Electricity prices up 5% YoY, also home-energy monitoring!

Just because you wanted to know: electricity prices are up 5% year-over-year in California, and about the same amount across the U.S. See this chart for more data.

Depending on the state, it's a mixed bag. But it is fun to read how much prices vary: people in Idaho pay 7c/kwh, whereas Connecticut and Hawaii pay >20c!

My household spends >3x as much on electricity as gas (natural and automobile combined). I wonder if this is common, because the ratio seems high. The computers amount to maybe 15% of the total, so having too many computers isn't skewing the numbers too much.

It's a good thing utilities and other companies are paying attention to this. If you want something to help understand your energy usage before your utility company and Google fix it, this article has two good alternatives, called Blue Line and TED (which weirdly is branded very much like the TED conference.)

Geoff Fowler at the WSJ seems to like the Blue Line/Black & Decker monitors slightly more than the TED thing. Maybe it's worth trying one, since they sound pretty easy to install.