USING
ELECTRIC BILLS
TO MAKE EVERYONE MORE GREEN
OUTLINE:
1. VOLUNTARY CARBON TRADING
2.
LET
THE ELECTRIC COMPANIES DO THE MATH
TO TRANSFER CASH FROM THE OVER-USERS TO THE UNDER-USERS
3.
A
POSSIBLE NEW ELECTRIC RATE STRUCTURE
4.
SUCH
A SYSTEM WOULD BE SELF-REGULATING
5.
EVERYONE
WOULD BE MOTIVATED TO SAVE ELECTRICITY
6.
I
AM NOT A HERMIT LIVING 'OFF THE GRID'
7.
LOOKING
FOR WAYS TO SAVE ELECTRICITY
USING
ELECTRIC BILLS
TO
MAKE EVERYONE MORE GREEN
by
James Park
1. VOLUNTARY CARBON TRADING
Al Gore's mansion in Tennessee uses as much
electricity as 20 average American's homes.
He tells us that he pays extra fees so that the impact of his
electrical use
is balanced by benefits to the environment elsewhere in the world.
We have no reason to doubt that Al Gore does in fact make payments
to compensate for this high energy use.
But there are millions of other Americans who use more than their share
but who do not pay anything beyond their normal bills for electricity
and natural gas.
The practice Al Gore uses is sometimes called
"carbon trading".
This refers to the possibility
that he can pay a carbon broker a certain fee each year
so that that broker can send part of Al Gore's payment
to some other organization
which will reduce its carbon dioxide emissions because of Gore's
payment.
For example, the carbon broker could pay a power plant
that has discovered a way to produce electricity
with less release of carbon dioxide into the atmosphere.
But here is an even homier example of how such an
exchange might work:
I save electricity in my home in Minneapolis
by using unheated water for my baths.
My hot-water heater is powered by electricity.
Thus during the hottest time of the year,
the temperature in my home reaches 90 degrees,
which heats the water standing in my hot-water heater
to the same temperature as the rest of my apartment,
so that I can take a nice bath without paying anything to heat
the water.
Al Gore could do that same thing in Tennessee,
where
it is even hotter in the summer.
He probably has conventional ways of heating his water
---either natural gas or electricity.
So this is the way he could balance his hot-water use:
Each day each of us takes a bath or shower, he in Nashville, I in
Minneapolis.
He has a hot shower; in the summer I use unheated water.
Al Gore pays me 25 cents for the privilege of taking a hot shower.
And my electrical use is genuinely less than it would have been
if I also had taken a hot shower.
And I get compensated for the slight inconvenience of using less
electricity.
The reader will see immediately many possible
problems with this kind of trading.
How does Al Gore know that I have not actually had a hot shower
and still charged him 25 cents for having his hot shower?
Would we have to create a complex system to make sure
that those who claim to be reducing their emissions have actually done
so?
And how would we measure the amount of savings they claim?
What if the reducers say that they could have used much more than they
did?
For example, I could leave my hot-water heater running all the time,
which would use many kilowatt-hours of electricity every month.
Then I could could turn it off
and ask Al Gore to pay for this huge
reducing in emissions.
Air conditioning uses much more electricity than
heating water.
Even tho my condo does have central air conditioning,
I did not use it at all this past summer.
I assume that Al Gore did use air conditioning.
Should he pay me 25 cents for each hour
I did not use air
conditioning and he did?
Since his home is 10 or 20 times larger than mine,
he would actually have to find others to reward for saving electricity.
How would such savings in other places be measured and certified?
How would the payments be coordinated
between those who use as
much air conditioning as they like
and those who are saving the
planet by using less air conditioning?
I think we would have to abandon any such system
as far too complex and
costly to administer.
Wherever there are possibilities of cheating, some people will cheat.
And how many people would voluntarily
pay more for their electricity?
2. LET THE ELECTRIC COMPANIES DO
THE
MATH
TO TRANSFER CASH FROM THE
OVER-USERS TO THE UNDER-USERS
But there is a fool-proof way to make sure
that Al Gore pays for his excess use of electricity
and I get rewarded for using less than my share.
