It's not exactly Big Brother, it's more like Big Father.

Over my dead body! You just know whoever is controlling it will be like "It's summer, I'll set the thermostat to 85."

//Prefers cold
//Naturally insulated

Excuse me?

Each PCT will be fitted with a "non-removable " FM receiver that will allow the power authorities to increase your air conditioning temperature setpoint or decrease your heater temperature setpoint to any value they chose.

Not in this lifetime, idiots.

The audacity of politicians never ceases to amaze me.

angrymacface: Over my dead body! You just know whoever is controlling it will be like "It's summer, I'll set the thermostat to 85."

//Prefers cold
//Naturally insulated

You only Think you know when you're comfortable. The government has formulas and tables that Know what's right for you.

well thats just a bad idea that won't end well.

From here^: PCT's are thermostats that receive price or electric system reliability signals, and can be programmed by the customer to automatically reduce energy consumption through thermostat set-point adjustments.

The article I linked to indicates that they'd be using the PCTs to avoid brownouts and recover from blackouts. Since it seems to only contain a receiver, it's not going to be transmitting anything to the nearest black helicopter.

Tonight'z foahcast... a FREEEEEEEEEEEEEZE iz cohmeeng. ARHARHRHBWARHARHARHGHGHGH!

Toshiro Mifune's Letter Opener: Tonight'z foahcast... a FREEEEEEEEEEEEEZE iz cohmeeng. ARHARHRHBWARHARHARHGHGHGH!

That was a mediocre joke at best. Why did I laugh so hard?

hillbillypharmacist: That was a mediocre joke at best. Why did I laugh so hard?

Because that joke was originally written by the Academy Award-winning screenwriter of A Beautiful Mind?

Each PCT will be fitted with a "non-removable" FM receiver that will allow the power authorities to increase your air conditioning temperature setpoint or decrease your heater temperature setpoint to any value they chose.

Oh they think it will be "non-removable". But anyone with a little knowhow will be able to bypass such stupidity.

Replacing one's mandated PCT with a bootleg unit from Nevada should be within the skill of most homeowners. A low powered FM transmitter might easily be devised to override the broadcast commands for low cost. Even a metal wire shield around your PCT could block its FM reception. Adding a window air conditioner or an electric space heater are other work-arounds as neither have requirements for PCTs - yet.

Seriously, why go with such invasive systems? A much simpler and less big-brother system would be to simply allow and implement real time pricing. Modify the meter outside to receive this info and put a display in the house that shows the present price of electricity and your houses current electrical load. If someone wants to have their AC cranked to 66F and pay triple the normal rate, go ahead.

My central air system has a box that allows the power company to turn off the air conditioner during peak loads to help eliminate brownouts/blackouts. Even when they have had to disable the AC unit it has not gotten much warmer inside. I believe they simply use it to make sure that everyones air conditioner doesn't switch on at once and overload the system.

If the state "shaves" peak loads by adjusting your thermostat during "price events," generators will not receive the higher prices. This effect will reinforce electrical shortages much like rent control discourages apartment building.

Government yet again fails to realize that excessive regulation rarely solves the problem. Some regulation, yes, Oversight of industries to prevent illegal business practices, yes. Crap like this, no.

They can have my thermostat when they pry it from my cold, blue fingers.

Toshiro Mifune's Letter Opener: Because that joke was originally written by the Academy Award-winning screenwriter of A Beautiful Mind?

No way I'm believing that, Akiva.

nashBridges: I'd rather regulate a company before I regulate citizens. That's just me.

WINNER. Welcome to my profile. You just indicated that you have more sanity than the "libertarians" that infest this place.

They're already doing it here. It's optional. You sign up and it gives the elec co the ability to shut down your cooling when the system is stressed. In return, they give you a discount on your electric bill.

/retarded idea

TheCid: You just indicated that you have more sanity than the "libertarians" that infest this place.

Your post makes absolutely no sense. Are you saying that libertarians are in favor of regulating citizens more than companies? Are you saying that Libertarians believe that there should be NO government regulation?

I am libertarian on most issues and I see no problem with reasonable regulation and oversight of companies. Excessive regulation is what me and most libertarians have issue with.

HansensDisease: The article I linked to indicates that they'd be using the PCTs to avoid brownouts and recover from blackouts. Since it seems to only contain a receiver, it's not going to be transmitting anything to the nearest black helicopter.

Wouldn't they still be able to send a signal to it to tell the device to only keep the house at a certain degree? Say it is 80 degrees out, could they tell the cooling system to only let the house temp go down to 75?

and when a private utility needs some more money (a price event) can they crank up your thermostat to make you run up a bigger bill?

If this is for the environment then sign me up. No need to look at that whole personal freedom thingy.

Crosshair
A much simpler and less big-brother system would be to simply allow and implement real time pricing.

