All ready have turned the heat on

[iheartmaytag]

Sounds like The Weather Channel to me.

Never watch Weather channel. Just a bunch of crazies that chase tornados to me. I live in Kansas, you hide from those thing.

I actually read the apocalyptic prediction from "Farmer's Almanac".

As for Winter--HATE it. I am not a cold person.

 

[gusherb]

Will have not run the A/C for a week tomorrow. Had the heat on Friday, Saturday and turned it off Sunday and then back on briefly today. Will probably be back to A/C by end of week.

 

[circlew]

Only about 60F here today, and mostly cloudy. Have not turned on heat yet, but have baked in the oven a couple times to help warm things up.

It's expected to get back up around 80 by Sat., which is good since I'm planning to go to my H.S. reunion that evening. It's supposed to be a cookout, so hope weather is nice.

I'm hoping it won't get very cold until at least the middle of Nov. I've GOT to get my insulation in before winter arrives.

 

[abcomatic]

Here too, turned on the heat last Monday.

 

[washdaddy]

Still have the AC on. But it only runs a couple of times a day briefly. Won't be much longer before I switch it off for the season. Probably around the first of the month. Than we'll see what happens with the temps.

Considering that we had such a mild summer this year I'm afraid to think what's going to happen this winter. It wouldn't surprise me in the least if we get nailed with a couple of good snow storms. Certainly don't want it. But you can't control the weather. OH WELL!

Just wrap up and try to stay warm!

 

[imperial70]

Ditto on the heat running here in MA. Plus I have my elderly mom with me and she really likes it in the mid 70's. It's gonna be a long winter. I upgraded my system and windows 10 years ago and that has helped tremendously.

 

[verizonbear]

I keep my house a crisp 60 degrees in the winter, I do have a heated floor in the bathroom, use an electric mattress pad and I have ventless gas fire place in the basement bar area I use when watching tv or having people over. I love the colder temps, but not too cold below 30 is little too much.

 

[joelippard]

Bah Humbug!  That bitter air can stay the hell away from here.  I despise having to wear long pants and bundlesome clothing.  The only thing I like about winter is Christmas!  My best friend can't wait for the cold air to arrive, he says I need to move to shady acres!

 

[mrsalvo]

I hope we get some rain this winter. S. Central Texas is very, very dry. Drought. We could use some badly needed rain. I hope its a wet winter.

 

[mark_wpduet]

It's been cool here a few mornings 40s/50s ...I'm more of an AC abuser but I made up for keeping the heat much lower than most people do in the winter ..I keep my ac on 71, so it runs a lot, even if it's not very hot. Not a lot of big trees in my subdivision. In the winter, I keep my heat on 65 and use electric blanket. For some reason, For me, I'm more comfortable if I'm too cold than if I'm too hot.

 

[twintubdexter]

Turned on the heat huh? It was 109/110 on Monday. A few degrees cooler today due to the swamp-like humidity from some storm swirling around off the Baja Coast. September is the last month of "reasonable" Summer rates from the power company. The heat is getting worse here every year. The phrase "it's a dry heat" no longer applies. Be grateful if you're experiencing an early "cool spell."

 

[arbilab]

Your electric goes DOWN in summer? Ours goes up. All the better to gouge you with my dear.

Week ago was record high 101F. 2 days later it was 57F at night (and this ain't the desert). No need heat on but did turn air off and got the blanket out.

Not to get too political but if this is what Algore was talking about a while back, have to conclude there might be something to it.

 

[whirlcool]

Electrical deregulation in Texas always has been a joke. When they first went to it the rates were about $.08 per Kwh. Soon afterwards the rates were north of $.18 per hour.Everyone was cashing in on the windfall and prices were skyrocketing.People complained but the regulators would just say "Hey! It's deregulation doing it's thing!" Finally after a few investigations into deregulated practices began the prices fell back down to about $.07-.09 per Kwh.

Now in Illinois when they deregulated their rates went from about $.12 or so to $.04-$.05 per Kwh. Why did theirs drop so dramatically when ours climbed sky high due to deregulation. Maybe the Illinois version of deregulation had some warnings in the law about profiteering?

 

[twintubdexter]

The "rate" goes down from June first thru end of September. You get X number of kilowatt hours at Tier #1 and then move on to the more expensive tiers. The electric bill is of course much higher in the summer. May, an Edison "winter" month, can be very hot here. October, the first winter month after summer is usually not all that hot, but the temps...they're a changin...somethins blowing in the wind (humidity and the stink from the dying Salton Sea.)

