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October 17, 2011, 07:32:56 PM |
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I was offering BTC for the information - i.e. I would pay. I thought $20 of coin would be reasonable yesterday, although it looks a little less today.
Yes, the terms change depending on country. Network or distribution = the company that owns the poles and wires locally. You might also have a national high-voltage network covering the major connections between power stations and the main demand centres, but usually that is included in the network bill.
I am based in New Zealand where we have a few major retailers (6) and lots of small network companies (20-30). Fairly similar to Australia where I've also done a lot of work in this area.
The argument I am dealing with is basically as follows: - Retailers like to combine the network/distribution charges into the delivered price. - My client is a lines business that chooses to bill customers directly and the retailers can't then fudge the numbers (my cynical bias) - Some customers don't like paying their share of the network and are waging a campaign against the network company. - The local mindset is "no one else in the world does this, why do you?"
Now obviously other people around the world do actually charge separately for lines and energy. Most are a per unit or kWh charge, some have a daily charge, but few charge a "demand charge" measured in kW to residential or small commercial. Normally you would need a demand meter (or time-of-use/smart meter - a device that records consumption in half-hour or hour blocks, not just the total between meter reads.)
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