The electric companies could be required to change their rate structures
so as to reward those who
use less than average
and to penalize those who
use more than average.
But before we get into any numbers for this proposal,
since any such specifics might distract from the main point,
let's just consider the wisdom of big users paying more than small
users.
If wide consensus is reached agreeing with this basic principle,
we should be able to create fair ways to shift the rate structure
from the small users to the large users.
Right now the small users are subsidizing the large users.
This could be reversed:
The large users could subsidize the small users.
And Al Gore might agree.
He would not have to estimate
how much excess electricity he uses
and how much he should pay the carbon brokers
to purchase energy-reductions elsewhere.
The whole process would become automatic for everyone:
Large and small users alike would just continue to pay their electric
bills.
Voluntary payments by conscientious people like Al Gore
would be replaced by mandatory payments calculated by the electric
companies.
And everyone would pay
or benefit depending
on their actual use of
electricity.
Every user has an electric meter,
which records exactly how much electricity is used.
(And in order not to harm the electric utilities and
their shareholders,
I would propose that there be no
net change in revenues
for the companies that generate electricity.
In other words, the electric companies everywhere
would still get the same total amount of cash
each month for the electricity they provide.
But there would be a change in the way the electricity is priced
so that the people who conserve electricity
(who use less than average) would be rewarded by lower costs
and the people who continue to use more than average would pay more.)
Because providing electricity is a monopoly in most
places,
there are Public Service Commissions, sometimes with other names,
which are responsible for approving or disapproving
every rate change proposed by the public utilities.
Usually the providers of natural gas and electricity
ask for more than they finally get,
but the companies are almost guaranteed a reasonable profit.
The Public Service Commission does not require them to operate at a
loss.
3. A POSSIBLE NEW ELECTRIC RATE
STRUCTURE
Now we get to some actual numbers,
based on my own electrical use,
which is probably well below average for a variety of reasons.
I do not offer my electrical bill as an example of some average
consumer.
I use about 2000 kilowatt hours per year.
This comes to 167 KWH per month.
I pay between 12 and 18 cents per KWH
(all fees and charges included).
My average cost is 15 cents per KWH.
My annual cost of electricity is $300 or $25 per month.
A kilowatt hour (KWH) is the basic unit of
electrical power used.
It is the amount of electricity to keep a 1,000-watt bulb burning for
one hour
or a 100-watt bulb burning for 10 hours.
The basic cost of electricity is supposed to be
between 6 and 7 cents per KWH.
But my cost is 10 cents higher because of various charges, fees, &
taxes.
The more electricity I use, the less it costs me per KWH.
Each electric customer can check his or her electric
bill
to see how much these costs are.
The cost per KWH is your total bill
divided by the number of KWH you used that month.
Let's say the average household used 5 times as much
electricity as I do.
This would be 10,000 KWH per year.
The electric rates could be changed
so that the smallest users
pay less
than it costs to generate the
electricity.
And the largest users pay more than the average cost.
We could create a new rate structure which is fair
to everyone:
(1) Fair to the electric company
because their total income would still include the authorized level of
profit.
(2) Fair to the small consumers of electricity
because the cost per kilowatt-hour would be lower for the small users.
(3) And fair to the large users of electricity
because such households can afford to pay higher rates
for the amounts of electricity they use beyond the normal level.
First, we should eliminate the basic service charge,
which is added to each bill without regard to the amount of electricity
used.
For me, this is $6 per month.
And in the summer months (when I use the least amount of electricity
because I do not use my air conditioning),
this basic charge accounts for about half of my electric bill.
The smallest consumers of electricity could be
rewarded
by being charged only 3
cents per kilowatt-hour
for any amount of electricity less than 100 KWH per month.
For the next 100 KWH, all consumers would pay 4
cents per KWH.
Those consumers who used more than 200 KWH per month
would pay 5 cents per KWH for the electricity they use between 200 and
300 KWH.
And the even larger users of electricity would pay a
still higher rate
for the next 100 KWH they use each month.
This step-by-step rate structure would continue to
increase
until the income for the electric company
is the same as under the present rate structure,
which costs the smallest consumers the most per KWH.
