Big Tech Oligarchs

[skybert]

Except they don’t need to say “this is fake news”. Just tell their media minions to go on the attack.

[Clark Griswold]

German Govt Wants to Remote Control Home Heat, Electric Car Charge (breitbart.com)

And lemme guess, there would be special accounts that would not be subject to the same rationing when power gets scarce?

[HeloDude]

2 hours ago, Clark Griswold said:And lemme guess, there would be special accounts that would not be subject to the same rationing when power gets scarce?

Well, the TVA (or somebody?) decided that it was ok to turn off the power to people’s homes but not for an NFL football game.  Now I’m not so naive to think that there aren’t large differences between killing someone’s power at their home during rolling blackouts vs having to reschedule an entire NFL game, but the optics aren’t good.

https://www.breitbart.com/sports/2022/12/25/wow-thats-ridiculous-outraged-tennesseans-endure-blackouts-freezing-temps-while-titans-nissan-stadium-remains-fully-powered/

[Clark Griswold]

Well, the TVA (or somebody?) decided that it was ok to turn off the power to people’s homes but not for an NFL football game.  Now I’m not so naive to think that there aren’t large differences between killing someone’s power at their home during rolling blackouts vs having to reschedule an entire NFL game, but the optics aren’t good.
https://www.breitbart.com/sports/2022/12/25/wow-thats-ridiculous-outraged-tennesseans-endure-blackouts-freezing-temps-while-titans-nissan-stadium-remains-fully-powered/

Yup saw that, more bullshit proving to me “they” believe we’re serfs and they will just give us what they think we should get not what was paid for or agreed to

After reading that and hearing about what TVA did the next hot trend is for every house to be wired for self generated power


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

[dream big]

21 hours ago, Clark Griswold said:

German Govt Wants to Remote Control Home Heat, Electric Car Charge (breitbart.com)

And lemme guess, there would be special accounts that would not be subject to the same rationing when power gets scarce?

The German Government here has total control over people’s lives, and they just roll over and take it STS. God what short memories these people have…

[Biff_T]

1 hour ago, dream big said:

The German Government here has total control over people’s lives, and they just roll over and take it STS. God what short memories these people have…

Imagine how much we could reduce the carbon footprint if we all just gave up control of our thermostats? Man.  That would be nice.   I'm not Nostradamus but I can predict that the left will try to push this agenda at some point in the future.   

I have solar panels.  I wanted to stop relying on CA to supply my power.  The power companies in CA are starting to try and add frivolous charges to people with solar.  They complain that the power companies are forced to charge the poorer families, who can't afford solar, more.  This is bullshit.  They have lost one element of control over people's lives for profit, and they are doing shady things with the CA government to keep them alive.   All the while, CA keeps pushing for residential solar.  There is going to be some sort of shady deal to keep solar customers paying for power.  As it stands, Edison power has to pay me for using excess power.  They're trying hard not too.  

[brabus]

Poor people can’t afford solar, ergo solar is racist, but the left pushes “green energy”…but they’re “anti-racist”…hmmmm. The progressive left is such a dumpster fire full of shit. 

[Biff_T]

I agree. The progressives are retards.  

 

Edit:  I just needed to reiterate that they are RETARDs.  I can't think of a single thing I like about them?  They destroy everything they touch.   Change my mind....lol

Edited December 27, 2022 by Biff_T

[Lord Ratner]

There's a big difference between solar and net metering.

 

Net metering was always absurd. Why should the power company pay you for electricity? And pay you the same rate they charge? Can you imagine going to the grocery store and trying to sell your homegrown tomatoes to the produce manager, except you want him to pay you the same amount he plans to sell them for?

 

It was yet another government scheme to get more people to adopt solar. And of course it increased the price of power. And yes, since the wealthy are more able to afford the frivolity of solar power, they disproportionately benefit. I'm not a big fan of subsidizing the poor, but having the poor subsidize the wealthy? Only California could hatch a scheme so absurd. Too bad others followed.

 

You want to be off the grid with solar panels? Awesome. Go for it. But wanting the power company to subsidize your prepper fantasies was a gross distortion of free market capitalism, one of many these days. 

Now a bunch of people are upset that they aren't making money off their solar panels. Many of them are allegedly conservative. Boo hoo. A handout is a handout, even if it's to someone with a big house and nice cars. 

