Someone's gotta say it

Comments

• HazardousBanjo@lemmy.world ⁨35⁩ ⁨minutes⁩ ago

  This is partially true.

  The real cause of the massive spike in power costs is AI data centers.

  Laws need to be passed that not only limit what non green energy AI data centers can use, but place the burdedn of cost of their power entirely on the corporation

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  • tomiant@piefed.social ⁨10⁩ ⁨minutes⁩ ago

    The real cause is DnD and computer games.

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    • undrwater@lemmy.world ⁨7⁩ ⁨minutes⁩ ago

      You mean…Satan?!?

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• tomiant@piefed.social ⁨10⁩ ⁨minutes⁩ ago

  China knows. China knoooows.

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• danc4498@lemmy.world ⁨42⁩ ⁨minutes⁩ ago

  I just saw a new report in the break room giving suggestions for lowering your heat bill. Things like keeping temperature below 68. At no point did it suggest QUIT USING AI.

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• givesomefucks@lemmy.world ⁨48⁩ ⁨minutes⁩ ago

  Bullshit.

  You really think companies in America with monoplies would lower prices just because their costs went down?

  I wish I lived in an America like that…

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  • UnderpantsWeevil@lemmy.world ⁨17⁩ ⁨minutes⁩ ago

    You really think companies in America with monoplies would lower prices just because their costs went down?

    So, theoretically, there’s a point at which induced demand through lower prices can raise profits. Having a monopoly on an elastic good only benefits you when you’re onboarding new clients at an escalating pace. Private energy companies looking to increase energy consumption overall may well take an upfront haircut on the retail price in order to encourage more people to adopt hardware that consumes the commodity.

    But - over the long term - sure, the incentive is to capture more revenue in pursuit of higher profit. And that means raising prices faster than inflation.

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  • palordrolap@fedia.io ⁨37⁩ ⁨minutes⁩ ago

    in America

    And you can almost cross out "with monopolies" too because there's a lot of tacit price-fixing in industries where there is competition.

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    • chuckleslord@lemmy.world ⁨25⁩ ⁨minutes⁩ ago

      Oligopolies, monopolies. Potato tomato, potato tomato

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• UnderpantsWeevil@lemmy.world ⁨26⁩ ⁨minutes⁩ ago

  Our utility bills would be cheaper if the government invested

  So much of the price of a thing is bound up in the administrative overhead and profit extracted at every step of the delivery process. You can pull a kwh of energy out of the ground, in the form of a lump of coal or a liter of gas, for pennies on the dollar when it is eventually sold retail. And that’s before we consider the pricing impact of artificial scarcity that occurs under the ERCOT model of wholesale electricity auctions.

  By contrast, the TVA system has kept prices below (often far below) the national market rate simply by operating at-cost as a public enterprise. Energy companies in socialist states - from Sweden to Iran to China - can even retail electricity at subsidized rates (below cost of production) as a loss leader intended to spur high value domestic energy-hungry industries like steel manufacturing and chip fabrication.

  Getting to green energy now that the global economy is flush with dirt-cheap high yield solar panels and market-competitive lithium batteries definitely cuts the raw labor / machine costs of fossil fuel extraction. And they defer the tail costs of fuel waste pollution management as well as the associated ecological and human health knock-on effects. But even sticking to the old fossil fuel economy is cheaper under a public system when the costs of operation aren’t inflated by the demands of private administrators and investors.

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• Brkdncr@lemmy.world ⁨38⁩ ⁨minutes⁩ ago

  Stop calling it green and start calling it cheap/free if you want to make some progress.

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  • thesohoriots@lemmy.world ⁨34⁩ ⁨minutes⁩ ago

    Green? Like RADIOACTIVE? Like three mile island? Fool me twice, don’t get fooled again!

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