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Dear Giuliana Rossini:

Posted: August 5, 2016 at 8:54 am   /   by   /   comments (0)

Thank you so much for the letter you signed on behalf of Hydro One, dated July 22, 2016. It’s so wonderful to get a piece of mail from Hydro One that doesn’t contain a bill. I’m sure I’m joined by my one hundred neighbours in expressing how exciting it is to receive the Hydro One Home Energy Report. Apparently, I am one of just over ten million homes, worldwide, who will receive a Home Energy Report to monitor my energy usage and help me reduce my consumption! I feel blessed to be among the millions. In particular, I like that my report has been personalized and my energy usage compared to at least one hundred of my neighbours on their energy usage. This report tells me that I use more energy than the rest of the folks in my neighbourhood. Well, ain’t that special? According to your reckoning, houses comparable in size to mine, and in my neighbourhood, use way less energy than I do. I am, most obviously, an energy guzzler of epic proportions.

Most obviously, you don’t know me very well. First of all, my home isn’t even close 1,736 square feet in area, but you’ve decided to compare my home to homes of that size. That being said, I suppose I should have used far less energy in my much smaller house. But the point of my letter (and I do have a point) is you have mistaken me for someone who wouldn’t check with my neighbours to see who the “efficient” one hundred folks are. I haven’t spoken to one of those people, yet. You’ve also assumed that people wouldn’t know one hundred other home-owning energy users in their own neighbourhood. Obviously, you don’t know small community Ontario very well. We all know each other in a six-degrees- of-separation kind of way. So, back to the report. My so-called “efficient neighbours” only used 375 kWh of electricity from June to July of this year. Okay, that’s possible for my efficient neighbours who aren’t even in the neighbourhood for a fair portion of the year, choosing, instead, to enjoy the sun and surf in the sunny south of the U.S. or someplace similar. Then you’ve presented a bar graph representing All Neighbours who used 758 kWh of electricity in that timeframe. I’m down with that. My next door neighbours fell into that category. To say the least, I think the neighbours were a bit insulted to be dumped into that category. Personally, I can’t imagine any ordinary household using less energy than they do without being off the grid. What about me? Glad you asked.

I’m in the category labelled “YOU.” I don’t like the shouty capital letters. They seem so angry. LOML and I spent about a month away from the County in that timeframe. We live, virtually, in the dark. The rooms in the upper portion of our house are closed off from the rest of the house unless we have guests. You, Giuliana, suggested we could save lots of money by replacing all of our light bulbs with those curly efficient ones. Been there. Done that. Then you suggested some quick fixes, like an efficient refrigerator. Thanks to Evan in Wellington—been there, done that. Efficient showerheads? That is so one decade ago, Giuliana. Not only do we have an efficient shower head but much to the dismay of our kids, we have a timer in the bathroom— three minute showers are the limit. All of our appliances are fairly new and are ENERGY STAR labelled, including our furnace.

What was my energy usage during this period? Glad you asked. It was 812 kWh. According to the report that is 27 per cent more than the one hundred “Neighbours” who, as you put it “may not be on your street or your immediate neighbours.” Well, who the heck are they if they aren’t really my neighbours, Giuliana? How many trees did you kill to send out that crappy report? How much energy was used to fire up those printers, envelope stuffers and keep the lights on while you compiled that report? I think the only things that are inefficient in this scenario are my smart meter, Hydro One and you, Giuliana.

 

theresa@wellingtontimes.ca

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