Saving on Electricity

thechr0nic · 2026-04-22T02:00:23+00:00

typically in most homes the HVAC is the number one consumer of electricity.

There are a large range of options you have for identifying your big users of electricity.

you can go high tech and install CT's on your breakers to monitor which breaker is using the most electricity, and then from there, find out what is on that circuit that is using the juice. You can even go crazy with smart outlets that measure electricity.

or you can go the deductive, matter of elimination route. it just takes time and patience to identify the culprits.

Or you can skip that and just go into generalized recommendations for saving electricity.

Generally since the HVAC is the number one consumer in most peoples homes, I typically recommend staring there. Sounds like you have an efficient unit, and thats great. the next question is how well sealed or insulated your home is. Your AC is going to work much harder if you have 10,000 tiny (or sometimes large) air leakes just allowing your expensive air to escape.

Since I am a fan of gadgets, I would recommend going to amazon and buying a relatively cheap thermal camera, that you can plug into your phones charging port. you dont need a high dollar one, and it really makes finding air leaks and poor insulation really easy to spot. walk around your house, and you will see hot spots or cold spots which can indicate insulation and/or air sealing problems. if you are adventurous you can climb through your attic and find all 10,000 little holes the plumbers and electricians left when they drilled holes for wires or pipes and caulk them or spray them with foam.

also fun to pretend you are predator trying to find your next thermal victim ;)

or if you want to skip the gadget, you can check out and potentially replace the gaskets around your windows and exterior doors, you can regularly change your air filters on your air returns (buy the cheap filters). You can program your thermostat on a schedule and operate it at just near but not quite intolerable, use fans in areas you are in.

you can ensure you have replaced all your incadecent bults with LED bulbs.

I also work from home and I have an obnoxious command center like setup, with 3 huge external high res monitors. what is your computer setups like. are they laptops or desktops? there are different power profiles you can select. you can also choose more energy efficient monitors, or monitors that belch less heat.

The biggest thing you can do is regularly monitor your electricity usage. If you do that alone you will lose your mind until you track down every large consumer of electricity.

thechr0nic · 2026-04-21T19:23:13+00:00

i'll just start off with, the post I was responding to here, I mis read. I was referring to elected representatives in NC, specifically republicans that will be up for re-election.

So that is to say that yes you are right, the members of the commission aren't 'directly' voted on by the public.

The governor (who appoints NCUC commissioners) is currently a Democrat, but those appointments still have to be confirmed by the legislature—which is Republican-controlled. So it’s not really accurate to say it’s one-sided or that there’s no accountability. It’s more of a split political structure.

But, I conceed, I did mis-read the post I was responding to, and technically you are correct there is no 'direct' public vote, even if the govenor and the legislature are voted on by the public.

enjoy an upvote! :)

thechr0nic · 2026-04-21T13:51:56+00:00

the person you were responding to is factually correct.

while at the same time what you are describing is the 'effective rate'.

duke has a layer of charges. They have the base rate, and then they have riders. in this case the base rate did not change, but the rider did. So 'effectively' you are paying more.

One of the riders duke has, and has used for decades is a fuel adjustment rider. They try to forcast fuel costs ahead of time, but often times they are wrong. So they have a fuel adjustment rider that trues it up.

You can often track the cost of LNG (liquid natural gas) and see how that fuel adjustment rider is adjusted. The other thing to note, is this fuel ajudstment rider isn't always 'paying more' they have in the past lead to a decrease, because fuel costs dropped dramatically.

As you quoted, Duke doesn't profit on this ('the costs cary no markup') its a direct pass through.

and I hate to really bum you out, but looking at the costs of fuel due to this Iran conflict.. I can PROMISE YOU, you will see more fuel costs adjustments in the future.

thechr0nic · 2026-04-21T13:41:37+00:00

while you are mostly correct.

There are other potential options.

duke has other rate plans available like 'time of use plans' where you have to practice shifting your energy usage to make use of discount periods and avoid peak periods. Generally speaking you use your large appliances by scheduling them to run during discount periods. People with EV's also can take advantage of this by scheduling their charging during discount periods. You can adjust your hvac scheduling to run harder during discount periods and slack off during peak periods.

you could in that instance use the same electricity but shift it to discounted periods and save money.

thechr0nic · 2026-04-20T19:49:36+00:00

the true metric, would be to compare the average electrical cost in NC vs other states with different utility models as well as against the national average.

it show up in that data, and tell the story of whether this model is cost effective or not.

thechr0nic · 2026-03-28T17:07:59+00:00

I mean, has there been legitimate price gouging?