[FLEA]

1 hour ago, Lord Ratner said:

There's a big difference between solar and net metering.

 

Net metering was always absurd. Why should the power company pay you for electricity? And pay you the same rate they charge? Can you imagine going to the grocery store and trying to sell your homegrown tomatoes to the produce manager, except you want him to pay you the same amount he plans to sell them for?

 

It was yet another government scheme to get more people to adopt solar. And of course it increased the price of power. And yes, since the wealthy are more able to afford the frivolity of solar power, they disproportionately benefit. I'm not a big fan of subsidizing the poor, but having the poor subsidize the wealthy? Only California could hatch a scheme so absurd. Too bad others followed.

 

You want to be off the grid with solar panels? Awesome. Go for it. But wanting the power company to subsidize your prepper fantasies was a gross distortion of free market capitalism, one of many these days. 

Now a bunch of people are upset that they aren't making money off their solar panels. Many of them are allegedly conservative. Boo hoo. A handout is a handout, even if it's to someone with a big house and nice cars. 

They should pay you because they are taking it. Its financial accounting 101. They took an asset, they generate a liability. It would be a handout if the power company was allowed to use excess energy for free. Unless there is something I'm misunderstanding about what you're saying here. 

Edited December 28, 2022 by FLEA

[Lord Ratner]

28 minutes ago, FLEA said:

They should pay you because they are taking it. Its financial accounting 101. They took an asset, they generate a liability. It would be a handout if the power company was allowed to use excess energy for free. Unless there is something I'm misunderstanding about what you're saying here. 

They are forced to take it at a rate equal to what they sell it at, depending on what state you're in.

The big change in California is getting rid of the requirement that what they pay equals what they charge.

With this change, the economics of solar turn red for many, many homeowners. This of course was obvious to anybody paying attention, but as I said before, government meddling in an attempt to promote the wide scale adoption of a half-baked technology has once again left us worse than we were before.

Edited December 28, 2022 by Lord Ratner

[nsplayr]

Disagree that net metering is somehow a government handout or a liberal scheme. As @FLEA said, power companies benefit by having additional distributed  generating capacity on the grid, they should reimburse homeowners who are net generating power. I’m not saying it always has to be 1-for-1 at the commercial rate, but there should be some reimbursement because as a homeowner with solar, if you are exporting watts to the grid, you are helping the power company out - it seems fair to be paid for that.

Whether changes in the law or policies make the economics of owing solar panels better or worse is a risk you as the purchaser of the system take…laws and policies change all the time and sometimes it works out for you and sometimes it doesn’t.

But on the whole solar power works great within known limitations, is now the cheapest way to generate electricity, and individual homeowners have the ability to gain some independence and resiliency from outages and price increases by putting panels on their roof, which isn’t an option with many other methods of generating power. It’s a net plus for a lot of homeowners, myself included starting this week, and for humanity as a whole.

[Bigred]

California requires solar on all new homes, but the builders tend to put the minimum legal requirement on the houses so solar doesn’t really 100% cover the usage. 
 

That said, as I’m experiencing first hand, my utility bill and solar payment combined is significantly lower than if I only used power from the grid. I’ve only had solar for not quite a year but so far it seems worth it. 

[FLEA]

1 hour ago, Lord Ratner said:

They are forced to take it at a rate equal to what they sell it at, depending on what state you're in.

The big change in California is getting rid of the requirement that what they pay equals what they charge.

With this change, the economics of solar turn red for many, many homeowners. This of course was obvious to anybody paying attention, but as I said before, government meddling in an attempt to promote the wide scale adoption of a half-baked technology has once again left us worse than we were before.

You're approaching this from a perspective that power companies have more leverage than they actually do in this situation. They are being forced to pay market rate for the power, which in many markets, as sole distributors and monopolies, they essentially establish. Not exactly familiar with California laws but if the distributor is allowed to set the rate they buy power there is probably additional business opportunity in CA to sell equipment that deprives the power company of additional power unless they pay a user defined rate. I'll have to look into that. 

Regardless, solar is at a pretty critical tech turning point and I think widespread adaption is going to happen in about 5-10 years. For one, power companies don't have the infrastructure to keep up with increasing power demands. So it makes sense that decentralized supply would be an overall benefit to development. 

[SurelySerious]

Let’s not forget that the power companies is CA can’t generate the amount of power required of them on a lot of days, so there is a decent demand for the home generated power. 

