Electricity Providers

[KC5AV]

I think I read on twitter earlier today where one of our Texas congress-critters is suggesting that it might be a good idea to make those plans illegal. I’ll see if I can find it.
There is it...from our former Speaker of the House. Not exactly a recommendation from an elected official.

[philip964]

I think I read on twitter earlier today where one of our Texas congress-critters is suggesting that it might be a good idea to make those plans illegal. I’ll see if I can find it.

https://www.businessinsider.com/texas-l ... ate-2021-2

Here is where the Republican Lt. Governor says I gambled and I lost. I have also read somewhere where they will make it illegal for consumers to buy wholesale. I stayed with Griddy. If they make Griddy illegal, I will not be able to make this loss back.

That is not how the free enterprise system works - Republicans.

Here is a copy of part of the Texas PUC order

“ERCOT has informed the Commission that energy prices across the system are clearing at less than $9,000, which is the current system-wide offer cap pursuant to 16 TAC §25.505(g)(6)(B). At various times today, energy prices across the system have been as low as approximately $1,200. The Commission believes this outcome is inconsistent with the fundamental design of the ERCOT market. Energy prices should reflect scarcity of the supply. If customer load is being shed, scarcity is at its maximum, and the market price for the energy needed to serve that load should also be at its highest. “

This is also not free enterprise this is illegally raising taxes.

Here is an energy trader that owns a mini generator and made so much money during the disaster that he feels so bad about it that he has donated $400,000 to a chef in Houston that has restaurants I can't afford to-go to's charity. He donated the extra $400,000 he made after the electric crisis passed on Thursday but the PUC did not remove the order till Friday morning as he must have felt extra guilty about that.

https://www.papercitymag.com/culture/ho ... adam-sinn/

[RoyGBiv]

I think I read on twitter earlier today where one of our Texas congress-critters is suggesting that it might be a good idea to make those plans illegal. I’ll see if I can find it.

https://www.businessinsider.com/texas-l ... ate-2021-2

Here is where the Republican Lt. Governor says I gambled and I lost. I have also read somewhere where they will make it illegal for consumers to buy wholesale. I stayed with Griddy. If they make Griddy illegal, I will not be able to make this loss back.

That is not how the free enterprise system works - Republicans.

Here is a copy of part of the Texas PUC order

“ERCOT has informed the Commission that energy prices across the system are clearing at less than $9,000, which is the current system-wide offer cap pursuant to 16 TAC §25.505(g)(6)(B). At various times today, energy prices across the system have been as low as approximately $1,200. The Commission believes this outcome is inconsistent with the fundamental design of the ERCOT market. Energy prices should reflect scarcity of the supply. If customer load is being shed, scarcity is at its maximum, and the market price for the energy needed to serve that load should also be at its highest. “

This is also not free enterprise this is illegally raising taxes.

Here is an energy trader that owns a mini generator and made so much money during the disaster that he feels so bad about it that he has donated $400,000 to a chef in Houston that has restaurants I can't afford to-go to's charity. He donated the extra $400,000 he made after the electric crisis passed on Thursday but the PUC did not remove the order till Friday morning as he must have felt extra guilty about that.

https://www.papercitymag.com/culture/ho ... adam-sinn/

Great story. Thanks for sharing.

[MaduroBU]

I was told by someone who went to the ERCOT site that Houston and Dallas had the most percentage of customers with outages.

Where as San Antonio or Austin for example had a much lower percentage of customers who went without power. So it may be Centerpoint and who ever it is in Dallas, said "hey we will take the fall for this, shut us off"

Or maybe if your trying to reduce big useage in a hurry its easier to flip a big switch than lots of small switches.

Governor is holding up bills for customers. I think a lot of small cheap electricity providers went bankrupt part way through all this (because they couldn't pass on the $9 rates to their customers or could not borrow money until their customers paid them), when they went out of business, their customers were thrown to the wolves. Their customers may not know at this point. In addition did any one read the fine print of the contracts they signed. It may be during an emergency you may not get the 12 or 15 cent electricity prices that were quoted. They may get to bump you to $9 like the Griddy customers did.