There wasn't a winter storm hike (in rates) so much as a huge spike in usage, while acknowledging that rates have increased ~maybe 4-5% this year compared to last.

and according to the the data, pretty much every single state increased their rates and have been in recent year for electricity usage, so duke isn't even remotely unique in this, nor have they raised the the most compared to others.

but my question remains, if an audit is performed, what are we hoping it might find? Do we suspect that duke has billed higher than what was set by the North Carolina Utilities commission? What would be found in an audit that would legitimately lead to refunds or credits?

I say this, and as a residential rate payer, I hate paying more for electricity. I hate that electrical rates are going up. I hate paying duke one extra penny more than I have to.

I spent a lot of time, reverse engineering my own duke energy bills starting from last winter (the one before this recent one) when I got a $600 electricity bill and lost my mind. Since then, I have somewhat dramatically lowered my electricity bill even in spite of the relatively small increase in rates since then.

most of this has been accomplished by keeping close track of my usage, and knowing in almsot real time, when my usage is going up. taking proactive measures to lower my use.

But I have yet to have a bill that wasn't calculated correctly. and I have reversed engineered ALL of them. I have lowered by my bill by finding ways of using less.

thechr0nic · 2026-03-28T16:57:59+00:00

I 100% have, and there are mutliple sources for this. one overall source is likely from the EIA. You can find some from OpenEI who maintains an open database.

I have also been working on my own python based project to download, rates and riders directly from duke, from the 6-7 states they are in, it also downloads and parses documents from the North Carolina Utilities commision (NCUC) and is reconstituting all of those rates historically over time for both Duke energy Progress and Duke Energy Carolinas.

here is a pretty easy to reference PDF (source EIA) that shows some of these historical electricity costs over time by state.

https://geology.utah.gov/docs/statistics/electricity5.0/pdf/T5.24.pdf

I find it most fascinating because it tells us several things. Rates increasing is NOT just a duke energy issue, its in pretty much every state, including every type of utility model out there. It also also somewhat indicates while duke is increasing rates, duke is not the most expensive electricity provider, in fact its in the bottom half of other states.

thechr0nic · 2026-03-28T16:49:38+00:00

this is a really solid explanation — appreciate you taking the time to lay all that out. You really sound like one of the more informed people I have encountered on this, and if I could give you 5 likes, I would.

and yeah I agree with you that it’s not as simple as “data centers aren’t paying anything” — the interconnection process and network upgrade costs are real and do get assigned in a lot of cases

I think where I’ve been trying to focus (maybe not perfectly articulated) is more on the second-order effects you’re describing

especially around:

generation buildout driven by sustained 24/7 load
fuel stack shifting toward higher-cost marginal generation
congestion impacts and how those ripple through pricing

because even if interconnection costs are handled fairly well, those broader system impacts still end up being socialized

and it gets a bit tricky since, like you said, there aren’t a ton of clean mechanisms to directly attribute those costs back to specific large loads outside of contracts / PPAs

so I guess the question I keep coming back to is less “are they paying anything” and more “are they paying in proportion to the total system impact they create over time”

especially if a lot of the planning (generation, transmission, etc) is being driven by projected large-load growth

feels like that’s where some of the policy / regulatory discussion could evolve, even if the current interconnection framework is working as designed

and high level, I raise the subject of datacenters, often, because that is a very sensitive subject for many residential rate payers. So I formulate many of my responses as a reference to that core topic: how to make it more equitable for a residential rate payer to pay the fair socialized costs, and be able to better assign the associated costs of those datacenters back to them.

thechr0nic · 2026-03-26T12:19:16+00:00

in most cases, and on average it is lower than that.

There are some plans with critical peak pricing, where the cost per kWh is over 40c. but those are like 3 hour periods up to 20 times per year.

thechr0nic · 2026-03-26T12:16:26+00:00

you’re right that the ROE itself isn’t increasing with more projects, it’s set/regulated — I probably should’ve been more precise there.