In other words, at present we have an upside-down
rate structure:
The smallest consumers of electricity pay the most per KWH.
And the largest consumers of electricity pay the least per KWH.
This could easily be reversed:
Let the small consumers pay the lowest rates.
4. SUCH A SYSTEM WOULD BE
SELF-REGULATING
Such a new rate structure would not depend
on anyone to be concerned about the environment
or to feel charitable toward the small users.
Large users would not be required to do their own math
to see how much they should pay for their excess use of electricity.
And they would not have to locate the people
who should receive the payments.
Everyone would be rewarded or penalized by the automatic calculation
performed by the computer of the electric company.
The computer that generates each electric bill
would easily know how much to charge for each KWH of electricity used
that month.
There would be no honor system
such as me saying how often I had a bath with unheated water
and Al Gore saying how many hot showers he took.
I would not have to report how
many hours of air conditioning I did not
use.
And Al Gore would not have to report how many hours of air conditioning
he did use.
Our respective electric bills would tell the whole story
down to the last kilowatt-hour.
And the people besides Al Gore who are using more
than their share of electricity
would be automatically charged for that privilege.
And their higher electric bills would compensate
for the lower bills found in the mailboxes of the small consumers.
5. EVERYONE WOULD BE MOTIVATED TO
SAVE ELECTRICITY
Because there is a direct relationship
between the
amount of electricity used and the size of the bill,
each consumer who uses a small amount would be rewarded.
And each consumer who uses a large amount would be penalized.
Especially the large consumers, who are paying say 10 cents per KWH
for each additional KWH they use,
would be strongly motivated
to find ways
to reduce their excess use
of electricity.
Such a new rate structure for electricity
would probably reduce the total amount of electricity used.
This would help to create a greener world for everyone.
(Because the sun is coming up as I write this,
I just got up from my computer to turn off some of my lights.)
I live in a small condominium overlooking downtown
Minneapolis.
I can open my eyes at any time of the night to look at the skyscrapers
downtown.
And there are always some lights on---even on long week-ends.
If the electric rate-structure were suddenly changed,
the executives of all large companies
would order better controls on the use of electricity.
Instead of a lights-out police telling office buildings to turn off
their lights,
these users would get a strong message in the form of their electric
bills:
You are wasting lots of electricity by keeping your lights on all the
time.
A new
electric-rate-structure mandated by the Public Service
Commissions
would be much better than a carbon
tax.
No new systems would have to be established.
The in-place electric meters
and the computers already calculating our electric bills
would do all the work.
Large users of electicity would pay more per kilowatt hour.
Small users would pay less for their power.
And all users would be rewarded for whatever reductions they could
achieve.
6. I AM NOT A HERMIT LIVING 'OFF
THE
GRID'
Someone who reads that I use only 2000 KWH of
electricity per year
might be tempted to dismiss me as a freak who lives in the woods
without any modern appliances.
But this is far from the case.
I do have and use the following electrical devices:
Computer and printers:
I am writing this essay on a computer screen,
with the keyboard in my lap.
I use my computer a few hours each day I am home.
I also have two laser printers,
upon which I am presently printing all of my books.
I believe this is one of my largest uses of electricity,
because the lights dim just a little
when each sheet of paper gets printed.
Television and radios:
I have a large color television in my bedroom,
which I use almost every day.
And I have radios in several rooms,
which are on a few hours each day.
Refrigerator:
I have a large refrigerator, which I keep operating
all year round.
Hot-water heater:
As mentioned before, I have an electric hot-water
heater,
which enables me to easily to turn it off whenever I do not need hot
water.
I find that it take about 30-60 minutes to heat enough water for a bath.
And during the hot weather in the summer,
the water in my hot-water heater gets up to 90 degrees F
simply because that is the air temperature in my apartment.
So I do not need to heat any water during the hottest part of the
summer.
Furnace:
I have a forced-air furnace for my small condo.
Electricity is needed to run the fan whenever it is either heating or
cooling.
Electricity is the power used for any cooling I do.
