Re: Electric Demand ?
With all the auto manufacturing, steel mills, stamping plants, and other smaller plants shutting down, some people who don't have a job will not be using their A/C. Just like the demand for gas is down. With millions of people not driving to work each day reduced the demand for gas. With the plant closings and no products being shipped, diesel is now under $2 a gallon where as it was up above $5 last year.
I had a bro-in-law that worked at the General James A Gavin power plant in Gallipolis Ohio. Its basically 2 coal fired plants. It was built back in the 60's and during this whole time, both sides of the plant never ran at the same time. The reason for that is the emissions. If both sides were to be fired up, they would get cited for going over the limit on emissions. Some plants will drop off the grid if the demand is not needed. For reduced amount of output, they can throttle down a couple of turbines to run just a few to maintain an output.
I do know when and if things pick up again, there will be the need. For now though, I don't buy into their understanding of an electrical energy crisis.
BTW, A/C's of today are a whole lot more efficient than the ones that were made 5 years ago. Even changing to the CFL's has lowered consumption. When I changed all mine to CFL's, my bill went down in a very noticeable way.
