“using a programmable thermostat to heat your house only when you are home.”

Huh? … Sure, I’ll remove the thermostat and replace it with a manual one.

How about changing the program instead?

Come on BC Hydro, this is BC (hence your name). We have winter here that you probably should have noticed and planned for. We’ve made it through other harsher winters without there being a shortage in power. Maybe you should stop sending power to the States and keep it here for us, who are paying for it.

One more. Do not cook at home if you have an electric range. Go out to eat and save money …. ;-)

So where is Fortis in all of this?

Is there a run on pellets?

Is it -40C yet?

You know we are getting into the 6 darkest weeks of the year. We like to see what we are doing when it is dark.

Pretty hard to reprogram our thermostats in the dark ;)

I think this is all hype to help BC Hydro justify the coming rate increases we will be facing in April, and defer our attention away from the fact that had the present adn prior CEO’s done their jobs properly,not been neligent, and or stupid, ( pick one, or all) instead of just writing themselves huge checks, we wouldn’t be in quite as bad a spot.

Bc hydro.. This isn’t cold weather.. This is around the average we get.. Don’t talk to us like we are stupid please.. As bc racer said.. You are just trying to use this as an excuse to make the ridiculous rate increases seem warranted. Shut off all the power to the states, pay execs no more than $150.000 with no bonuses or golden retirement packages, make rio tinto pay fare market value and lower our rates back to 5 yrs ago.

I use wood for heat, so I just smile when hydro or gas rates go up.:)

I use wood for heat, so I just smile when hydro or gas rates go up.:)

Give more .. So you are nice and warm in the dark..lol

And the rest of us appreciate your empathy, and thanks for polluting our air by driving to get wood, paying for gas there and back, gas for your chain saw etc.. All contributing to air pollution… But at least your warm.

Bounce should come out with a fabric softener “wood smoke smell” for those of us without wood heat.

Candles are cool……I mean warm and make the place cozy too. Programmable thermostats don’t save you that much if any at all. Once your house is at temperature X it takes just as much energy to keep it there as it does to have it go up and down when you aren’t there!

The new generation wood stoves have very low emissions and are sealed units so there’s no wood smoke smell. If hydro is going to increase its rates 25% like they say! then I say its time to buy a new wood stove. I just bought a new insert for my fireplace and I love it.

BC Hydro has helped a lot of ignorant people lower their bills, I lowered mine by 60% with little effort.

I love my smart meter. I can actually see the amount I am saving by making changes, primarily to lights, but also to better quality appliances.

I am consistently lower than tier 2 level and consistently lower by about 40% than other houses in the area.

My electricity bills are actually down by 40% or so over say 5 years ago.

Eating out is the only way i could reduce farther (ha ha), and maybe a platinum power supply.

I see the gas companies are getting in on this gouge the peopel thing again as well..
over the last few days there has been between a 10 and 15 cent a liter increase in gas…

Yes, some people still think most of us use old steel barrels converted into woodstoves to heat our homes. They have no clue about the advances in burning technology that have some wood burning stoves virtually emission free. And not everyone has to drive miles and miles for firewood, especially with all the beetle kill around now. Save your condemnation for those in the city who burn wood in their old fireplaces, now those do pollute since they have no mechanism in place to burn the gases before they go out the pipe. It is too bad those people didn’t realize just how inefficient those are and that they actually pull warm air out of your house when burning.

Where did Hydro say they have a problem? Just tips on reducing usage at home.

We are not at War, so we don’t have Rationing of Hydro, so Hydro screw off with all the Power smart talk. All you want to do is charge more for the same, like Tier 1 and
Tier 2 pricing for the same KWH, yes I do heat with Hydro , that is what you pushed in the Days I build this House, no Gas Line going by my Place ,so that is out but I do have Wood on my own Land to use if I feel like it! I like the once who talk Conservation of Resources than drive a Monster Pickup and fly twice a Year to somewhere!

Hydro is run by the government of the day which have used it as a piggy bank with little regard for the future. Hydro is forced by the fiberals to use very expensive IPP power before their own much less expensive power.

There’s your cost increase, 52 billion of IPP LIABILITY.

Lighten up folks. Rate increases aside, we should all be less wasteful. Don’t let your pride prevent you from doing the right thing. Good habits to get into before the big price jump. I’ve manage to whittle my Hydro bill down to $30/month

Wood stove can heat your home when the hydro goes out.
metalman.

