So Mrs. ACW and I have been selected to participate in an energy-saving experiment with Baltimore Gas and Electric this summer. BGE selected about 1000 homes at random to participate in what they call the “Peak Time Rebate program”, and we were lucky enough to be one of them.
Basically, it works like this: BGE will run the program for 12 days between June 1 and Sept 30. Essentially, they’ll let us know by phone, email, or even text a few days in advance when a “peak day” is coming. (Can you believe that? Text? I’m shocked at their acceptance of modern technology.) Then, when the peak day rolls around all we have to do is reduce our energy usage between 2pm and 7pm.
“Ha ha, sucker,” I can hear you saying now, “They’re just duping you and some other suckers into reducing your energy so that they don’t have to brown-out the state for a few days this summer.”
Yeah, I was skeptical too, but they’re providing incentives out the ass. First of all, just by calling to see if I qualified to participate in the program they gave me $15. Not bad for 5 minutes worth of work.
Next, they’re going to refund me for every kilowatt hour I reduce off my average usage. So if they measure that I normally use 1000 kWh per month and on a peak day I use 5 or 10 kWh less, they’ll pay me about $1.16 for every kWh reduced. That means $5.80 or $11.60 (or more) for doing nothing! Even better, there’s no penalty if I don’t reduce my usage during peak days. At this point my plan is to flip all the breakers on everything except the refrigerator on “peak” days. I don’t care if the cats suffer for my cash.
Once the experiment ends in September, and if I don’t bail out, which I won’t, they’ll pay me another $100 just for participating. This is on top of whatever I earn through reduced usage and the $15 they paid me initially.
Finally, the coolest part of the experiment are the tools they’re giving me to help reduce energy usage. They’re installing a device on my air conditioner/heat pump that will cycle on and off while the air conditioning is on. The air conditioning will stop, but the fan will keep running for a few minutes to blow around the already cold air, then the AC will kick on again, then off again while the fan stays on, etc. So they’ll be saving money FOR me. How can I lose?
The other cool thing that we get is an Orb! When I read about these in Wired a few months ago I thought, “Man, I’ve GOT to get one of those.” It keeps track of any number of things, but in this case, it’ll be our energy usage. So we can see if we’re using more energy than we need to be using and I can yell to Mrs. ACW, “Hey, the orb is red. Stop doing whatever you’re doing! Jerkass.”
I know I’m totally nerding out here, but I’m totally psyched about this, and can’t wait to see how it goes. And there’s really nothing nicer than getting paid a fat wad of cash for having a lower energy bill.
“when you see your ball flashing red, you notice”
are you gonna have mrs. acw be checkin your ball?
Lucky bastard. BGE is at least making it worth your effort. The nazi fucks here with PGE offered us $25 to let them put a device in our home that gives them complete control over heat and ac so they can turn it on and off whenever they want. I wanted to use that letter as the wick in the fire bomb I was planning to throw at their fucking building but the wife would not allow it.
I’m so jealous! Enjoy your home energy experiment.
THAT’S TOO COOL!!! Damn, for once I’m jealous that you live in Bawlmur and I don’t.
As move-in time in AA County comes closer for me, I’m gonna be bugging you with all sorts of questions about your utility costs, country taxes, etc. We’re pretty close to a decision down here, but it’ll be end of April at the earliest before we move in anywhere.
They’ve had those radio-controlled devices for a few year now. The best part about about them is that they are easily bypassed.
That is actually quite a good deal… Finally there’s incentives to save the planet and crap. Personally, i’m getting really tired of companies trying to ’shame’ us into reducing our energy usage…
@unusualpsycho: Buy your wife something pretty, take her out to dinner then ask her if you can firebomb PGE! LOL!!
Yah, I have the radio-thingee on my AC. Don’t even notice when they shut it off for a short spell - and a nice little credit on the power bill, so cheers to that.
I’d gladly pay to be able to interface my power meter to get some display of usage. I’m pretty good about not leaving lights on, so I must be woefully ignorant of the things that bring my usage up.