Welcome to General Chat - GAW Community Area
This General Chat area started off as a place for people to talk about things that are off topic, however it has quickly evolved into a community and has become an integral part of the GAW experience for many of us.
Based on its evolving needs and plenty of user feedback, we are trying to bring some order and institute some rules. Please make sure you read these rules and participate in the spirit of this community.
Rules for General Chat
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Be respectful to each other. This is of utmost importance, and comments may be removed if deemed not respectful.
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Avoid long drawn out arguments. This should be a place to relax, not to waste your time needlessly.
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Personal anecdotes, puzzles, cute pics/clips - everything welcome
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Please do not spam at the top level. If you have a lot to post each day, try and post them all together in one top level comment
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Try keep things light. If you are bringing in deep stuff, try not to go overboard.
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Things that are clearly on-topic for this board should be posted as a separate post and not here (except if you are new and still getting the feel of this place)
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If you find people violating these rules, deport them rather than start a argument here.
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Feel free to give feedback as these rules are expected to keep evolving
In short, imagine this thread to be a local community hall where we all gather and chat daily. Please be respectful to others in the same way
Are consumers getting higher electric bills because utilities are selling to AI guys first? Is AI driving up energy prices for regular consumers? Shouldn't we be protected from that?
What caused my electric bill to increase 30% over last summer's bills?
The one thing I am pretty certain of is that AI pays much less per kWh that us consumers. It doesn't really matter when the AI training is done, so it makes sense to run overnight when electricity is cheap. They could pause some processing when electricity is expensive. Opportunistic loads like that should help stabilize the grid.
Has your electric meter been replaced with a "more accurate" electronic version?
Has the price per kWh gone up? The bills from my electric company are very obfuscated. I had to add up the "electricity" cost, the fuel surcharge, and then add city, county, and state taxes to all of that.
Has the base service charge gone up? While a 30% increase in the base charge could happen, that wouldn't increase the whole bill by 30%.
The amount of energy used by an air conditioner should be somewhat proportional to the Cooling Degree Days for your location.
Great questions. 👍
I'll have to get my bill and do some figuring. (Oh no! Math on a holiday weekend!)
Have raised the thermostat in an effort to curb cooling costs. And no, I refused the "smart" meter so don't have that, unless they installed without my consent. Hmmm Wonder if they impose a penalty or surcharge on people like me.
Thanks for your comment.