On Friday after the PUC order was removed electricity prices at about 10 am went from the artificial $9 a kwh to 2 cents a KWh because that was market at the time. Saturday I used 39.8 KWh and paid a total of 17 cents for power. Sunday I used 38.4 KWh and got paid 19 cents for using it.

The about 5 days last week cost me more than double my total yearly bill in 2020.

If I get any back, its going into a generator.

I live in Plano, just north of Dallas. My daughter is on a TXU plan and I am on Sparkenergy, out of Houston for my provider. Thank god we are both on fixed rate plans. We were both out for the majority of time on Monday and Tuesday. My son is in Pearland out near Houston and they were down two days. It makes sense that they would just kill the areas with highest number of users. Many areas out away from the suburbs had power the entire time.

I could never pay a 17K bill, even with a "payment plan", LOL... so your payment would be 500 a month for three years? They have to help these people. Yeah, they gambled some with variable rates but nobody expected it to be that kind of gamble. Maybe a nickle a KWh or something...but my gosh! Even a two thousand dollar bill would be crazy in a house.

Just understand, I gambled and agreed to a market rate and I am certainly willing pay that. However the PUC mandated a $9 rate for conservation purposes. I never agreed to pay an artificial mandated rate that the government set. As far as I am concerned I was given an illegal tax.

100% agree. If the market clearing rate is $1200/MWH, then that's what the price is. Setting a price "floor" (hard to call it a floor when the it's literally pegged to the ceiling) doesn't repair an artificial decrease in energy demand due to negative externalities. If they're saying that there are still rolling blackouts so demand is not yet reflected in the price, then it makes sense to fix the rolling blackouts. The PUC doesn't get to add $0.01 to the clearing price on ERCOT when a tree branch falls on a power line in West Texas and kills the electricity demand from Jim Bob's deer lease.

[03Lightningrocks]

I am not understanding how this whole thing works. It sounds completely off the walls. Maybe that is a good reason I never got involved in such a crazy situation.

You mentioned making up the loss. Maybe your bill did not jump as much as some but I see no way to make up for a bill even as high as 1000 dollars. My average bill for the whole year is only 120 a month. I would have to get free electricity for almost a year to break even.

Are you telling me you get 0 dollar bills on occasion?

[MaduroBU]

I am not understanding how this whole thing works. It sounds completely off the walls. Maybe that is a good reason I never got involved in such a crazy situation.

You mentioned making up the loss. Maybe your bill did not jump as much as some but I see no way to make up for a bill even as high as 1000 dollars. My average bill for the whole year is only 120 a month. I would have to get free electricity for almost a year to break even.

Are you telling me you get 0 dollar bills on occasion?

Power extremely cheap 99.9% of the time. Power is extremely expensive 0.1%. In a standard plan, you overpay a little 99.9% of the time to avoid the potentially brutal costs from the 0.1% of the time. In a market rate plan, you pay much less 99.9% of the time but are at the mercy of the market for the 0.1% of the time. The critical question is: can you mitigate the effects of the 0.1%? If you can, either with generation, drastically reduced usage, or a company that actively hedges (sort of a hybrid model), then you'll come out way ahead on a market rate plan. If you cannot mitigate the effects of those price spikes, then you're drastically better off with a fixed rate plan. As of today, Griddy has saved me about $500 over 2 years (was ~$650 on 2/1 and cost me about $150 extra for the month) because I can adapt my usage to the variable rates. YMMV.

[03Lightningrocks]

I am not understanding how this whole thing works. It sounds completely off the walls. Maybe that is a good reason I never got involved in such a crazy situation.

You mentioned making up the loss. Maybe your bill did not jump as much as some but I see no way to make up for a bill even as high as 1000 dollars. My average bill for the whole year is only 120 a month. I would have to get free electricity for almost a year to break even.

Are you telling me you get 0 dollar bills on occasion?

