John Smillie

As an energy nerd (who may or may not run a multivairable regression model on household energy usage) and financial analyst by profession, "My bill was super high!" complaints leave me wanting. Did rates change? Did usage change? Was it really hot or cold? Aberrant bill? Catch up charge?

That would be important to resolve!

Hot tub? Meat freezer? Dialysis? What's going on in there

Does anyone else read these baffled at how much electricity people use? In September?

I have an EV, a home from 1915, and everything electric except when it dips below 20ºF outside, and I don't understand how they spent 3x my bill in September of all months on 10% higher rates.

That's good! But still being at 26 months seems kinda long?

I knew it would be bad (though it is even worse), so I voted, donated, and even did some phone banking accordingly. I guess do more?

It's hard to know what to takeaway from an election where a garbage man with garbage policies and a garbage campaign won.

ah that explains Toyota over Hyundai

95% if you move closer

Bragging about record LNG exports as we head into heating season is certainly a choice with affordability being the watch word of the day.

h/t @athada.bsky.social

Mine is quite good even without snow mode on

Pretty effective way to raise costs on the American consumer while also polluting more.

I don't think he heard me...

Ugh there was a Volts guest that kept framing it like that and I had to keep yelling "Dividends are not the only cost of capital!"

Hmm surprised to see Toyota but not Hyundai.

Snake-inspired tech adds 4K thermal vision to standard cameras A new snake-inspired system lets standard CMOS sensors capture 4K infrared images at room temperature without cooling.

interestingengineering.com/innovation/s...

Could basically turn every smart phone into an IR camera.

A new era for building efficiency obsessives...

www.geekwire.com/2025/gates-b...

TerraPower passed final review hurdle before NRC decides on construction permit

Why Healthcare Costs Are Rising So Much with Jonathan Cohn

Well, they are trying "lift the tariffs and act like we solved a problem"

As for Healthcare, as discussed here, they actively fought any attempt to extend the subsidies for purely ideological reasons. So I don't think they are much interested in looking better.

open.spotify.com/episode/4qvI...

Climate Change Is Already Costing U.S. Households Up to $900 Per Year A new working paper from a trio of eminent economists tallies the effects of warming — particularly extreme weather — on Americans’ budgets.

Even with a limited scope and only looking at current state, we are already at $900 per household in the US.

$119B annually in one country.

heatmap.news/economy/clim...

Also, we already have a crap load of electrification to do without data centers. And a lot of it is more flexible (EV charging) and thus more likely to put downward pressure on rates.

Energy Secretary Says Data-Center Boom Will Drive Down Power Costs Chris Wright says growth in electricity production to power AI will make electricity cheaper in the long run.

www.wsj.com/articles/ene...

There are ways in which this could be true (incr. load factor decr. cost of fixed infra. w/o requiring more infra, rate makers set rates that shift more system burden on to DCs, waste heat used for district heating cutting winter peaks)

But I don't see those happening

At 4/gallon, and 33% efficiency, you are at $318/MWh just on fuel. Definitely more than Vogtle.

Just $20, but it's my pleasure. Keep up the good work.

The first 30 years will certainly be a lot more expensive than the second thirty.

K, then just the diesel gen sets then

But here I am counting just "utility cost to procure", which is higher than say total production divided by homeowner capital outlay

Guess it depends on how many year you lock in with the German feed-in tariff or NEM 2.0 or NJ or MA net metering then. Even locking in 10 years at German retail rates and then like 4 cents for the remaining 10 years would put you over Vogtle.

There are also net metered rooftop solar installations in Germany and a few US states that are more expensive than Vogtle, though that's a bit of a policy choice.

Diesel gen sets on remote islands

I gave in honor of the vegan mcrib

The temperature for superciritcal CO2 is quite low (31.1ºC), but it is a lot of pressure (73 atmospheres).

A full scuba tank is about 200 atmospheres, so I guess I am still comfortable strapping that to my back.