The basic fuel for heating is natural gas,
which is another story.
Space heater:
In the winter months, I keep my condo quite cool
in order to save fuel.
I set my thermostat at 60-65 degrees when I am home.
And I take a space-heater around with me to various places:
my desk when I am writing, my bathroom when I am in there,
and my bedroom when I am watching television.
There is no point in heating my whole condo
when I am in just one part of it.
This space heater adds to my electric bills in the winter months,
but it is less costly than keeping my whole condo at 70 degrees.
Also, when I am away from home,
which is about half of the
hours of any week,
I turn down the heat to 50 degrees F during the winter months,
since there is no one else home who needs to keep warm.
My plants do not thrive a much in the winter,
but that is a trade-off I am willing to accept.
Lights:
I have the normal number of lights
needed for lighting a condo of 1,000 square feet.
And two of these are compact florescent bulbs,
which use just 7 watts of electricity.
Cooking appliances:
I have a small microwave oven,
which is where I do most of my cooking.
I also have a toaster oven for appropriate heating.
My condo did come with a dishwasher,
but I have only used it once, after a Christmas dinner for relatives.
Otherwise, I never have enough dishes to warrant turning it on.
So I wash all of my dishes the old-fashion way---by hand in the sink.
And sometimes the water is just above room temperature,
but that does a fine job anyway.
Washing machine and dryer:
My brand-new condo also came equipped
with a washer-dryer combination.
Both of these use electricity to do their work,
including the heat needed to dry my clothes.
I do not use my washer and dryer as often as many people.
But that again is a personal choice.
Garage space:
I also have a garage space on the ground floor,
which I rent to another owner, since I have no car.
And the electricity needed to light this garage space 24 hours a day
and needed to open and close the garage door for the building
are all included in my monthly association fee,
so I have no control over these uses of electricity.
Any home-owner who has a garage hooked to their electric meter
will have higher electrical use than I do for that reason.
Cooking range:
I have a gas stove, which only uses electricity for
its clock
and to provide a spark to start the gas burning when I turn it on.
I use so little natural gas that my bill during the summer
shows zero used each month.
Ventilation:
I have an exhaust fan in my bathroom,
which I use regularly when I am in that room.
And the fan in my furnace/air-conditioner
could be used to keep the air moving.
But I never use it for this purpose.
Some people have their furnace fans running all the time,
which uses a lot of electricity in a year.
I also have a small air filter,
which I almost never use.
There is also a hood ventilator over my cooking
range,
which I seldom use.
My condo is on one corner of my building,
so I can take advantage of natural cross-ventilation
more than half of the year.
I have a vacuum cleaner, which is powered by
electricity.
So all-in-all, it seems that I have all of the
appliances
that use electricity in most modern homes.
I am able to keep my use of electricity low
because I use all of these carefully and sparingly.
And when I am not home, none of these is operating.
Only my refrigerator and my electric clocks
keep running year in and year out.
7. LOOKING FOR WAYS TO SAVE
ELECTRICITY
When you look around your own home,
you will probably find that you have basically the same devices using
electricity.
But all of us can reduce the amount we use each device.
When you are not watching the television or listening to the radio,
turn it off.
When you leave a certain area of your home, turn off the lights.
Don't leave your computer running all day
so that you can have instant access.
It only takes a minute or two for even the slowest computer
to start working again after it has been resting for a few hours.
If the electric rates were changed as suggested
above,
would you start looking for possible ways to save electricity?
AUTHOR:
James Park is an existential philosopher and
ecological advocate.
He began his college education in the natural sciences
and later turned to philosophy.
He lives very simply without a car
or other energy-consuming habits.
Much more about James Park will be found on his website:
An Existential Philosopher's Museum:
http://www.tc.umn.edu/~parkx032/.
About half of the 800 'rooms' in this museum
are devoted to Unitarian Universalism.
Created
9-20-2007; Revised 9-25-2007; 10-11-2007; 11-4-2007; 2-9-2008
See related cyber-sermons:
Using Electric
Bills to Make Everyone More Green.
How to Tread
More Lightly on the Earth.
Global Warming
Fundamentalism.