Power extremely cheap 99.9% of the time. Power is extremely expensive 0.1%. In a standard plan, you overpay a little 99.9% of the time to avoid the potentially brutal costs from the 0.1% of the time. In a market rate plan, you pay much less 99.9% of the time but are at the mercy of the market for the 0.1% of the time. The critical question is: can you mitigate the effects of the 0.1%? If you can, either with generation, drastically reduced usage, or a company that actively hedges (sort of a hybrid model), then you'll come out way ahead on a market rate plan. If you cannot mitigate the effects of those price spikes, then you're drastically better off with a fixed rate plan. As of today, Griddy has saved me about $500 over 2 years (was ~$650 on 2/1 and cost me about $150 extra for the month) because I can adapt my usage to the variable rates. YMMV.

So your bill actually only increased by 150 dollars? That is not so bad. Are the extremely high ones more the one off bills? They kind of made it sound like everyone was getting throttled for thousands of dollars. Thanks for explanation.

[srothstein]

So your bill actually only increased by 150 dollars? That is not so bad. Are the extremely high ones more the one off bills? They kind of made it sound like everyone was getting throttled for thousands of dollars. Thanks for explanation.

If you think about it, the extreme ones are definitely one-offs. The first rule is that only the unusual makes the news, so the reporters went looking for the highest they can find. They then repeat it over and over until it sounds common and people think it is a wide spread problem (kind of like how many school shootings there are).

Another way to look at it is to take a $15,000 bill (lower end of the extreme I heard about) and divide it out. Since the extreme rate was only in effect from Monday through Friday, we can estimate it at 4 days or 96 hours. That is $156.25 per hour for the whole time of the crisis. The rate went to 9$ per kilowatt-hour, which divided out says they were consuming 17.36 KWH for 96 hours straight. That is not a small home and reflects no effort to conserve energy at all, in my mind. Most people have whole house back up generators in the 10KW range, which is based on cutting some unused power if possible.

I know I am a bit of a snob (or reverse snob?) but I worry much more about the people whose bill went to $1,000 or so than the extremes like that. Of course, I have a moral outrage over the government price gouging like that when they criminally prosecute others for it. I am even more upset that the free market was working and set the top price much lower (around 2/KWH if I recall correctly) until PUC said we need to raise the rate higher artificially. I just don't have much sympathy for the people who got those extremely high bills.

[philip964]

https://www.mercurynews.com/2021/02/26/ ... -customers

Griddy shut off from grid by ERCOT.

[03Lightningrocks]

https://www.mercurynews.com/2021/02/26/ ... -customers

Griddy shut off from grid by ERCOT.

The jerks want me to pay to see the article. I can see from your comment what has happened. Does this mean you are automatically shifted to another provider?

[philip964]

https://www.mercurynews.com/2021/02/26/ ... -customers

Griddy shut off from grid by ERCOT.

The jerks want me to pay to see the article. I can see from your comment what has happened. Does this mean you are automatically shifted to another provider?

https://abc13.com/ercot-griddy-energy-h ... /10374198/

Free article.

So Governor says no one can be cut off for non payment. Power providers don’t get money from customers. Power providers don’t send money to ERCOT. ERCOT now owes 2 billion to power makers. Griddy owes 2 million to ERCOT. ERCOT decides Griddy will be first and so far only Power provider cut from grid. I am now I think moved to a provider of last resort to be over charged again.
Now I have no way of getting whole again. Thank you Republican government of Texas.

[MaduroBU]

Someone is selling me electricity right now, but I have no idea whom.

[RottenApple]

The jerks want me to pay to see the article. I can see from your comment what has happened. Does this mean you are automatically shifted to another provider?

Not saying it'll work in this case as I didn't test it, but a lot of the time if you put "outline.com/" (without the quotes) in front of the URL, it'll let you view it without the paywall. For example:

Paywall: https://www.dallasnews.com/news/2021/02 ... olice-say/

No Paywall: http://outline.com/dallasnews.com/news/ ... olice-say/

[03Lightningrocks]

I'll give it a try.

[philip964]

https://www.click2houston.com/consumer/ ... -business/

Which energy providers are in trouble. Energy Monger is on the list. Griddy is first gone. Others are saying ERCOT is in error.