OT: USA & Canada Electricity costs.

No geothermal in Hawaii?

Tim

A trifling amount, it's had problems with lava!

A writer, recently moved to the UK from Canada complains about how cold it is in England and how expensive the energy is. It's written in a humorous vein but you can feel his actual pain.

I thought Canada was cold and then I moved to England

Comparing it to the UK prices, we are being well and truly ripped off, even if you believe the Ofgen numbers.

We need to be drilling, fracking, and digging coal, while developing Nuclear power.

You can get a home delivery of Lava - if you are really unlucky.

It's interesting to read some of the early comments in that article alluding to the false view that the difference is in the humidity level. I'm afraid that although that is true of temperatures below zero Celsius, when the relative humidity hardly changes - it's basically zero

- it is much more important above zero Celsius.

Many years ago I spent several weeks in Toronto over Christmas and into January. The temperature varied, but when I went to Niagara it was

-25°C. Walking around northern Toronto (at the observatory), it was around -18. But, dressed properly, I never felt cold. And it really was cold - breathing in it felt like someone was spraying glue into your nose as the membranes froze. On my return to the UK, it was around +6 to

As you know, across Canada there are a huge range of temperatures and conditions (amongst other things I've done Thunder Bay in February at

-26 and Vancouver Island at +6 at the same time of year) but the common factor is well built, well insulated houses and affordable energy so that people can keep themselves warm, whatever the conditions outside. The disparity between the cost of energy and the price of energy here in the UK doesn't really help us.

Nick

I usually listen to half an hour of the morning Today programme on BBC R4, from 0600 onwards. When those that run businesses are interviewed in that section of the programme, many complain of the extraordinary high price of UK electricity, which puts them at a serious competitive disadvantage when compared to other countries. We have been promised cheap renewable electricity for twenty years and yet there’s no end in sight to the rip-off prices. About six months ago the CEO of a major energy retailer interviewed for the programme let the cat out of the bag by admitting that cheap renewables were for ’the medium to long term’ - in other words, forget about cheap electricity.

The forecast wind speed for the next three hours here is "50km/hr with gusts to 70km/hr". And there will be some amount of wind for the next 24 hours. Humidity 75%.

These are the temperatures right now across Canada.

"This hour's hot and cold spots ...

Hot spot in Canada: 10.1 °C 50.2 °F Cumshewa Island, BC Cold spot in Canada: -45.0 °C -49.0 °F Old Crow Airport, YT "

Old Crow is on the wedge of land on the upper left of Canada, at the top of the wedge. You have to zoom in on a map to see it.

Old Crow Airport provides year-round transportation to other communities. During winter time, a temporary winter road is sometimes built from Eagle Plains to transport freight into Old Crow; it is not annual, but only when a significant need arises such as a major building project.[15] "

And as a "dry" community, there is no liquor store. The only booze would be brought by the bootlegger.

Paul

Hardly suprising given 'every single room in the house – including the bathroom – has a small, plugged in, electric heater'.

Privatisation probably contributes to UK prices being higher, but it's one factor among many including fuel mix, infrastructure age, policy choices, and global market conditions.

It's certainly chilly there.

Power provided by diesel generators, and the diesel has to be flown in (no roads). Wonder why they don't have wind generation?

Probably for the best.

Are you claiming the industry is Nationalised in the US or that the USA is on a different planet?

Hint, neither are true.

It is due to crass stupidity.

What makes prices higher is eco-loon idiocy. Money is thrown at 'green' products by the government regardless of long term viability or cost to the consumer.

Blaming it on private industry is frankly disgusting: It is the Greens and the government that have made private industries supplying wind and solar power above the law, and a species more protected than those they routinely kill.

Renewable energy so called, is beyond antisocial. It is criminal.

As is anyone profiting by it, advocating it, or defending it.

Hmm. All the places where National Grid operates in the USA seem to be the 'expensive' areas ? :-(

Where does the National Grid operate in the US? >>

We own and operate electricity distribution networks in upstate New York and Massachusetts. We own and operate electricity transmission facilities across the Northeast; including upstate New York, Massachusetts, New Hampshire, and Vermont. We own and operate gas distribution networks across the Northeastern US. <<

Guess where National Grid also operate ?

Err, no. Whatever coal we have is under important stuff likes roads, houses, hospitals and factories. We have limited easily accessible coal deposits

Apart from which coal can be mined in Oz and shipped half way round the world to the UK and landed at about a third of the cost of deep mining it here.

Do you *really* want Scargill and others back in charge of energy policy ?.