I recently read that Hydro rates in Ontario were going to go up by 42% over the next 5 years. Now I read that are Ontario homeowners face a 33-per-cent hike in electricity rates over the next three years. Apparently this is lower than the previous government forecast!

So, 33% over 3 years, 42% over 5 years?? I wonder if they will build another nuclear power plant in Ontario??

Looks like we are all getting hit with higher energy cost! I suspect that it will just get worse!

“The highest peak demand on record was Nov. 29, 2006, when consumption reached 10,113 megawatt, between 5 and 6 p.m.”

I did some checking and here is the temperatures for November 29, 2006.

http://www.almanac.com/weather/history/BC/Prince%20George/2006-11-29

-33.3 degrees celsius with a high of -22 celsius, twice as cold as our current temperatures of -14 low and -11 for a high. In fact the coldest it has gotten so far this winter was -24 celsius.

If BC Hydro posts hydro consumption higher than, or comparable, to November 29, 2006, I call smart meter BS… or are these metres doing exactly what they are designed to do… skimming money for BC Hydro’s / Lib-Con Government’s pockets?

Long term weather forecast is calling for below historical average temperatures for pretty much all of December. Brrr!

Yeah right HG, normal winter weather between -10 to -15 for the next two weeks, and then a warming trend. Those temperatures are perfectly normal, and are projected temperatures according to the Weather Network’s long term forecast for December.

Don’t worry HG, I will be posting a comment about how balmy the weather is before the month of December is over… oh right on December 1st it was +3 degrees celsius, just three days ago… hmm… funny how the weather temperatures are fluctuating so wildly over the past few years, as predicted by climate scientists.

Here is something interesting in the news today:

http://www.edmontonsun.com/2013/12/04/arctics-peregrine-falcons-suffering-heavy-rains-warmer-summers-research

I think BC Hydro should be releasing it’s megawatt consumption rates on a daily basis so we are able to compare it to historic temperatures.

Temperatures are a big factor in the consumption of hydro, but not the only factor. I find it strange that with all the more energy efficient technologies we use today, like LED lights, and more efficient technology in heating systems for our homes, more efficient appliances, etc. we are still up there on total megawatt consumption with lower annual winter temperatures.

Let’s see some transparency from BC Hydro!!!

Accuweather projection for December shows daily low temperatures being below the historical average temperatures for 22 of the remaining 27 days of December. The remaining 5 days are projected to be only a few degrees warmer than the historical average! There is no projection for above freezing temperatures for the entire month of December. Nothing balmy there!

http://www.accuweather.com/en/ca/prince-george/v2m/december-weather/47164

Hmmm, People#1, increased consumption couldn’t and wouldn’t have anything to do with you owning 2 (TWO) computers, would it??

People with population increase all the new electronics over the last twenty years and appliances and devices not really off when off consumption up.

Too bad you don’t check facts I give you. Even the IPPC ACKNOWLEDGES no warming for the last 17 years.

The US HAS just broken 1000 low temperature, snowy records. Oh right you warmers say low temperatures is only weather and high temperature is climate change, global warming, climate disruption or whatever. http://joannenova.com.au/2013/12/more-than-1000-cold-snowy-records-set-in-us-one-small-media-outlet-covers-it/

Welp, found out the November 29, 2006 peak hydro consumption is for the entire province:

2006/2007
Nov. 29 2006
10113 peak hour consumption
214274
-11.1 to 0.3 mean BC temperature

Taken from page 3 of the following 3 page BC Hydro report.

http://transmission.bchydro.com/nr/rdonlyres/c0da41d3-7dea-4f77-89f8-72d2e3448107/0/7t06.pdf

Obviously, when the temperature drops below freezing in the lower mainland, record power consumption levels will be set!

The information in this article is completely useless when it comes to determining local hydro consumption peak loads.

I wonder how much business and industry contributes to hydro load consumption? Would be nice to have BC Hydro report out on load consumption on a daily basis with a break-out of residential consumption compared to industrial consumption!

To quote Gus:

I am consistently lower than tier 2 level and consistently lower by about 40% than other houses in the area.
===========================================

Wind up radios…shower in cold water…battery powered candles…free wifi at starbucks…

I find it hard to believe anyone can stay under tier 2 unless they are living like hermits…..