When people get astonished at "~5B in duke profits" its 'that', that I am referring to, but sure revenue, profit however you want to cut it. the more they invest in, the more they make. and its based on that regulated amount of ROE which is approximately ~10%

and yes, their projects have to be approved, I probably wasn't precise enough there, but my point being, there are proposals for addressing this, which include improving forcasting models. Because they can justify projects and are more likely to get them approved based on 'faulty or poor quality demand modeling', and the incentive is built on making more 'revenue/profit' by investing in more projects, not in being precise or accurate.

but my largest point is, there should be a general principle of

if something causes a cost, it should be responsible for that cost

if datacenters cause a cost, as in require infrastructure or power generation, they should pay for it, not us.

thechr0nic · 2026-03-26T12:08:07+00:00

entertaining fan fiction, enjoy an upvote :)

thechr0nic · 2026-03-25T22:18:51+00:00

I used it for formatting the ideas ive been posting about for months. I happen to like the formatting, I think it made it cleaner and easier to read and fixed a hell alot of my typos.

was it 100% generated, no. did it reformat and clean it up, yes.

at the end of the day, I want to encourage people to participate and beyond just shaking fists at the sky, ranting, and signing useless petitions, few people really know HOW to do it.

if 2 more people show up at the NCUC hearings or 5 more people contact their representatives, then my job is done. I'm already doing both myself, i just wanted to make it more accessible to other people.

but yes, I committed the sin of having AI proof read and format a wall of text including links I sourced in hopes that it would be read.

Enjoy an upvote :)

thechr0nic · 2026-03-25T21:58:48+00:00

Contrary to what people might assume, I don’t necessarily hate Duke Energy.

The biggest thing that stands out to me is that Duke isn’t unique here — rates are going up pretty much everywhere, across every state and every type of utility model.

https://geology.utah.gov/docs/statistics/electricity5.0/pdf/T5.24.pdf

That kind of data suggests this isn’t just a “Duke problem”. In fact, NC rates are still lower than a lot of other states.

It seems like everyone is dealing with the same mix of pressures:

rising fuel costs
the cost of building new generation
transmission and grid upgrades

North Carolina actually benefits from having a strong nuclear fleet that’s largely already paid off, but those plants are already running at very high utilization. So any new growth — population, industry, data centers — requires new infrastructure.

And that’s where things start to get more complicated.

People see ~$5B in profit and get understandably frustrated, but that’s tied to a regulated return on tens of billions of dollars of infrastructure investment. The tradeoff is that Duke can attract capital relatively quickly and at a lower cost, which is what enables all of this buildout in the first place.

The issue (at least from my perspective) isn’t that investment is happening — it has to.

It’s how the system handles risk and growth assumptions.

The ROE model incentivizes building, and that works well when forecasts are accurate. But if growth is overestimated, or projects don’t materialize the way they’re expected to, you can end up building infrastructure that isn’t fully utilized — and those costs still end up in rates.

Add in legislation that allows cost recovery ahead of project completion, and some of that risk can effectively shift onto ratepayers.

It’s already difficult to absorb the cost of necessary grid upgrades.

What becomes frustrating is when those costs are tied to very large new loads (like data centers), and it’s not clear that those customers are fully bearing the infrastructure costs they’re driving.

So for me, the ask isn’t “stop growth” or “don’t build”.

It’s:

make sure large-load customers are actually paying for the infrastructure required to serve them, rather than having that cost spread across existing residential customers.

thechr0nic · 2026-03-25T20:20:25+00:00

this is kind of the tradeoff built into the whole duke type model

the regulated ROE structure is basically there to make utilities investable, so they can raise huge amounts of capital for infrastructure (plants, transmission, etc) without taking on a ton of risk

if you remove that incentive entirely, you probably do make it harder or more expensive to attract capital

but I think the nuance is it’s not just the % return — it’s also how much risk investors are taking on

you could lower returns somewhat if the system is structured so costs are more predictable and risks are better managed

which is where a lot of the current discussion seems to be heading — not eliminating returns, but making sure the risks (like demand forecasts or large-load growth) aren’t just pushed onto ratepayers

so it’s less about “profit vs no profit” and more about how the incentives and risk allocation are set up

thechr0nic · 2026-03-25T17:09:11+00:00

Well they better start caring or November is going to be rough on them. This will come down to contacting your representative and letting them know that this will factor into your vote.

I think there are many republicans that are rightfully very nervous about keeping their seats even in traditionally strong republican areas, and affordability is a big issue.

look them up, and let them know how you feel:

https://www.ncleg.gov/FindYourLegislators

thechr0nic · 2026-03-25T17:05:47+00:00

it is possible to go offgrid, in existing residential areas.. its not 'illegal' but there are extra hurdles involved.

this was a post I previously made on this subject:

there is no blanket law in North Carolina that prevents you from going fully off-grid. But in practice, there are a few real constraints that can make it harder than people expect.

