SAN DIEGO — After months of dealing with May Gray and June Gloom, many of us have forgotten some of the tips to save money during the July fry, so we checked in with SDG&E to get some reminders.
“Pre-cool your home before 4 p.m. because typically most of our customers are on a time-of-use plan which means before the hours of 4 and 9 when demand surges, the price can go up too,” said Communications Manager Alex Welling.
- SDG&E also recommends doing laundry and running the dishwasher outside of those peak hours.
- Another tip: Close blinds so the sun can't enter a room.
- Whole house fans are okay, but shouldn't be used if it's warmer outside your home than inside because it'll just bring that hot air inside. Instead, personal fans are better, but make sure you turn them off when you leave a room.
Nowadays, with an increase in electric cars on the road, we're using more and more power. Energy experts say we all need to do the little things to keep electricity use from spiking - which can lead to power prices going up in the future.
“Each one of us can contribute to decreasing that cost by just turning off like 1-kilowatt hour and if thousands do that, we're going to bring the cost down collectively and that will impact all of us down the road,” said Saeed Manshadi, SDSU Assistant Professor of Electrical and Computer Engineering,
The state's power operator says, at this point, we have enough electricity to prevent rolling outages.
Also working in our favor, Mother Nature has been cooperating by keeping wind gusts down, especially in the East County.
“Right now, our team doesn't anticipate any public safety power shutoffs,” Welling said. “Really, the winds aren't there, but we're continuing to monitor it to make sure we're operating the grid in a safe manner.”
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