A good friend of mine just finished his 8.8 kW solar array construction project, and will be going live late today or sometime tomorrow. He lives in rural Stanislaus County, so his electric utility is Turlock Irrigation District.
He shared with me the contract between him and his wife and TID:
A monthly meter rental of $17.
Mandatory time-of-use metering for delivery and receipt of electricity. Part peak starts at 9PM during the summer, and off peak starts at midnight.
Demand charges for the highest delivery amount in any one 15-minute increment throughout the billing period. Summer demand charges are $2/kW and winter demand charges are $1.70/kW.
Monthly settlement of net electricity delivered or received.
I have never heard of residential users being assessed a demand charge from any utility until now.
My wife and I are in PG&E territory. Our meter rental is about $4.35/month. We can opt for either TOU rates or baseline rates. We use baseline as the summers are so incredibly hot, and the HVAC runs into the evenings. We have zero demand charges. We settle with PG&E annually, with a dollar-for-dollar credit at retail rates against our bill when our delivery of electricity exceeds our receipt of electricity for the billing period. Any excess generation for the year is calculated at about 4 cents/kWh and is a credit against our gas bill.
When the current scheme runs out in a couple of years, I wonder if the three largest public utilities will start gouging us with higher meter rentals, demand charges and monthly settlements, not to mention mandatory TOU.
Battery storage is looking better and better.
He shared with me the contract between him and his wife and TID:
A monthly meter rental of $17.
Mandatory time-of-use metering for delivery and receipt of electricity. Part peak starts at 9PM during the summer, and off peak starts at midnight.
Demand charges for the highest delivery amount in any one 15-minute increment throughout the billing period. Summer demand charges are $2/kW and winter demand charges are $1.70/kW.
Monthly settlement of net electricity delivered or received.
I have never heard of residential users being assessed a demand charge from any utility until now.
My wife and I are in PG&E territory. Our meter rental is about $4.35/month. We can opt for either TOU rates or baseline rates. We use baseline as the summers are so incredibly hot, and the HVAC runs into the evenings. We have zero demand charges. We settle with PG&E annually, with a dollar-for-dollar credit at retail rates against our bill when our delivery of electricity exceeds our receipt of electricity for the billing period. Any excess generation for the year is calculated at about 4 cents/kWh and is a credit against our gas bill.
When the current scheme runs out in a couple of years, I wonder if the three largest public utilities will start gouging us with higher meter rentals, demand charges and monthly settlements, not to mention mandatory TOU.
Battery storage is looking better and better.