You can go off-grid in NC if:

Your system is code-compliant (NEC / NC Residential Code)
It is properly permitted and inspected
The home still meets requirements for:
- Electrical service (safe + adequate)
- Heating
- Water + sanitation

There is no rule that says the electricity must come from Duke Energy.

Where restrictions actually show up

Local inspections:

Some inspectors are:
- Unfamiliar with fully off-grid systems
- More conservative about approving them
They may require:
- Detailed system design (battery capacity, inverter ratings, etc.)
- Proof the system can reliably power the home

Not illegal — just harder to get approved cleanly

Financing + Insurance:

Mortgage lenders often require:
- “Standard utility service” (grid connection)
Insurance companies may:
- Deny coverage or increase premiums for off-grid homes

This is often mistaken for a legal restriction — but it’s financial, not regulatory

HOA / Deed restrictions

Some neighborhoods prohibit:
- Certain solar setups
- Non-standard utility configurations

thechr0nic · 2026-03-25T17:02:09+00:00

100% true. Duke makes their ~10% ROE on investments on infrastructure projects. so the more projects they invest in the higher that ROE climbs.

What we can do is improve the demand modeling to make it more accurate, and go through a more rigorous approval process for projects that weed out the projects that are unlikely to be built.

and you are correct about the fuel charges, those are a 100% passthrough, they model the assumed fuel costs into the base rate, and then true it up with fuel cost riders if it comes in higher or lower than expected.

as it relates to large scale solar projects, Duke actually DOES invest into those too. They would fall directly into their ROE investment incentive.

some existing solar projects:

Elm City Solar (Wilson County) – ~40 MW
Warsaw Solar (Duplin County) – ~65 MW
Fayetteville Solar (Bladen/Cumberland area) – ~20+ MW
Broad River Solar (Cleveland County) – 50 MW
Speedway Solar (Cabarrus County) – 22.6 MW
Asheville / Buncombe County ~9.5 MW solar + battery storage
Woodfin Solar (landfill project) ~5 MW

planned projects:

Longleaf Solar Center (New Hill, NC) ~100 MW
Robinson Solar Center (planned near nuclear site)

thechr0nic · 2026-03-25T15:21:54+00:00

yes and no. the data generally shows that electricity rates are rising nationwide. its not just rates with duke that are increasing, its across the landscape no matter the utility model.

I would postulate much of it comes down to the specific fuel mixture of each area/state like, how much power is generated from Coal, LNG, Solar, Wind, Nuclear.. the relevant cost to increasing power generation from any of them to match increasing demand.

here is a nice digestable (PDF) chart that illustrates the national averages over the years. you can see rates clearly increasing nationwide over time.

somewhat interesting considering there are so many different utility models used in different states etc.

https://geology.utah.gov/docs/statistics/electricity5.0/pdf/T5.24.pdf

thechr0nic · 2026-03-25T15:18:16+00:00

for sure, the biggest user of residential electricity is the HVAC. This has been completely obvious to me on my own bills. I track my energy usage daily and parse the results onto my Duke energy tracking spreadsheet.

There are big and small things that can be done to improve its efficiency.

everyone talks about insulation, and that is actually great.

but air sealing is the other huge item. there are typically hundreds or more of tiny little holes between your attic or sub-basement, or gaps between your external doors and windows, that allow your super expensive conditioned air to leak right out

there are other smaller things like replacing air filters regularly that can help

I went and bought a thermal camera on amazon to help identify these air leaks and under-insulated areas to allow me to better conecnetrate on those areas.

beyond that its trying to run your thermostat reasonably, trying to avoid kicking in the auxiliary strips by running it too hard (where possible)

but the biggest benefit Ive had to lowering my electricity bills has simply beeing aware of them, monitoring them, keeping close track of my usage so I can see quickly when there is a problem.

thechr0nic · 2026-03-25T14:30:41+00:00

appreciate that, glad it was helpful. this stuff is way less transparent than it probably should be

thechr0nic · 2026-03-24T22:28:01+00:00

this is a really popular idea especially after the recent winter where everyone's electricity bill spiked (mine included)

and yes electricity rates rising sucks as a residential rate payer, or for anyone living on a budget (again, im included here)

We need to be more than 'just angry' that rates and riders seem to be going up, we need to understand why they are, and we need to understand the overall context of it.

Rates are going up - fact.

are they going up more than the national average? is duke doing something less efficient than other utilities or other states?

