I see many commercials especially now just before summer, from the power supplier, urging the customers to save power; by setting the AC temperature to “room temp” or turning off the water boiler. And I can’t understand why they would spend money on media to ask their customers to “buy less product”.
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Utilities like Cooperatives and Municipals (in ERCOT) have charges allocated to them based on their demand. One of these is transmission rates, which I believe is based on the 4 peak months in Texas (June through September) so it’s obviously in the utilities best interests “even” out the peaks and keep their average demand as low as possible. Another similar, but different, transmission charge is from congestion on the transmission lines, which is more like a penalty since those charges are significant.
Also, there’s the concept of peak demand establishing the utilities rate burden for the year. A utility is often charged a percentage of their peak all year long. For example, if they peaked at 100 mw in August, but never came near that level again all year long, they’d still get billed a percentage (I think it’s 90%) of that peak every month for the next 11 months, or until the actual demand exceeded the 90%..
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