[Biff_T]

4 hours ago, Lord Ratner said:

There's a big difference between solar and net metering.

 

Net metering was always absurd. Why should the power company pay you for electricity? And pay you the same rate they charge? Can you imagine going to the grocery store and trying to sell your homegrown tomatoes to the produce manager, except you want him to pay you the same amount he plans to sell them for?

 

It was yet another government scheme to get more people to adopt solar. And of course it increased the price of power. And yes, since the wealthy are more able to afford the frivolity of solar power, they disproportionately benefit. I'm not a big fan of subsidizing the poor, but having the poor subsidize the wealthy? Only California could hatch a scheme so absurd. Too bad others followed.

 

You want to be off the grid with solar panels? Awesome. Go for it. But wanting the power company to subsidize your prepper fantasies was a gross distortion of free market capitalism, one of many these days. 

Now a bunch of people are upset that they aren't making money off their solar panels. Many of them are allegedly conservative. Boo hoo. A handout is a handout, even if it's to someone with a big house and nice cars. 

I live in OC CA.  That's pretty much dead center of the grid.  If having a family size box of Honey Bunches of Oats that I bought at Costco makes me a prepper, then you've got me.  The only thing I'm prepping for is going surfing tomorrow.  

I'm providing a service.  I'd like to be compensated for it.  

 

 

Edited December 29, 2022 by Biff_T
Not Exec

[ViperMan]

5 hours ago, Lord Ratner said:

There's a big difference between solar and net metering.

Net metering was always absurd. Why should the power company pay you for electricity? And pay you the same rate they charge? Can you imagine going to the grocery store and trying to sell your homegrown tomatoes to the produce manager, except you want him to pay you the same amount he plans to sell them for?

It was yet another government scheme to get more people to adopt solar. And of course it increased the price of power. And yes, since the wealthy are more able to afford the frivolity of solar power, they disproportionately benefit. I'm not a big fan of subsidizing the poor, but having the poor subsidize the wealthy? Only California could hatch a scheme so absurd. Too bad others followed.

You want to be off the grid with solar panels? Awesome. Go for it. But wanting the power company to subsidize your prepper fantasies was a gross distortion of free market capitalism, one of many these days. 

Now a bunch of people are upset that they aren't making money off their solar panels. Many of them are allegedly conservative. Boo hoo. A handout is a handout, even if it's to someone with a big house and nice cars. 

Power grids are public infrastructure, or are at least part of it - insofar as they utilize public rights-of-way, law, etc. Why, then, should you not be paid if you add power to the public grid? Businesses whose money-making models rest upon public infrastructure (power companies, internet, water, and so forth) are not businesses in the usual sense and hence can and should be regulated appropriately. In some sense, you're no different than the power company themselves. If you're adding voltage to the system, you deserve to be compensated for that.

The grocery store analogy is off because grocery stores do not require government intervention in order to conduct their business. Power companies do; they are not free market capitalism.

[Lord Ratner]

2 hours ago, nsplayr said:

I’m not saying it always has to be 1-for-1 at the commercial rate, but there should be some reimbursement because as a homeowner with solar, if you are exporting watts to the grid, you are helping the power company out - it seems fair to be paid for that.

No one is arguing that. The issue in California is the reduction of net metering rates down to wholesale-or-lower prices. Further, the power companies don't need a lot of the solar generated power when it is being produced, but they are forced to buy it under the current rules.

 

The power companies are not asking for free power. They want the ability to offer a price based on market conditions. The solar lobby knows that will be the death of residential solar.

2 hours ago, nsplayr said:

is now the cheapest way to generate electricity

It's not even close. And if you remove the cost benefits of having China build them with extremely wasteful and environmentally unfriendly processes, it gets even worse. And since we are currently in the process of detaching from China...

 

2 hours ago, nsplayr said:

laws and policies change all the time and sometimes it works out for you and sometimes it doesn’t.

Agreed entirely. But that's not how the solar homeowners in California feel at the moment...

 

2 hours ago, Bigred said:

That said, as I’m experiencing first hand, my utility bill and solar payment combined is significantly lower than if I only used power from the grid. I’ve only had solar for not quite a year but so far it seems worth it. 

You have to contrast that with the cost of installing the system. Right now, and this is according to CA, without batteries you won't be able to make back the cost of the install if net-metering is fixed.

