Living Like Ed

by Ed Begley, Jr.

  • methane—the gas that’s emitted from landfills

  There are also ways to produce electricity using steam that don’t involve burning things. For instance, you can create nuclear reactions, or you can use the heat from the earth to create geothermal power.

  How much electricity does your home use? I use 1,200 kilowatt-hours a month.

  There are also steam-free ways to generate electricity, among them:

  • Hydroelectric power. In this case, the force of falling or flowing water turns a turbine.

  • Wind power. You can literally harness the wind to create power using windmills—or, more precisely, wind turbines.

  • Solar power. The energy of the sun can also be harnessed to create power. Big solar electric power plants either use the heat of the sun to produce steam, which then turns a turbine or some other kind of generator, or they use photovoltaic (PV) cells to convert solar energy directly into electricity.

  So these are the primary ways utility companies all across the United States create the electricity that powers your home and your workplace and your city.

  Renewable vs. Green

  Now, some of these sources of electricity are considered renewable, meaning they don’t require the use of limited natural resources. Renewable resources are generally considered inexhaustible.

  Certainly no one would argue that waste, or trash, is in scarce supply. We obviously make plenty of it in this country. It’s definitely a renewable resource.

  But, just as certainly, you can see that renewable energy is not the same as green energy. Yes, waste is considered renewable, but burning waste is certainly not an environmentally friendly way to make power. You’re just taking all that often very toxic material and releasing it into the atmosphere. I’m highly opposed to incinerators as a means either of dealing with trash or making power.

  Different Region, Different Choices

  The mix as to which power sources are used to generate electricity varies from region to region. Here’s how it breaks down where I live. The Los Angeles Department of Water and Power (LADWP) generates 47 percent of its power from coal, 29 percent from natural gas, 9 percent from nuclear, 7 percent from large hydroelectric power plants, and 8 percent from renew-able power.

  On average, the entire state of California produces

  • 41.5 percent of its power from natural gas

  • 19.0 percent from hydro

  • 15.7 percent of its power from coal

  • 12.9 percent from nuclear

  • 10.9 percent from renewable resources

  That’s in dramatic contrast to states such as

  • Indiana, Kentucky, North Dakota, Utah, West Virginia, and Wyoming, all of which still generate more than 90 percent of their electricity by burning coal

  • The District of Columbia, which generates 100 percent of its electricity by burning crude oil

  • Rhode Island, which generates 98.9 percent of its electricity by burning natural gas

  Creating Carbon Dioxide

  In most cases, when you generate power at a power plant, you put out carbon dioxide, or CO2. These emissions come out of the power plant’s smoke-stacks as a result of the combustion process—from burning coal or crude oil or natural gas. Power plants also produce sulfur dioxide, oxides of nitrogen, and mercury emissions, but carbon dioxide is the thing people focus on most because it’s considered a primary cause of global warming.

  Obviously, the way your utility company generates power has a profound effect on how much CO2 it emits. According to the EPA, for each megawatt-hour of electricity that a utility company produces, it creates

  • 2,988 pounds of CO2 by burning municipal solid waste

  • 2,249 pounds of CO2 by burning coal

  • 1,672 pounds of CO2 by burning oil

  • 1,135 pounds of CO2 by burning natural gas

  • 0 pounds of CO2 by using water to create hydroelectric power

  • 0 pounds of CO2 by using wind

  • 0 pounds of CO2 by using solar power

  • 0 pounds of CO2 by using nuclear power

  On a state-by-state level, Texas leads the way in CO2 emissions from power generation, putting out more than 280 million tons of carbon dioxide each year. It’s no surprise that Texas generates most of its power by burning coal and natural gas.

  After Texas comes Florida, which produces 145 million tons of CO2 emissions from power generation annually, thanks to an emphasis on burning coal, crude oil, and natural gas. Then comes Indiana, at 133 million tons, with coal used to create 94.7 percent of the state’s power.

  California is way down the list, producing only 67 million tons of CO2 emissions a year—if you can use the word only.

  Vermont gets the cleanest ranking in terms of CO2. It produces just shy of 19,000 tons of carbon dioxide emissions from power generation. That’s because most of the power generated in Vermont is nuclear—70.5 percent—and another 21.7 percent is hydroelectric. Only 0.4 percent of all the power generated in that state comes from the burning of fossil fuels, and then we’re talking oil and gas—not coal. So it’s a really clean state in terms of CO2 emissions, though nuclear power certainly has its drawbacks, which we’ll get into later.

  The Grid

  Now, how does electricity get from a power plant to your home or workplace? The utility company sends that electricity out over a network of transmission and distribution lines, better known as the grid.

  Transmission lines are those large, high-voltage power lines you see, usually supported by tall metal towers. They move electricity from the power plant to a local substation.

  From the substation—or from a transformer—the power then travels over smaller, lower-voltage distribution lines. These are the power lines you see overhead along city streets, supported by what we usually think of as telephone poles. If you don’t see those lines overhead, your city probably has its distribution lines underground.