Every month I see another home or two in the area adding solar electricity. The price I was quoted for a 20 year lease for solar was about $300 more than I pay Edison per year. I don't like the idea of signing a long lease and would prefer to buy the system outright. Selling my home with a lease attached seems like it would create a liability considering many buyers are only here seasonally and avoid the heat as well as feeding power-hungry air conditioners. I'm curious as to what others think.

 

[arbilab]

The regulators would say "hey, gawd's will".

Electric in DFW, still a monopoly dictated by Oncor, the generator and distributor, just jumped from 11c to 13c. Two cents? Yeah but that shxt adds up when you multiply it by a thousand. Sure it's "deregulated" (sadistic snicker) but your 'choice' is who sends you the bill.

"Oncor" is a snide nickname for TXU-- what it always was but is now an 'encore' of what it was before-- and TXU is one of the 'choices' of billing entities. On paper, they are also bankrupt. Thence, I strongly suspect, is where the 2c/kWh goes.

OBTW, the utilities commission 'approved' (sadistic snicker) Oncor charging each of their customers $250 to re-fleet to "smart" meters. When else in the history of electricity did customers get a line-item bill for infrastructure?

Texas. We're number one. In corruption among many other undesireable things.

 

[petek]

Corruption you say... Ontario is far worse for that. I think we're paying the highest rates in N.America now. It's been one debacle after another with the provincial govt from closing down gas fired plants to garner votes and save legislature seats in one area and guaranteeing wind and solar firms outrageous amounts to purchase their power at more than the cost of what it's sold for.

 

[artcurus]

The regulators would say "hey, gawd's will".

Electric in DFW, still a monopoly dictated by Oncor, the generator and distributor, just jumped from 11c to 13c. Two cents? Yeah but that shxt adds up when you multiply it by a thousand. Sure it's "deregulated" (sadistic snicker) but your 'choice' is who sends you the bill.

"Oncor" is a snide nickname for TXU-- what it always was but is now an 'encore' of what it was before-- and TXU is one of the 'choices' of billing entities. On paper, they are also bankrupt. Thence, I strongly suspect, is where the 2c/kWh goes.

OBTW, the utilities commission 'approved' (sadistic snicker) Oncor charging each of their customers $250 to re-fleet to "smart" meters. When else in the history of electricity did customers get a line-item bill for infrastructure?

Texas. We're number one. In corruption among many other undesireable things.

========> Actually, no. Oncore primarily handles the "grid" side of the connection, the actual high voltage wiring and distribution itself. Oncore is who you call the connection fails at the weatherhead outside on the pole. Oncore is responsible to the meter, customer is responsible from the meter onward. TXU handles billing. Completely seperate entities.

In Ft. Davis, it's AEPS.

 

[whirlcool]

In Houston Centerpoint/Entergy is the carrier of the electricity. There are a bunch of "billing companies" to choose from. Two years ago we got $.0075 for a year, now we are up to $0.92 for this year. Combined with the American Standard system we installed in 2012 our biggest electric bill this year so far was $105.00. That's not bad at all.

 

[arbilab]

Er, um, well, this substantially cooler summer cost substantially more than last year in the same space with the same equipment and settings. Underzaggerated if anything, $15/month more. Typical 2013 high $75, typical 2014 $90. NOAA is not yet publishing statistics like comparative 100* days, just have to take my word it's fewer.

Yes I understand that Oncor is the new name for the generation/distribution arm of the former TXU which did that plus billing and the 'new TXU' only bills along with idunnohowmenny others. But Oncor sets the price of the product and the billing agents simply pass that along plus their own markup which varies marginally. I'm not billed through TXU anyhow, but Champion.

11c to 13c doesn't sound like much but it's 18 percent increase, rounded, same as the bill increase. Natural gas price-- what they usually blame rates on-- is NOT up 18%, scarcely at all. But in looking it up, I found that the delivered price of natgas is 3-4 times the market price. That's a helluva lotta wear and tear on 40yo pipes. But whaddya gonna do, burn weeds?

 

[Ultramatic]

NYC is positively balmy next to some of you guys...

 

 

We may hit a low of 52 tonight. No central heat is on yet. Just a space heater to chase away the chill. I like to sleep with the windows open in cool weather.