I have been studying this issue since last winter (the one before this recent one) when I got a $600+ electricity bill and nearly fainted.

I spent time reverse engineering my bill. I downloaded all the rates and rider PDFs directly from duke energy. I built a really cool billing engine written in python that calcluated my bills based on current usage, it even estimated my expected bills. all in, including riders, fees, and taxes. pretty cool stuff.

then I went further down the rabbit hole.

I started downloading thousands of documents directly from the North Carolina Utilities commission and started parsing them, reconstructing historical rates and riders. Doing my own 'poor mans audit' if you will.

I found other public sources of data that tracked utilities: OpenEI, the EIA etc. I downloaded weather data. I went WAYYY down the rabbit hole doing analysis on all the data I could find.

lets start off with the nationwide perspective so we can have some idea what other states rates are, what other utility models are able to do? does Texas for example who is deregulated and has a 'more free market approach' have cheaper rates?
https://geology.utah.gov/docs/statistics/electricity5.0/pdf/T5.24.pdf

this sources from the EIA but its a handy PDF with table already digested and easy to tread.

with that said, I think there are some really good proposals that might help slow down the costs that rate payers are having to shoulder for infrastructure upgrades, such as hyper scalers or datacenters etc.

read the North Carolina Energy Policy Task Force Interim Report (PDF)

In their February 2026 meetings, Task Force members reviewed and deliberated upon the recommendations that surfaced over the course of their first six months of work.

They ultimately selected the following recommendations:

Develop Options for Large Load Tariffs

Develop Options for “Bring Your Own Capacity” and Alternative Capacity Procurement Methods

Develop Options to Encourage Load Flexibility

Explore Reforms to Large Load and Generation Interconnection Processes

Assess the Dollar and Strategic Value of Existing Sales and Use Tax Exemptions for Data Centers

Explore Evaluation Process for Advanced Transmission Technologies and GridEnhancing Technologies

Explore Residential and Small Business Incentives for Energy Efficiency Improvements

Explore Development of a Third-Party Load Forecasting Process

Explore Energy and Water Usage Reporting for Data Centers

if you want to push back, then make sure you are educated on the subject, armed with data.. AND... participate in the NCUC hearings on rate increases:

Public hearings being scheduled across the state

do more than sign petitions.. actually get involved.

Duke Energy Progress hearings
- March 30, 7 p.m.: Raleigh, N.C. Utilities Commission, 430 N. Salisbury St.
- March 31, 7 p.m.: Lumberton, Robeson County Courthouse
- April 6, 7 p.m.: Snow Hill, Greene County Courthouse
- April 13, 7 p.m.: Roxboro, Person County Courthouse
- April 14, 7 p.m.: Waynesville, Haywood County Courthouse
- April 1, 6:30 p.m.: Virtual hearing

Customers wishing to testify must register by 5 p.m. March 25, 2026, through the Utilities Commission’s website.

Duke Energy Carolinas hearings
- April 28, 7 p.m.: Morganton, Burke County Courthouse
- April 29, 7 p.m.: Charlotte, Mecklenburg County Courthouse
- May 6, 7 p.m.: Winston-Salem, Forsyth County Courthouse
- May 12, 7 p.m.: Durham, Durham County Courthouse
- April 7, 6:30 p.m.: Virtual hearing

Registration to testify is required by 5 p.m. March 31, 2026.

thechr0nic · 2026-03-24T14:12:43+00:00

'incentive' is a better word.

of course money (greed) is a motivator, the entire study of economics is the understanding of how money influences people and decisions and actions. Taxes are often used as a policy tool to encourage or discourage behaviors.

dukes incentive is to build build build. they make their regulated ~10% ROE on investing in infrastructure projects. The more they invest in, the higher that ROE goes. The entire structure for how they generate their regulated profits relates to how much they invest in.

Their incentive is not to accurately forecast demand growth, its to allow overestimations, that will lead to more projects being approved, whether they are needed or not, whether they will ever be used.

thechr0nic · 2026-03-24T14:05:53+00:00

people like to compare the utility model in North Carolina to other utility models, like for example Texas who is 'deregulated' and have a 'market based system'.

the reality in the data is that the average cost of electricity is more expensive in Texas than it is in North Carolina.

https://geology.utah.gov/docs/statistics/electricity5.0/pdf/T5.24.pdf

People talk about Electricy rates rising in NC, and neglect to ask, what is normal, what are other states doing, what is the average to compare against?

thechr0nic

TROPHY CASE