  The Price of Electricity

  Once you get your electricity, of course you have to pay for it. For home use, electricity is measured in kilowatt-hours. Your electric meter tracks the number of kilowatt-hours you use, then the utility company charges you a price per kilowatt-hour.

  We’ve seen a rapid rise in the price of electricity over the last few years. The curve has started to go up and up and up, and now we’re starting to see a real spike. And over time, I think the price of electricity is only going to continue going up.

  The price you’ll actually pay for electricity varies pretty dramatically by state and by city. In a place like Los Angeles, the LADWP charges 7¢ a kilowatt-hour. Overall, the rate for California averages 12.36¢ per kilowatt-hour.

  Hawaii has the highest rate in the nation, averaging 19.05¢ per kilowatt-hour. Electricity is very expensive there because you have to bring in a lot of the fuel from off the islands.

  If you go to a place like Idaho, where they’ve got hydroelectric plants from the 1930s that have well since been paid off, they’re charging an average of 4.75¢ a kilowatt-hour. It’s the cheapest in the country.

  Capital investments to build new power plants impact electricity prices, too. And prices can also fluctuate on a seasonal basis, going up in the summertime, for instance, when demand and usage are much higher.

  High Peak, Low Peak, and Off-Peak

  There’s another variable that can affect what you pay for your electricity: the time of day. Now, most people pay a flat rate for electricity, no matter what time of day or night they use it. They pay the same price, no matter what.

  But one way you can save some money on your electric bill, if you can control when you use power, is by doing what I did: I had a time-of-use meter installed at my house. Most electric meters just keep track of how many kilowatt-hours you use. A time-of-use meter keeps track of when you use that power, too.

  It has three tiers for electricity:

  HIGH PEAK. Peak power is very expensive. That’s power that is used from 1 P.M. to 5 P.M., when the drai
n on the grid is heaviest. That’s when you may experience brownouts and when power stations tend to go down. People have the air conditioner on. Everybody’s in their office with their laser printer on. People are at home watching soap operas on their plasma TVs.

  Any power company will tell you that one to five is the period of highest activity, so they charge you the most for power during peak hours if you have a time-of-use meter. Peak power hours are when utility companies have to buy more power for the grid. They buy power from Canada. They buy it from Utah. They buy and sell it on an exchange. And it costs them more when they have to buy this extra power, so they charge you more. High peak is very expensive. That’s like 14¢ a kilowatt-hour if you use power then, ac-cording to the LADWP.

  LOW PEAK. This is from 10 A.M. to 1 P.M. and 5 P.M. to 8 P.M. During these two time slots, the price is just a little more than what you would normally pay if you were to buy your power at a flat rate, regardless of the time of day.

  OFF-PEAK. All other hours outside of high peak and low peak are considered off-peak—that is, from 8 P.M. to 10 A.M., as well as weekends. I mentioned in Chapter 2 that power plants are generating so much extra power that it’s wasted. Power plants are surprisingly inefficient structures. They can’t just be shut down when the power isn’t needed; instead, these huge electric plants are literally doing make-work to shed extra power at night. They’re doing things like pumping water uphill so they can use up those extra electrons they don’t need. So power companies charge much less for power off-peak because it encourages you to use power when they actually need to get rid of it.

  And guess what. I buy nearly all my power from the LADWP off-peak. It starts at less than 4¢ a kilowatt-hour. If I used the exact same amount of energy, but during peak hours, my utility bill would be more than double.

  You can do a lot of things off-peak. That’s when I do laundry and charge my electric car. You certainly can wait to run the dishwasher until after 8 P.M., or you can run it before you leave for work first thing in the morning. If you’re going to be doing a lot of baking or printing out a whole bunch of stuff on your home computer, you also can control when you use that power.

  Creating My Own Power

  Now, one of the reasons I’m able to buy nearly all my power off-peak from the utility company is because I actually generate most of my own electricity—and this is something you may be able to do, too.

  Most people don’t know this, but I’m a strong supporter of nuclear power. After all, we have the perfect reactor sited in a safe position 93 million miles away cranking out clean power 365 days a year. It’s called solar energy. And I know that solar works because it’s been running my house and charging my electric car since 1990.

  Going solar is something I’ve been intrigued by since I was a young child. Being the nerd that I was, I pored over the Edmund Scientific Catalog and the Heathkit Catalog, and I would drool over those solar panels. They were insanely small—and insanely expensive—but I coveted them.

  I clean my solar panels about four times a year, and I see a real current increase.

  I believe that solar is the cleanest form of energy. There are no emissions from the panels themselves, and the only emissions involved in the entire process of making solar energy are the minor ones from the manufacture of the panels and from transporting them to the installer and finally to your house.

  I was able to take my entire home solar electric in 1990. I’ve upgraded the system twice, installing fixed arrays of photovoltaic solar panels on the roof of my house and garage, as well as a tracker that follows the sun all day long. The system performs flawlessly.

