{"id":7413,"date":"2017-01-11T22:29:16","date_gmt":"2017-01-11T21:29:16","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.theoillamp.co.uk\/?p=7413"},"modified":"2017-01-11T22:29:16","modified_gmt":"2017-01-11T21:29:16","slug":"variable-rate-electricity","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.theoillamp.co.uk\/?p=7413","title":{"rendered":"Variable rate electricity"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"meters\"<\/a>Last week a small energy supplier was in the news for offering its customers variable rate electricity.\u00a0 In one way there is nothing new about all this.\u00a0 People who used (or use) a lot of electricity at night (mostly those like my grandparents who had storage heaters*) had a system of variable rate electricity that involved two meters (economy 7 or economy 10).\u00a0 This was complicated to install but relatively simple on the maths calculations.\u00a0 The power at night was about a fifth of daytime and the system was a means of using some electricity at night in the days when power stations had to be left on all the time (or at least a lot more often).\u00a0 Now of course we have variable supply (renewables) and increasingly variable demand.\u00a0 People rarely sit down on mass to watch a particular TV programme.<\/p>\n

One way to match supply and demand is said to be variable pricing and this is what the energy company is offering via a smart meter (so simpler to install).\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 The electricity under this scheme is at its most expansive between 4 and 7pm when peak demand is highest and cheapest at night with at least another daytime rate.<\/p>\n

Whilst this is the way we are going with smart meters there are some issues of concern.\u00a0 The first is if you are cooking using an electric cooker then this offer is not for you for obvious reasons.\u00a0 Second, following on from this point switching your consumption to cheaper times may not be possible.\u00a0 Third the whole idea works on the premise that you switch heavy usage to night.\u00a0 This is a concern for a number of reasons.\u00a0 Using washing machines and dryers at night is not recommended there have been a number of fires recently.\u00a0 Another problem is that their use could be antisocial affecting neighbours.\u00a0 Lastly working out how much your energy use is costing you and lowering its cost will involve a considerable amount of time and effort.<\/p>\n

As this is the way we are going we are going we are going to have to live with it.\u00a0 It could be wider societal changes such as multiple TV channels, a more 24 lifestyle and electric cars will even out power consumption.<\/p>\n

Neil<\/p>\n

*actually thinking about this my Grandparents house was heated by a bizarre mixture of heating methods.\u00a0 Depending on which bit you were in a coal fired boiler, night storage heaters and a coal fired stove in the lounge.\u00a0 The house was freezing – at least upstairs.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Last week a small energy supplier was in the news for offering its customers variable rate electricity.\u00a0 In one way there is nothing new about all this.\u00a0 People who used (or use) a lot of electricity at night (mostly those … Continue reading →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_exactmetrics_skip_tracking":false,"_exactmetrics_sitenote_active":false,"_exactmetrics_sitenote_note":"","_exactmetrics_sitenote_category":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[29,4],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-7413","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-energy-costs","category-renewables"],"yoast_head":"\nVariable rate electricity - The oil lamp - shining God's light on peak oil<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.theoillamp.co.uk\/?p=7413\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:label1\" content=\"Written by\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data1\" content=\"admin\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:label2\" content=\"Est. reading time\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data2\" content=\"2 minutes\" \/>\n<script type=\"application\/ld+json\" class=\"yoast-schema-graph\">{\"@context\":\"https:\/\/schema.org\",\"@graph\":[{\"@type\":\"WebPage\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.theoillamp.co.uk\/?p=7413\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/www.theoillamp.co.uk\/?p=7413\",\"name\":\"Variable rate electricity - 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