Yes and that's why I store it via my own tank - In SA anything supplied by a monopoly that was privatized via an expectation of receiving a premium price for the asset has found that the ongoing charges have been probably way above the cost of production. However the cost of providing water actually does go up and without a desalination plant you did have a scarce/ finite resource. So it was logical to restrict demand by way of an increasing price per usage. However since putting in the desalination plants it should be encouraged to work - I am not sure if the one in SA has ever worked... Again its social engineering. You have a plant that can produce water but the social engineering has made demand inelastic...
However the cost of producing electricity is flexible. Take my issue since putting in solar I have rarely drawn more than 2Kwh during the day and in fact have only drawn 25600 Kwh from the system. I have however supplied 44200kwh to the grid and all during the peak day hours. Yet I spend around $3000 per annum even after getting my so called feed in tariff...
this year I will install 2 or maybe more Tesla powerwall 2 systems and it will give me a return of 25% per annum. The grid will get far less and probably not much and I will supply my own after hours electricity. The disincentive is that the standing charge I will still have to pay may well exceed the feed in receipt - It may pay me to disconnect from the grid...
The net effect for the country - I cannot access cheap power during the night at anything less than the 40c per Kwh. Yet the cost of production is low as is the demand during this period. I will withhold at least 25Kwh of power that can go into the grid during the day when they have peak demand. I even have a diesel generator that could assist and feed into the grid to offset the peak demand yet there is no way for the electricity company to compensate me for that power at a fair rate if I supply it to the grid...
Really old world thinking and no national solution. I have reached the point where Jay W and his team are so discredited that I have made my own solutions so that I can service my business needs.
EPW Price at posting:
$1.32 Sentiment: None Disclosure: Held