  Now, there’s periodic maintenance with anything—well, nearly anything—that you have in your life, and solar panels are no exception. You just need a little bit of water to loosen up the smog dust and the dirt that gets up there. You want to get these panels hosed off, then brushed. So then you see the voltage go up and the current increase—sometimes 20 percent, depending on how much smog dust was on the panels.

  Ed is so in love with those solar panels. I swear, he spends more time up there on the roof. Really, sometimes I wonder if he’s trying to get away from me. He knows I’m afraid of heights, so what does he do? He goes and hides up there on the roof. The neighbors might not like him looking in their windows, though.

  I do worry about him, especially when he gets up there to clean the panels four times a year. He’s up there with a broom and a hose, washing off all the gunk from the air in L.A. He says it makes the panels work better, and I’m sure it does. But growing up, I never thought the electricity in my house would depend on a man on the roof with a broom.

  Stand-Alone vs. Net Metering

  My solar electric system was installed in 1990, long before they had net metering. So mine is a stand-alone system—the kind that is more common in rural areas where there’s no electricity available at all.

  In other words, I’ve got between 6 and 7 kilowatts of solar up on the roof—that’s a lot—and then I have a big battery storage system in my garage. Thanks to those batteries, I have 2,400 amp-hours of power available at 120 volts. That is a lot of power. It could be cloudy and rainy for a month, and I would still have power for the bare necessities, like my electric teakettle, my computer, a few lights, and the refrigerator. Even on a cloudy or rainy day, though, there is still current going into the system. I have been out in the garage during a heavy rain and witnessed firsthand 5 amps of power going into the system at 120 volts. That is 600 watts of power. So you’re still getting something even during the worst weather. You’re still going to be able to limp along even if you don’t have bright sunshine every day.

  And besides, where does it rain for a month? Even in Seattle, it doesn’t rain a month straight. So even under the most dire conditions, you’re still going to have some power going into the system.

  Compared with many American homes, of course, I don’t require a tremendous amount of power. For instance, my electric car draws 32 amps at 240 volts, or 7,680 watts (about ¾ of a kilowatt) of power. The air-conditioning pulls 18 amps at 240 volts, or 4,430 watts. A lamp with a compact fluorescent lightbulb draws a mere 1.5 amps at 120 volts, or 18 watts.

  Besides, having a solar system with batteries for storage means I don’t have to worry about brownouts or rolling blackouts or natural disasters. I’m self-sufficient to a very great degree. I sometimes hear from my neighbors that the power has been out for several hours, and I’ll have no idea that occurred. And during the 1994 earthquake, for several days mine was the only house in my neighborhood with the lights on and the power functioning.

  When I was first living here, Ed would go out of town, and he sometimes would send me running out to the garage to check the numbers on the battery system. And I’d say, “0.6 and 2.10,” and he’d freak out and start saying, “Oh, my God! Oh, my God! Switch it up to the grid. But no-no-no. Don’t do that first. Switch this one down first.”

  And then I’d be freaking out, because I thought if I didn’t do it right, I was going to blow the house up. He’d finally walk me through it and we’d both heave a huge sigh of relief. “Phew. We’re safe another day.”

  Now if I need to switch us over to the grid, it’s not such a big deal, but it did take a little getting used to. Come to think of it, maybe it was just the drama of Ed freaking out on me on the phone.

  Net Metering

  The type of solar electric system I have now doesn’t have to be connected to the grid, but because I live in an area where it’s easy to be connected—and because my house was already connected when I bought it—I have the option of switching over to the grid as needed. As needed for me always means after 8 P.M. and before 10 A.M., when power is cheapest due to low demand.

  There’s another way to go that makes a lot of sense, too. Today, instead of having all those batteries at your house, you can choose net metering. Many states require utility companies to accept renewable energy from their residential customers. Rather than store an
y excess solar electricity you produce in big batteries, you can feed that electricity directly into the grid. Then, whenever you need more power than your solar electric system is generating, you simply draw that power back from the grid. In essence, you let the grid itself act like a big battery system for your solar electric setup.

  Even if your utility company does not allow for net metering, you can still feed any excess power you produce into the grid. However, instead of receiving the full retail price for that power, the utility pays you a wholesale rate for the electricity, which is considerably less.

  Can Anyone Go Solar?

  As much as I love solar, let me be clear: Solar panels will not work on just any roof.

  A good candidate would be a house with a pitched roof that gets a full day—or close to a full day—of sun. A bad candidate would be a roof that gets a lot of shading from another home or from trees. The western part of your exposure is very important. I have to keep a tree that is west of my solar panels very well trimmed. It’s a deciduous tree, so during the winter months, there’s very little shading. There are also hedges that I have to keep after quite regularly because they would eventually shade the panels.

  Other bad candidates include roofs that are more challenging—a tile roof, for example, or a flat roof. You can certainly put solar panels on flat roofs, people do it all the time, but you want to be very careful that it’s done by top-notch installers to prevent leaking. Flat roofs are prone to leaking anyway. When you start putting stuff up there, you have to be very, very careful, both with leakage problems and with the exposure problem. Make sure you get a really good day of sun.