1 hour ago, FLEA said:

They are being forced to pay market rate for the power, which in many markets, as sole distributors and monopolies, they essentially establish.

Like nearly all regulated utilities, they set rates at the discretion of the controlling agency. 

 

1 hour ago, FLEA said:

For one, power companies don't have the infrastructure to keep up with increasing power demands.

Solar is never going to replace baseload power. The stalling out of the wind and solar movement has forced politicians on both sides of the Atlantic to (finally) accept nuclear as the future. Only took a few decades. The catalyst will be the continued spikes in the price of oil and gas. Russia is just part of the story. The systemic underinvestment in exploration and production for over 10 years is going to make things painful. The strategic reserve hitting record lows won't help either. But that will be masked by the building global slowdown, which will further delay investment in exploration and production.

 

1 hour ago, SurelySerious said:

Let’s not forget that the power companies is CA can’t generate the amount of power required of them on a lot of days, so there is a decent demand for the home generated power. 

California hasn't done a bang up job of infrastructure planning. The water situation there is another self-inflicted wound.

3 minutes ago, ViperMan said:

Why, then, should you not be paid if you add power to the public grid? Businesses whose money-making models rest upon public infrastructure (power companies, internet, water, and so forth) are not businesses in the usual sense and hence can and should be regulated appropriately. In some sense, you're no different than the power company themselves. If you're adding voltage to the system, you deserve to be compensated for that.

Sure, that was the theory, and I don't particularly mind the logic, though I don't agree either. But as California is learning, this system is benefiting those who need little benefit, and costing the lower class. Is there a single person here with home solar that didn't receive subsidies? The government paid for (statistically) wealthier Americans to install solar on their homes, and now the costs of net metering (which are largely detrimental to the power companies) are pushing the costs onto those without solar. 

 

This is an emblematic example of the free market distortions at play at almost every level. This shit is why people are souring on capitalism. But it isn't capitalism, it might be corporatism, or good old-fashioned government waste, but it sure as shit isn't the free market.

Solar system should be paid for in full by the homeowner. Whether or not they tie them to the grid should be their choice. When the power company would like to buy power from residential solar systems, they can offer a price, and you can choose to accept or refuse. But this nonsense of paying people to install the systems and then forcing the power company to pay them more than it costs them to produce power in the first place, is silly. It's fucking stupid actually.

 

And considering the input energy for producing solar panels are higher than the output of the solar panel over their 20-year lifespan (if you live at a latitude above Texas), not to mention the environmental damage caused by the mining practices of the countries that make these panels, or the waste generated when these panels hit their end of life, there should be pretty easy to recognize as another government. Boondoggle.

 

How many more fucking years are we going to pretend like solar is economically viable? It's been decades and yet still we need subsidies to get them installed? 

 

[ViperMan]

38 minutes ago, Lord Ratner said:

Sure, that was the theory, and I don't particularly mind the logic, though I don't agree either. But as California is learning, this system is benefiting those who need little benefit, and costing the lower class. Is there a single person here with home solar that didn't receive subsidies? The government paid for (statistically) wealthier Americans to install solar on their homes, and now the costs of net metering (which are largely detrimental to the power companies) are pushing the costs onto those without solar. 

This is an emblematic example of the free market distortions at play at almost every level. This shit is why people are souring on capitalism. But it isn't capitalism, it might be corporatism, or good old-fashioned government waste, but it sure as shit isn't the free market.

Solar system should be paid for in full by the homeowner. Whether or not they tie them to the grid should be their choice. When the power company would like to buy power from residential solar systems, they can offer a price, and you can choose to accept or refuse. But this nonsense of paying people to install the systems and then forcing the power company to pay them more than it costs them to produce power in the first place, is silly. It's fucking stupid actually.

And considering the input energy for producing solar panels are higher than the output of the solar panel over their 20-year lifespan (if you live at a latitude above Texas), not to mention the environmental damage caused by the mining practices of the countries that make these panels, or the waste generated when these panels hit their end of life, there should be pretty easy to recognize as another government. Boondoggle.

How many more fucking years are we going to pretend like solar is economically viable? It's been decades and yet still we need subsidies to get them installed?

I don't disagree with any of this and you make some important observations about these programs' implementation, but there is an important distinction you're not acknowledging: power companies are NOT a free market, and they are NOT capitalism.