If we just let everyone see what things cost, they'll make the best choices, right? Unfortunately, not everyone has 200 hours per day to keep track of things.

Dupa: You only Think you know when you're comfortable. The government has formulas and tables that Know what's right for you.

You would think that was funny, but any soldier who has lived in Army barracks during the "no heat, no cool season" knows that it's actually true.

nashBridges: I live in a very rural area, in Virginia no less, that experiences longer than normal outages because the power draw after an outage is far higher than normal usage.

Rural Virginia has electrical service? I thought y'all used wood stoves.

I work for a big power company in the east and we have had this system forever. It's optional, and you can get out of it at any time. Me thinks the writer of the article is over-reacting just a smidge.

The article does say that the devices will be required, but it doesn't say if the actual control will be optional or not. If it's not, then he may have a point.

FTFA: Each PCT will be fitted with a "non-removable " FM receiver that will allow the power authorities to increase your air conditioning temperature setpoint or decrease your heater temperature setpoint to any value they chose. During "price events" those changes are limited to +/- four degrees F and you would be able to manually override the changes. During "emergency events" the new setpoints can be whatever the power authority desires and you would not be able to alter them.

Riiight.. I'd like to see some of their plans on how they're going to implement a "non-removable FM receiver." Seems to me it would be practically impossible to do anything like that. The only way I can see doing this is by adding the "receiver" to the internals of AC units and replacing every existing unit in the state, so that blunt-force removal of the receiver breaks the unit.. Oh, and also new thermostats for everyone. Not only is it not feasible, but someone will have figured out a way around it before it's put in the first home. This is one of the dumbest things I've heard in a long time.

I've lived a middle class life style in Mill Valley, San Francisco, San Luis Obispo and now San Jose, and never have I lived in a home with air conditioning. Even in relatively warm San Jose, separated from the Pacific Ocean by the Coast Range, ceiling fans will get a family through the worst.

San Jose can get pretty damn hot during the summer. Fans do not cut it over there. Those other places I can see not needing AC.

/Lives in Austin now and would die in the summer without AC.

Chalk this up to a policy brain fart. Like when our Ontario Premier contemplated setting up Sharia Law courts in Canada.

When was it that the term "American Thinker" started meaning "lying propagandist"?

Two words for you, California regulators: Faraday. Cage. Good luck telling my thermostat anything.

I program HVAC controls so I am getting a kick out of these replies.

RanDomino: If we just let everyone see what things cost, they'll make the best choices, right? Unfortunately, not everyone has 200 hours per day to keep track of things.

Why would it take that much time. If the price of energy is high at a particular time, people won't do things like wash/dry clothing, run the dishwasher and maybe will adjust the thermostat a degree or two.

Southern California Edison already does this on a voluntary basis. My air conditioner has a box mounted outside of it (which was there when I moved here) with a little green light... If the light goes out, the compressor won't work, and all you get is the fan. They send out the signal to shut the compressor down during "power emergencies"... which, it seems, translates to "every single hot day of the summer."

And what do you get in exchange for agreeing to sweat your ass off all summer long? A few cents off your electric bill every time they do it.

grab the tinfoil guys they're invading our brains through the AC unit...


Seriously though, if you live in a high density desert area then you have to farking adapt to living in a high density desert area.

That includes reducing the load on the grid while recovering from a blackout.

It makes sense just like banning watered grass gardens in drought-prone areas.

Cool. Soon we won't have to grow up evar!

Yeah, Daddy Government.

Remember, boys and girls:

* Government adjusting your thermostat: BAD.
* Government throwing your ass into Gitmo and waterboarding you because you look like a terraist: GOOD.

Goose-steppers are all in favor of Big Government when they get scared of swarthy furriners.

Does not approve.

Just stick one of these in the thermostat...


/one side gets hot while the other side gets cold
//flip it over according to the season
///haxor teh thermostat, I M so 1337

Crosshair: My central air system has a box that allows the power company to turn off the air conditioner during peak loads to help eliminate brownouts/blackouts. Even when they have had to disable the AC unit it has not gotten much warmer inside.

*Clicks on profile*

Hmmmm, nice reloading setup. North Dakota huh? I would dearly love to save money on my cooling bills here in South Alabama.Unlike you however when the AC goes off here, it gets hot and muggy quickly. If the power company can turn your ac off and the temp/humidity in the house doesn't change, you could probably get by without AC.

Sure glad my apartment building has central heating so I don't have to worry about some nameless entity controlling the temperature of my apartment.

/Oh. Wai......

