# The Future of Community Power Grid Planning? **URL:** \ **Category:** In My Humble Opinion\ **Created:** [December 18, 2019, 2:42am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-future-of-community-power-grid-planning/845017 "2019-12-18T02:42:55Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 4\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![DorkVader](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/73ab20/32.png) [@DorkVader](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DorkVader)\ **Post date:** [December 18, 2019, 2:42am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-future-of-community-power-grid-planning/845017/1 "2019-12-18T02:42:55Z")
Thread and awkward title inspired by [this thread](https://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showthread.php?p=22033286#post22033286) from General Questions, more specifically, the last two paragraphs of post #14 by Melbourne as follows, > [@](#): > > Price bidding for residential loads like washing is contentious because it’s providing a service that discriminates based on how much you are able to pay: prices can rise because poor people can avoid peak costs by turning off their heating in a cold snap and their air conditioning on hot days, which is a worst case scenario will kill them. Remote control of loads is contentious because you may not want to have your load turned off just then. > > Another thing they can do is start charging homes for peak loading, as they have long done for heavy commercial users. If you go on a tariff like that, you can personally control your hot water to come on only when the air-conditioning goes off. I certainly don’t have enough knowledge to speculate compentently, so what say the Dopers who might? What is the future of planning for community electrical needs? Might there be communities in the near (say 20 to 30 years) where the community as a whole is treated as one single large consumer like a factory instead of hundreds or thousands of individual household consumers and bill accordingly, perhaps Pi City gets billed by Moebius Power and Light for X amount of power and then Pi City divides that power bill evenly amongst the residents by averages. A household on average in Pi City uses 5Megawatts a day, a restaraunt uses 7, the average CPA business uses 6.5 megawatts/day etc. so that each month every single house hold pays Y based on 30 days of 5Megawatts/day of power use and so on down the line. I know that scenario is extremely rough and simplistic, but I think it should do to illustrate the concept I am trying to ask about btw exactly how do you post a link to a specific post so that just that post opens in a new window? ---
**Author:** ![Hari\_Seldon](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/hari_seldon/32/5173_2.png) [@Hari\_Seldon](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Hari_Seldon)\ **Post date:** [December 18, 2019, 2:42pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-future-of-community-power-grid-planning/845017/2 "2019-12-18T14:42:25Z")
There is one city (Westmount) on Montreal island that buys its power in bulk from the power company and resells it to its residents. But it is still metered. The OP seems to be asking about its redistribution unmetered and I cannot imagine anyone doing that. Until my recent move into a condo, I had dual energy. The heating was electric so long as the temperature stayed above -12 C and oil if below. I got a 20% discount on the power most of the time, but the rate tripled when it was below -12. My wife tried to avoid running the clothes dryer then. ---
**Author:** ![Dewey\_Finn](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/dewey_finn/32/4222_2.png) [@Dewey\_Finn](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dewey_Finn)\ **Post date:** [December 18, 2019, 3:09pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-future-of-community-power-grid-planning/845017/3 "2019-12-18T15:09:59Z")
The electricity and water in my apartment building are individually unmetered, so I have no particular incentives to take short showers, or to turn off lights in rooms not in use. (Although at my own expense, I’ve installed LED bulbs almost everywhere, so I use little power anyhow.) ---
**Author:** ![Chronos](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/chronos/32/134_2.png) [@Chronos](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Chronos)\ **Post date:** [December 18, 2019, 3:15pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-future-of-community-power-grid-planning/845017/4 "2019-12-18T15:15:58Z")
You seem to be assuming a simpler billing structure. But what the future actually holds is more complicated billing structures (but with computerized systems to handle that complexity). The price for energy will vary on a minute-to-minute basis, cheaper when the solar and wind plants are producing, and more expensive when they’re not (as well as changing based on demand), and many of your appliances will be programmed to run only (or at least, preferentially) when the price is low.