@ seamut;

“Joanne Nova aka JoNova (real name Joanne Codling), born circa 1967, is an Australian right wing communicator who mainly writes to promote anti-science views of climate in books and a denialist weblog, joannenova.com.au. She has no evident academic background in climate science; her degree (B.Sc.) is in molecular biology.[1] Nova is based in Perth, Western Australia.” ~ Source Watch

Wow, what can I say seamut? Blindly following and believing a molecular biologist’s opinions about climate science. You do realize she worked for the SHELL sponsored Questacon Science Circus for 4 years don’t you?

You are such a loyal and blindly following sheeple, time to wake up seamut, I stand here before you with both my hands open, in one hand is a red pill, the other has a blue pill… stop popping blue pills and take the red one for a change.

Come on people refute the information. Where did the warming go? Can you refute anything she has posted. Hay what qualifications does your super rich gore have besides scam artist. What about Suzuki he is making good coin.

Facts man facts.

Go spend some time on NASA’s website and the US EPA’s website and learn some useful scientific facts about global warming seamut, quoting obscure and irrelevant climate denier sources will continue to make you, and the Harper Government, look bad!

Stop being a Big Oil & Gas industry shrill.

Maybe you do not understand what average temperatures are People#1. It could be +10 during the hottest part of the day but if it starts at -10 and ends at -10 the simplified average is 0 degrees, not +10

Most weather services provide a average high and an average low. For example the average high for today is just under -2 degrees which we definitely did not hit. Dec 11 the average high is -3 and Dec 21 it is -4…Average low (usually at night but not always) for Dec 2 is -9, but we hit -20… Dec 11 average low is -10, etc.

In December we have steadily falling temperatures in which it exceeds 5°C or drops below -19°C only one day in ten, so far has not exceeded 5 but it has fallen below -19

“but we hit -20” this morning at 8am, didn’t see what it hit last night

Seamut and slinky; your arguments are not with me but NASA, the US Environmental Protection Agency and hundreds of other reputable science and government based organizations around the world.

I think most of us side with the scientific facts and truth, while you, and the Harper Government, side with junk science sponsored by the Oil & Gas industry.

NASA and the EPA don’t set the average daily temperatures – those are done by the dudes working for the government probably someplace in Ottawa or Toronto. Not sure what daily average highs and lows have to do with Harper but… ok… to each his own

http://weather.gc.ca/city/pages/bc-79_metric_e.html

GISS Peaple even shows no warming. You have not kept up on the controversy with NASA and the EPA have you. Follow the money.

So just what are your thoughts on the lack of warming? Answer some basic questions. Ever hear of Yamal?

Oh by the way what what does being right wing have have to do with it. Refute the facts, you never do. CAGW only exsists in computer models not real world data.

I suppose you would believe anything some super rich pinhead like Suzuki says without question. How does he make his money?

Haha Seamut, be nice!! Don’t you know that some “People#1” don’t take kindly to anybody who disagrees with their opinion!

Sorry People#1, I’m just speaking truths and facts, haha!

Just have to be embarrassed for Canada when it’s Environment Minister goes on record with this:

http://www.canada.com/technology/Stephen+Harper+environment+minister+casts+doubt+climate+change/8992852/story.html

Harper Government = Big Oil & Gas = deny global warming. I apologize to the rest of the world for our government’s ignorance of the scientific facts and the truth! But I am not surprised, Harper fired nearly 1,000 scientist… wouldn’t want them around protecting the publics interests and well-being against the environmental and human health effects of unchecked Oil & Gas expansion.

Harper’s boys in Ottawa collect and sort data like this from YXS, it is the average November temperatures high and low and the extremes for the month since 2009:

Elevation: 691.00m TC ID: YXS
2009 av high 3.4 avg low -4.1 highest 14.7 lowest -10.4
2010 av high -.07 avg low -9.8 highest 14.3 lowest -29.4
2011 av high 1.1 avg low -7.1 highest 8.6 lowest -26.9
2012 av high 0 avg low -7.6 highest 10.1 lowest -20.6
2013 av high .2 avg low -6.6 highest 8.1 lowest -24.6

UNBC & PCIC collaborative report from 2009 which was funded (paid for) by the PG taxpayer has our mean temperatures for Nov (1961-1990) baseline provided by the PG airport climate station as av high .6 av low -6.8

…wonder what happened in 2009/2010, maybe People#1 is on to something, in 52-23 years later we should be able to see a warming trend and there it is? Oh yeah… there was that 2009 El Nino and then an 2010 La Nina in North America thingy, probably caused by ‘big oil’ no doubt – or Harper