If you want to start a supermarket, record label, software company, fast-food chain, brewery, or consultancy, or any other number of businesses, you're completely free to do so. You are not free to just start a competing power company and start running your own power lines, installing utility poles, tearing up roadways, utilizing public rights-of-way or easements on private property, etc. The government has a direct hand in ensuring the viability of power infrastructure. There is a categorical difference between these types of companies, so while power companies appear to be companies, they're really part company, part government.

In any case, insofar as ME (who personally has no solar) selling power "back to the grid" using public infrastructure (the same thing the power company does) I don't see any problem at that level of analysis. There is no reason why one entity should be allowed to conduct business using public property while I am not. A government that disallows that, or privileges other businesses over others (me) is engaging in a totally anti-capitalistic practice.

[Bigred]

2 hours ago, Lord Ratner said:

You have to contrast that with the cost of installing the system. Right now, and this is according to CA, without batteries you won't be able to make back the cost of the install if net-metering is fixed.

 

The best part is California is further reducing the NEM credits for new customers in April. It makes sense from the utility’s perspective, the mandate for solar on all new homes, plus the encouragement for solar on existing homes, has reduced the utility’s cash flow. They’ve gotta make up for it somehow.

 

[brabus]

Cough, nuclear power, cough…

[Biff_T]

17 hours ago, Lord Ratner said:

Sure, that was the theory, and I don't particularly mind the logic, though I don't agree either. But as California is learning, this system is benefiting those who need little benefit, and costing the lower class. Is there a single person here with home solar that didn't receive subsidies? The government paid for (statistically) wealthier Americans to install solar on their homes, and now the costs of net metering (which are largely detrimental to the power companies) are pushing the costs onto those without solar

Me.  I paid for my solar panels without being subsidized by CA (other than a tax credit) out of pocket.  I don't pay power bills anymore and it feels nice.   

I'm not an environmentalist, I don't drive an electric car.  I saw an opportunity to eliminate my power bill and make a little money.   CA provided me with this chance to "fuck over" the poor along with the power companies and I took it.   Burn fucking coal/oil until its all gone, I don't care.  I'll be pushing up daisies when the Arabs run out of their precious black money juice.  

If the power company is so concerned about the poor, why don't they cut some more overhead?   They are allowed to cut costs.  They are "forced" to charge the people without solar (not all people without solar are poor) more because they (power companies) like money.   They can lay people off just like Facebook.  

If you don't like solar, cool.  If I built an oil rig to generate my own power the oil companies would also come after my money along with Edison.  They're losing money and they refuse to adapt.  ×

[nsplayr]

14 hours ago, Lord Ratner said:

The stalling out of the wind and solar movement has forced politicians on both sides of the Atlantic to (finally) accept nuclear as the future.

It seems like overall you have a lot of California-specific net-metering gripes that I'm not equipped to debate about since I don't live there.

But the above...what universe are you living in? New utility-scale solar PV and wind installations and planned projects vastly, vastly outnumber any other tech. The cost of wind and solar have plummeted to below fossil-fuel levels while nuclear costs have risen (unfortunately) and fossil fuels have stayed flat.

Look, I'm a huge fan of nuclear power, both fission and especially fusion once we get that figured out at scale, and we should do way, way more nuclear. BUT, solar/wind technology, scale and cost improvements are massive wins for humanity and are expanding rapidly not due to some lizard-people Liberal conspiracy, but because they're now the cheapest ways to generate electricity, and humanity is going to need a lot more electricity both today and especially in the future. 

[Lord Ratner]

8 minutes ago, nsplayr said:

But the above...what universe are you living in?

It's the universe where input costs and secondary effects are factored into overall cost.

 

The oft quoted $.03 is nonsense. It ignores bad weather, damage maintenance, and, most critically, the costs associated with the rest of the grid. When you move to solar you drastically change the pricing dynamics of fossil fuel/nuke power production which is necessary in any system due to the inherent failings of solar and wind. Power plants are most efficient when running at full tilt 24 hours per day. Power demand doesn't work like that, however the use of solar takes somewhat regular and predictable demand curves and shakes them. Nice hot sunny day in the summer? Great, solar shines, and the power plants can spin down. But those same plants still have to be able to reach full grid coverage if a summer storm rolls in. Or similarly with a winter storm. So the irony here is that solar increases the cost of fossil fuel and nuclear power production, then brags about the cost difference. It is a 100% fact that on a cost basis alone, solar does not compete. Do you really think we would still need government subsidies to promote solar if it was cheaper? That's a lack of surface level analysis. 

