Empower Yourself

SDG&E just raised electricity rates for Tier-4 from 29-cents to 36-cents per kilowatt-hour.
That's 20%! You can see how much this will cost you: http:www.sdge.com/residential/2013-rates
This is a great time to do take control of your energy use and empower yourself.

I've got two things you can do without cost to you,

reduce energy waste and get a renewable energy system.

Free Energy Audit for your Home!
My friend Griffin Hagle is a professional Home Energy Auditor and has a great deal.
SDG&E has a grant program for local residential energy audits.
For $199 Griffin can do a Scientific Energy Audit of your home and give you a California Certified Report (good for future remodels or upgrades, etc.) Then after six weeks you get the money back through the SDG&E grant.
So, there is ultimately no cost!
Griffin Hagle 619-573-9560
griffhagleentrepreneursworkshop.org



Free Solar-PV system for your Home!
I'm still working for SolarCity and can get you a FREE Solar-PV system, if you qualify.
SolarCity provides alternative energy at costs less than your local utility.

To get a FREE SolarCity Photovoltaic system for your home, you must have three things:

1. A roof
2. A utility bill
3. A credit score > 680

If that is you, or someone you know, click here to set up a Home Energy Consultation: SolarCity


So, without any cost you can now reduce energy waste and produce your own green power for life.
-Michael Russell

Fracking Hell: The Untold Story

From Occupy

GREENING NON-PROFIT BUSINESSES Workshop

DEMYSTIFICATION OF NONPROFIT ISSUES

FREE Community Workshops for Nonprofits

Provided by the Team at Grant Writing Specialists
Sponsored by
@SPACEBAR INTERNET CAFE
7454 University Avenue, La Mesa, CA 91942
THURSDAYS - 10:00 to Noon

Aug 8 GREENING NON-PROFIT BUSINESSES:
NEW OPPORTUNITIES FOR RENEWABLE ENERGY FINANCING

Changes in Federal, State and Local Government funding for energy related issues require your business to act before the incentives, rebates, and grants run out. Luckily, new financing options are available for businesses and home-owners who want to reduce utility costs and switch to renewable energy. Learn how to maximize your potential savings by avoiding waste and going green for free, with a utility-bill swap to Solar Energy. Also, opportunities for non-profits to earn donations for helping their community become sustainable and get a head-start on electric car transportation. Our Speaker/Presenter is Michael Russell of www.sdsustainablefuture.com

To register
Call 619.460.2738 or send an email to BeDemystified@aol.com

http://grantwrtr.com/

SDG&E Raisng Rates, Lobbying CPUc for "Time-of-Use" Billing

This video with SDG&E Vice President, Lee Schavrien  

SDG&E Rate Hike - Listen to the audio interview from KPBS Midday Edition: http://www.kpbs.org/news/2013/jul/08/sdge-rate-hike-goes-effect-september/

 

If you have $100 bill you will see about a $15 rate increase. If you have a $250 electricity bill, you will see about $75 rate increase. The current rate hike will effect only 25% of residential customers that are in tier-3 and above. It is not because of San Onofere Nuclear Generating Station (SONGS), that will be determined by a seperiate California Public Utility Commission (CPUC) hearing, now underway. 

 

AB 327 - "Time of use" rates (a.k.a. 'time varying rates') - is going to eliminate our progressive tier rate system.  Frees the CPUC to move to utility time of use rates.

"We want to charge rate payers what it costs to provide electricity service to them, no more, no less." - Lee Schavrien, SDG&E VP 

JEA, a Florida non-profit that ranks utilities, finds SDG&E is 3rd highest rates in the USA.

 

Schavrien claims that 'the less energy you use the more you are charged (per unit energy)" - because our climate is temperate we use less energy than others, so our rates are higher, because we have the same transmission costs. However, he doesn't say anything about how SDG&E a privately owned SEMPRA Energy subsidary, makes tragic business mistakes, like burning down East County San Diego, or risking radioative contamination via San Onofere Nuclear Generating Station (SONGS), then passes on the expenses from those mistakes to their rate payers. (I will not even go into the ENRON scandal and brownouts).

SDG&E and PG&E are sponsoring AB 327, a bill that would allow the CPUC to dump rate increases like this on low-income and low usage electric customers instead of applying them to the customers who use far more energy than average. It will be interesting to see if SDG&E uses this program to promote their proposed legislation with a ratepayer paid representative. Utility customer who use electricity more efficiently should be rewarded by lower rates. AB 327 would penalize energy misers and reward energy hogs. It would turn existing rate design on its head. The utilities know that their big capital projects hit ratepayers when their costs are rolled into rates, but they don't want them to hit wealthy heavy electricity users because those customers may just install rooftop solar systems.

 

Footnotes:

SDG&E To Raise Rates On Some In September: http://youtu.be/-eDQdtqiHOA

(note: this does NOT include cost of San Onofere Nuclear Generating Station)

 

Lee Schavrien, Senior Vice President, San Diego Gas and Electric

Lee Friedman, Economist, Professor of Public Policy UC Berkeley

 

It may cost you more to turn on the lights starting September 1st. San Diego Gas and Electric is raising rates for some households and most businesses. High energy users, or about 25 percent of SDG&E customers will see some increase on their bills. The rate hike was approved by the Public Utilities Commission earlier this year. The utility says the rate hike is needed to help pay for energy from renewable sources which is more expensive than electricity produced from natural gas. California's greenhouse gas reduction goals call for 33 percent of energy to come from renewable sources by 2020. A new report by nonpartisan organization Next 10 finds that rate reform is needed in order to meet California's greenhouse gas reduction goals.

SDG&E Energy Rates Up 12% in 2013

As reported in the local press, your electricity rates are going up, agian. Renewable energy is infinite, the more you use, the more you get. But the traditional investor owned energy industries run on a model of scarcity, as resources are depeleated, costs contintue to rise at an accellerating rate, increasing profits.

The California Public Utilities Commission approved energy rate increases requested by both Southern California Edison (SCE) and San Diego Gas and Electric (SDG&E) that will raise electricity bills for many by up to nine and 12 percent, respectively. Some customers of the utility companies will be paying hundreds more per year for the same level of usage. It is estimated to cost homeowners and businesses $500 million dollars more in total utility energy expenditures.  

  

Currently, these utilities have the highest electric rates in the continental United States (surpassed only by Hawaii). The rate hike is higher than usual because of it being a retroactive increase, making up for lost revenue. The increase is set to take effect September 1, 2013, one of the hottest months of the year 

"The bigger bills will not only hurt ratepayers, but are reminder of SDG&E's stranglehold on the local energy market," says Jacob, "Consumers need more choices on where and how they get their energy so they're not at the mercy of the utility giant every time it wants to boost its bottom line." - San Diego County Supervisor Dianne Jacob

The CPUC said the typical electric bill (500 kilowatt hours per month) will leap 12.2% or $9.95 per month; the average gas bill (33 therms per month) will rise 9.6% monthly or $3.55.
 

When you stop wasting energy and go solar, you are hedging yourself against the whims of the utilities and their ever-increasing rates. Your savings will continue to grow over time. I encourage you to declare energy independence with SolarCity! Residents that sign up in the next two weeks will be installed before rates go up.

(Note: In December of 2006, SDG&E filed a case before the FERC requesting a 22% increase in its annual retail rates along with an indefinite continuation of formula rates. The CPUC, along with other intervening parties, protested SDG&E's filing stating that its 22% rate increase, its proposed return on equity (ROE) and the indefinite length of formulaic rates are unjust and unreasonable.)