In recent years, the powers that be within the power industry have discovered that their supply does not necessarily always meet the demands of society. Around here, that means that in an attempt to force better use of hydro, power companies go right for the jugular and wallet of the lowly home-owner, and have instilled "time-of-use" rates. Basically that means that during off-time (like at night when most normal folks are sleeping and all) the rates are cheapest; and during early to mid-day, AKA PEAK hours (when everyone is up and getting ready for the day - and NEEDS hydro the most), the rates are the most expensive (almost DOUBLE what the off-time is), and then somewhere in the middle of that is 'mid-rates', which aren't as bad as peak hours, but definitely not as 'good' as off-hours. SO...as I see it, they're hitting the average Joe with the expenses and the responsibility of modifying their usage so the power is available for big-paying industries that likely get HUGE breaks with their hydro. Am I bitter about that? No, not at all. I like that I screwed over and over again and gouged for something that has almost become a necessity of life.
Did I mention that I'm EXTREMELY sarcastic?
SO, imagine my 'pleasure' when I read in the paper a few weeks ago (I know, crazy stuff, isn't it? *I* read the paper) that our local power provider was planning a large power outage for much of this little padunk town for 'important upgrades' to the system. I get upgrades. In fact they're much needed. When we first moved here, if the wind blew, the power went out. No exaggerations, we would lose power 5-10 times a week. They could stem from 10 mins to 10 hours, which after a few weeks really was a pain in the ass. After many 'upgrades, we don't lose power terribly often at all anymore - just after tornadoes, car accidents, storms and random "oops" by the powers that be.
Anyway, back to this planned outage for upgrades. They were planning one. For 8 hours. On a Sunday.
That Sunday was yesterday.
And it was a colossal pain in the ass. And it was hot (and by no means am I knocking the weather - in fact I would love to see this weather stay FOREVER - but it added to the dynamics of power outage in terms of food in fridges and such). And it didn't start on time, therefore didn't end on time either. And it created havoc on the roads with stoplights being out (because we live in a town filled with ass-hat drivers that lose all sense of common sense about driving when the lights are out).
As a way of offering the olive branch, the power company supplied a BBQ lunch for those affected by the power outage at the water front (and yes, it was on the side of town that HAD power all day). However, I'm sure that I'll be billed for that on my next bill (even though we didn't (couldn't) attend).
So while in the grand scheme of things, it wasn't a hardship that we lost power for about 10 hours (did I mention that it WAS indeed a pain in the ass?! Because it was. I can't tell you how often I tried to flick a light on, or start a fan, or fix Banshee's keyboard. She got me SO many times with that! She'd tell me that it wasn't working, and I'd go and fiddle with the cords and plugs in an attempt to fix it, and by the time I crawled out from under her desk, she was nearly crying because she'd got me AGAIN!), it was more the principle of it. First of all, they planned this outage - which mostly affected residential areas - for a Sunday. My issues with that are two-fold. 1) EVERYONE is home on a Sunday. How about planning this on a Tuesday when the majority of people are at work and they don't have their 3 kids bugging about something they NEED out of the fridge that needs to stay closed because it's so hot out and if they keep opening it, everything in it will be spoiled?! Or when they don't need to manage their families and households without power for 10 hours without power. It would have been SO much easier for most of the families involved to have had their kids at school or daycare, and themselves at work (which likely wouldn't have been in the affected area - there is very little industry in the affected area). 2) It would be a hell of lot cheaper for the power company to pay their workers REGULAR wages instead of the souped-up overtime that comes with working on a Sunday. The next issue is the fact that it was during OFF-TIME hours for usage. That means that it cut into one of the only days where people can do laundry and other power-sucking activities at a cheapest rate. It means that
The last issue is with the expense of this whole affair. For citizens who were out and about yesterday, they would have noticed the millions of hydro trucks and workers milling about all over the place. I get that the work they were doing was probably significant, but the sheer volume of hydro people here seemed a little over the top. It's a damn good thing that the rest of the province was OK with their hydro yesterday, because I'm certain every single hydro worker within it was right here in this town. And I can assure you, they were NOT all working hard. In fact it's safe to say, they were hardly working. Taking the kids to Tim Hortons for breakfast (and passing 3 different crews of workers - probably 10 at each location), there was actually only 1 or 2 workers actually doing something work-related within each cluster of workers. The others were just standing around doing nothing at all except texting, having a smoke, sipping their coffees, and talking amongst themselves. Later, during our walk with the dog, we passed a crew that we assumed was having their lunch break. I get breaks - I truly do, and I don't begrudge them to people. However, I do begrudge returning over an hour later and they're STILL sitting there in the same positions they were in when we passed them the first time - still having accomplished nothing. It's a Sunday - and you can bet your ass that they're being paid VERY well - double time, travel time, premiums for coming to this padunk town. I can't imagine what they're being paid for that, but times that by 10 hours of 'work' (and I loosely use that term - because as I mentioned, very few were actually doing anything), and the travel time, the prep time and all meals, the cost of the trucks, the cost of the materials, the cost of tools, the cost of the gas. Yeah, that's a shit-ton of moolah. But don't worry - I'll be billed for that on my next bill too.
So, at this point, alternate means of hydro are highly attractive, however, living within this limited town with all it's crazy bylaws, and well, the crazies (AKA my neighbours - only some - most are great), we are stuck relying on this wack-a-doodley system. I don't think a big-ass solar panel or windmill would be received well by some of the neighbour-folk; although it might give them something to bellyache about other than the 'noise' that comes from this house (children, and music we had on when we had people over a couple of summers ago). Yeah, have I ever mentioned we have some hum-dinger neighbours?! Because we do.
So there you have it. Hydro and pesky neighbours piss me off. And on that note, I'm off to finish the laundry. During peak hours. Maybe the hydro business needs to hire someone like me. I'd help trim their budget and I'd make damn sure that the workers actually WORK - and they'd only have overtime if it was 100% necessary. If I could have been at the helm yesterday, those workers would have actually worked more and stood around less, with the work likely being completed in a much shorter time frame. I am woman, here me ROAR! And I wouldn't gouge the residential users - I'd be going after the industry that uses hydro to create something for profit. But maybe that's TOO much efficiency and cost-savings, right?! AND...it might make sense. And Common sense is definitely not something that we correlate with the hydro industry. Just my opinion.
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