The more shiat like this I hear, the more I'm convinced that the whole global warming thing really is a conspiracy to move us towards a communist utopia. I mean, so far we've seen proposed carbon credits (wealth redistribution), calls for limits on the # of children you can have (population control), and now government regulation of energy consumption (government rationing).

spickus: Hmmmm, nice reloading setup. North Dakota huh? I would dearly love to save money on my cooling bills here in South Alabama.Unlike you however when the AC goes off here, it gets hot and muggy quickly. If the power company can turn your ac off and the temp/humidity in the house doesn't change, you could probably get by without AC.

Thanks, I'm getting into bullet casting too, but I will be doing that outside. Going to start smelting wheel weights into ingots this week. Should have to money to get the molds and sizers in a month or so. (Going with Lee brand.)

As for the temps, we actually get quite a few 90F+ days during the summer and during summer in the Red Rifer Vally the humidity is ungodly. As I mentioned before, the electric company here mainly uses the boxes to stager everyones energy usage to avoid powder spikes and brownouts during peak demand. It isn't used to curb peoples energy consumption.

AC is very much a needed thing here in the summer. Spring, fall, and winter are nice though. Once you get west a ways the humidity drops off drastically and it is very easy to sweat off the heat in the summer. I have been in Bismark ND when it is 110F outside and as long as you have water to drink it is quite nice to be outside. My uncle doesn't even have AC at his house, he just keeps a large pitcher of water in the fridge. Grand Forks ND can get very muggy and even 85F becomes very uncomfortable.

spickus: If the power company can turn your ac off and the temp/humidity in the house doesn't change, you could probably get by without AC

I agree. I live in NC and it is the same here with the temps. We have heat related deaths every year because of it. I don't trust the folks that would make that decision of when we need to turn it off to save the system. I set my AC on 82 in the summer and heat on 68 in the winter and when it gets really cold we have a fireplace. I installed a very efficient heating and cooling system and insulated really well, so that is all I am willing to do. Our electric bill is usually a lot lower then all of the neighbor's.

IF they would do some improvements to the electric grid, maybe some of these problems would be less of a problem

immrlizard: Our electric bill is usually a lot lower then all of the neighbor's.

This is the problem right here. Not every house is the same. If I set my thermostat to 75 degrees, my house as a whole may only warm to 68 degrees due to size, insulation, a basement, etc. Someone else who has a small house that sits in the sun all day may set the thermo to 75 and be backing in 80 degree heat. Plus, what do you do when people hack into their thermostats to guarantee themselves independence from the 'grid'?

Crosshair:

I'd like to get my own reloading setup but I can't afford another expensive hobby (I just bought a beer kit, so I just mooch off my reloading friends! I never would've thought the humidity would be so high there. How much do these energy plans save?

Now... I'm a green guy and am for just about every green measure we could come up with... But this? This oversteps the boundaries by about a billion.

immrlizard: I installed a very efficient heating and cooling system and insulated really well, so that is all I am willing to do. Our electric bill is usually a lot lower then all of the neighbor's.

I completed this house in 2006. It is an Energy Star home but still there's quite a bit of room for improvement. I added 3M solar and security film. It made a significant difference in our comfort and power bill. I recommend that you look at it. It is expensive about $9 ft².

The true agenda of the Church of Globoal Warming and Socialism is being revealed. They learned it is easier to control you through dependency and regulation (for the children) than with a gun pointed to your head.

All hail our new dictators! All Hail Hillary!

Shaggy_C: The more shiat like this I hear, the more I'm convinced that the whole global warming thing really is a conspiracy to move us towards a communist utopia. I mean, so far we've seen proposed carbon credits (wealth redistribution), calls for limits on the # of children you can have (population control), and now government regulation of energy consumption (government rationing).

So...you're saying that you are really starting to believe that global warming and efforts to conserve energy are really just aspects of a vast communist plot?

And also, just how many people do you think can live on the planet without mass poverty, disease and starvation? Ten billion? 100 billion? a few trillion? More?


Oh, and while you're at it, please share with us your thoughts on water fluoridation.

==========================================

As for remote control of thermostats, people can and should be deeply suspicious. Our president has very clearly demonstrated the terrible things that can happen when our government is not held accountable for its actions.

That said, this step is probably necessary given the current limitations of the power infrastructure in the area.

Face it-- if power starts to get critically low, would you rather have your thermostat automatically cranked up a few degrees or suffer a total blackout for hours or days on end?

The common sense alternative is to build new power plants so that power shortages don't occur.

Except, of course, the idiot author fails to note that it only solves half the problem. Furthermore he goes ahead and blames it all on the environmentalists, but the NIMBY people have a big hand in stalling power plant construction as well. Yes they want power, but they don't want those plants anywhere near them! Meh, who cares, it's California and I don't live there because I like four seasons. You live California that's your trouble. It's like dolts moving to the desert, building a big city, and then crying about a shortage of water. There is no boundary, nor can you go broke, betting on human stupidity.