FROM THE MANAGER
A Healthy Electricity Diet
This month I’m going to write an article about saving money. Yes, it will have lots
of information about electric utility stuff, but what I’m really talking about is
how we — the Brown-
I’m talking about something called “demand response.” So, what the heck is that? It sounds like going on an electricity diet or something. Actually, that sort of nails it! Demand response means cutting back electricity consumption at the most crucial times to lower costs.
At Brown-
First, there are energy charges for the volume of kilowatt-
The second type of charge is the demand charge. In contrast to the odometer which
measures how far a car travels, the speedometer measures how fast the car is going
at a particular point in time. Similarly, the demand charge from KEPCo measures how
fast Brown-
That all sounds pretty complicated! This is where the electricity diet thing comes in: We can significantly lower electricity costs by carefully choosing when we consume it. Just like any effective diet, you don’t have to completely give up eating to lose weight, you just have to be careful what you eat. For me, it’s simply about watching the carbs! For power cost savings, it simply about watching when we consume electricity.
I mentioned “particular point in time.” Most of KEPCo’s demand charges for Brown-
One little side note: You may have noticed that your bill came a few days later and is due a few days later. By pushing the billing back a few days, it allows us to more accurately reflect the power cost bill we receive from KEPCo.