Because of the lack of battery technology, which is nowhere close to ready for grid-level coverage, solar and wind do not reduce the need for baseload power. You still need full grid coverage from fossil/nuke for those times the sun is gone and the wind is calm. So you are adding to the infrastructure costs, leaving only the fuel reduction as the cost-savings offered from solar. That savings is far lower than the cost of solar manufacturing and infrastructure. 

To repeat, the less you use a power plant, the more expensive it becomes on a /KWh basis. Without the ability to store ~ 1 month of energy from a battery array (not happening anytime soon), you must maintain your non-solar/wind power generation capacity. 

25 minutes ago, nsplayr said:

BUT, solar/wind technology, scale and cost improvements are massive wins for humanity and are expanding rapidly not due to some lizard-people Liberal conspiracy, but because they're now the cheapest ways to generate electricity, and humanity is going to need a lot more electricity both today and especially in the future. 

I know this is par for the course, because you are generally the most self righteous person here (which says a lot if you can out-righteous me), but you're ability to straw man is almost as impressive as your ability to be consistently wrong. 

 

Thanks to Russia we now have all the evidence we needed that the wind/solar movement was bullshit. And no, you can't compose a scenario where this war isn't a factor. This is the problem with liberal ideology in general. It works great in a hypothetical world, it collapses in reality. Germany, the icon of solar and wind installations, has been importing wood from the US to burn in their power plants. Wood is one of the worst fuels imaginable, yet because their zeal for killing fossil/nuke power was unstoppable, they ended up using fucking wood(!), while having to fire up some coal plants too. So much for carbon emissions. Of course the EU quietly revises their climate guidance to declare nuclear power is now suddenly "green," because they see the failure of their wind and solar strategy agitating their populace. And the UK was paying people's power bills because they went up 500-1000%. Neat. How did we get there? The promise of solar and wind convinced these countries they could rely on countries like Russia to provide them with cheap fossil fuels for the "transition period" where they shut down the nasty fossil fuel and nuke plants. No need to invest in new power plants or fossil fuel exploration, wind and solar to the rescue.

 

Wind and solar are nothing but feel good nonsense. Ambrosia to the academics and virtue signalers, but impractical for wide-scale use. Solar/Wind + Batteries are great for purpose built systems that require off-grid or grid-failure resiliency, but that does not describe the average use-case. And anyone who has built a system like that without government subsidies knows how much more expensive it is than just plugging into the grid. 

[Lord Ratner]

54 minutes ago, Biff_T said:

Me.  I paid for my solar panels without being subsidized by CA (other than a tax credit) out of pocket.  I don't pay power bills anymore and it feels nice.   

I'm not an environmentalist, I don't drive an electric car.  I saw an opportunity to eliminate my power bill and make a little money.   CA provided me with this chance to "fuck over" the poor along with the power companies and I took it.   Burn fucking coal/oil until its all gone, I don't care.  I'll be pushing up daisies when the Arabs run out of their precious black money juice.  

If the power company is so concerned about the poor, why don't they cut some more overhead?   They are allowed to cut costs.  They are "forced" to charge the people without solar (not all people without solar are poor) more because they (power companies) like money.   They can lay people off just like Facebook.  

If you don't like solar, cool.  If I built an oil rig to generate my own power the oil companies would also come after my money along with Edison.  They're losing money and they refuse to adapt.  ×

Except your tax credit is a subsidy. So, not you. 

I built my system on my own. And it cost more than just using grid power. I'm designing a much bigger system for a new house, and it too will cost more than just using the grid. However the batteries and inverters are the main reason for the system (power-outage protection with a much smaller generator needed), so I'd skip the panels entirely except you can get pallets of used panels from power companies for very, very low prices, which make the system economically viable. But the used-panel strategy is a market abnormality supported by government subsidies, so I don't count it.

58 minutes ago, Biff_T said:

I saw an opportunity to eliminate my power bill and make a little money.   CA provided me with this chance to "fuck over" the poor along with the power companies and I took it.   Burn fucking coal/oil until its all gone, I don't care. 

Yeah I would do the same. I don't fault people for taking advantage of the system. When they defend it, however, is a different story. I don't think anyone on this forum thinks you care about anyone the poor, but CA allegedly does, and they are just discovering these policies are hurting them.