The EcoEnergy program is almost useless and I do not recommend it. The inspections required to get your rebate don’t even include thermal imaging, and you had to wait months for an inspection. If you get a $100 back on a $600 drain water heat recovery unit — now you are out $500 and it may never pay back. I did exactly this so that I could run some studies, but not to save money. The whole exercise costs me tens of thousands of my own monies. There are similar problems with insulation — except for extreme cases, it is not cost effective even with the grant monies. I maxed out the program out before it was cancelled the first time, and many small companies that had hired staff were wrecked when the program was cancelled unexpectedly. They just don’t trust government programs anymore to be cancelled without notice and aren’t willing to have their businesses ruined. The grants were also insufficient to make things like solar hot water cost effective. I have the research data to prove it and built an evacuated tube system from scratch complete with extensive instrumentation, so I don’t recommend it to others except as a hobby. I publish all my data as a public service as well as exposing every energy related scam I find.

The displacement of rural agricultural workers due to modern farming methods, and especially after the land enclosure laws in the 1800s has displaced millions into factory work and fed the labor needs of the industrial revolution. North Americans were not too bad off in the 1900′s because of the rise of the middle class, largely due to unions, but this is now in reverse. The system can work, but only as long as there is a need for sufficient labor such that involuntary unemployment is low and wages are above subsistence levels. Automation and outsourcing are getting rid of that rapidly. Millions of common persons have a pretty raw deal — no land, no means to produce anything, and no wages either. At some point, they would be better off as feudal serfs, and this wouldn’t be the first time inequity sparked a revolution.

Modern agricultural methods have been great, but are not sustainable at current levels. Natural gas is used as a feed stock for fertilizer production and will become prohibitively expensive, aquifers will drop to unusable levels and areas of the US Midwest will have to revert to grasslands. I do see using combine harvesters long into the future, but I also see demands for land reform. When millions have no job and nowhere to live and get hungry, they either need productive land to call their own where they can have their own shack and a food garden or the state had better prepare for chaos. If government response to the #occupy movement is any indication of what will come, I expect things are going to get very ugly.

Alternate energy is not a solution by itself. Read http://www.withouthotair.com/ for a good overview of the absolute futility of this approach. Add to this problems with EROI and you will see that all solutions require radical changes to community planning as well as housing design. Our future energy consumption is going to be a small fraction of what we use now. Adding some insulation or solar panels isn’t enough.

Regulated utilities aren’t free to arbitrarily increase rates, but they can make a case for whatever they want and this is usually rubber stamped. Their empires expand constantly, C-level salaries go up, investor losses on bad investments (like three mile island) are covered — and in the end, rates go up. It is like saying that governments aren’t free to increases taxes of passport fees — technically they can be voted out, but practically, they get what they want and voters are essentially powerless.

If you think that prices will stay the same without smart meters and go up with smart meters I am afraid you are mistaken. Energy costs are going up and the alternative to smart meters and time a day billing is a flat increase.

At least with smart meters and time of day billing people have a choice.

Besides utilities are regulated monopolies. They can’t just jack their rates, they need to make their case to the public utilities commission.

According to the International Energy Agency’s 2010 report we hit peak oil in 2006. That combined with the rise of the developing world means that energy prices are going to rise allot and that has nothing to do with smart meters. Smart Meters just mean each of us gets to pay his/her fair share.

Second, One of the ways we are going to deal with climate change and peak oil by creating power positive buildings hooked up to a smart grid. You can’t have a smart grid with out smart meters.

“The trend towards elimination of jobs via outsourcing and automation is out of control and will lead to a social collapse. ”

Where the heck did you get that idea? In the last hundred years we have gone from 50% of the population working on farms to just 3% or less now. Is that the kind of automation your talking about? Should we smash the grain harvesters? This trend has been going on for over 5,000 years what makes you think it is suddenly a problem?

However, I do agree with all your ideas about making more efficient buildings. That’s what those ecoEnergy grants from the Natural Resources Canada are for. They provide grants for replace old windows, adding insulation etc. Why not do something responsible and direct people to that program?

Thanks for writing this excellent article. It presents many facts and shows true face of engineering education at MUN. I suggest you send this article or a shorter version to chronicle.com for possible publication.

I also suggest you visit http://disciplinedminds.tripod.com/ and read that book. (available in QEII)

Enjoy holidays.

Regards

Tariq