Tom,

>>Tom,
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>>If I'm not mistaken, isn't the electricity you are using now, very expensive, since it was purchased under long term contracts that locked in a high price?
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>>And there were some rolling blackouts here this summer. Just not in my area, since I go thru DWP which is a city run service. But I heard about problems not too far from me.
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>>PF
>>
>
>Perry;
>
>You are correct - the electricity we are using was contracted at a very high rate. Then the cost dropped and we still have to pay the high rate - regardless of whether we use it or not. A major supplier of energy is Enron, the company in Texas that just went belly up. Enron has asked California to supply power to it’s customers as we cannot use all that we have purchased. California said no, because Enron would not be able to pay for it. We still have to pay Enron for our contract. Governor Davis is trying to renegotiate the energy contracts.
>
>There were a couple of power interruptions in your area but nothing like up here! We have 14 blocks and each day one block would be effected for several hours. On a Tuesday we were in block 12 and had a two-hour outage. On Thursday we had a second outage and called PG&E to ask why? They had moved us to block 14 so we had another outage after the first! Rotating outage was a mess. At first PG&E would not tell anyone anything. Then they rationalized, “If we tell which areas are without power, they may be subject to crime”! This put Public Service Departments in a position that they did not know where the outages would be. Power blocks were also re assigned so this helped to further the confusion.
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>Many businesses had problems up here – serious problems. Mexico is selling electricity to California, but because of the limitations of the power grid, only Southern California can use it. Our power lines will not carry the extra current.
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>The TV news said, “Even though we are using less energy in Northern California, because we have contracted to purchase more than we need, we will pay more for what we use”! Such is life!
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>Tom

Heh.. Grey Davis is such a knucklehead. Liberalism at its best. Cause a problem via overregulating and compound it by legislation, then blame someone else like the power companies. What a dope... Cause all the problems and take none of the responsibility. And to think that so many people actually voted for him..