these country’s national security interests, let alone environmental interest, to push away from gas and oil given that they are often imported from hostile nations. America doesn’t really have that same problem, but Denmark and China do.
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> let's not forget that the point of switching to electricity is to be able to use renewables Here in the UK, natural gas is used to provide electricity[1], so switching to a heat pump right now isn't likely to help with the environment and (because gas is vastly cheaper per unit energy) nor the utility bill. You might as well spend the capex on the insulation upgrades required for a heat pump anyway, but then stay o…
> Here in the UK, natural gas is used to provide electricity[1], so switching to a heat pump right now isn't likely to help with the environment Efficiency of a typical combi boiler is 90%. The notional efficiency of a heat pump in UK climate will be around 300-400% (or rather 3-4 COP). Even accounting for transmission losses etc. a heat pump powered from gas turbines is better for the environment than a combi boiler…
Transparency is great, but let's not forget that the point of switching to electricity is to be able to use renewables. We only have one nice planet to live on, and there are others who want to keep being able to live comfortably on it, I've heard. Oil/gas is a potent drug that is difficult to vane off of. (Arguably solar/battery has the same problem as oil: let's dig and refine stuff from the ground, and not care ab…
> let's not forget that the point of switching to electricity is to be able to use renewables Here in the UK, natural gas is used to provide electricity[1], so switching to a heat pump right now isn't likely to help with the environment and (because gas is vastly cheaper per unit energy) nor the utility bill. You might as well spend the capex on the insulation upgrades required for a heat pump anyway, but then stay o…
You can view the live production here:
https://electricityproduction.uk
51% renewables as I write this, and it’s only going to increase over time. I bet the people were arguing about the coal generation until we switched that off.
> because gas is vastly cheaper per unit energy
https://www.ofgem.gov.uk/energy-price-cap
Looking at the prices, and considering heat pumps are 300-400% efficient per kWh it looks like heat pumps may be slightly more expensive, although on a low night tariff it might be closer or cheaper if you consider 8 hours at 7p/kWh.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
I don't think the OP is talking about an income like tax but a tax built into every kWh you pay for...
It's still the same concept though. One is a bill you pay and other is free money you receive. There are all sorts of reasons for the bill you pay to be different based upon different criteria, that's not the same as getting free money directly.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
> Here in the UK, natural gas is used to provide electricity[1], so switching to a heat pump right now isn't likely to help with the environment Efficiency of a typical combi boiler is 90%. The notional efficiency of a heat pump in UK climate will be around 300-400% (or rather 3-4 COP). Even accounting for transmission losses etc. a heat pump powered from gas turbines is better for the environment than a combi boiler…
The incentive structure is broken right now. It costs ~4x to operate a heat pump compared to a gas furnace in California right now. Even with very low use and roof top solar my electric bill is $250 a month when, before heat pump it was $80 with heavier use.
The entire problem is that we aren't paying the actual cost of what we are consuming, and the cost of a product without these externalities is slightly more, but without making people pay for the externalities, it's not marketable.
This is the tragedy of the commons, and it's only a conundrum because the electorate wants to have their cake and eat it too.