European electricity price surge
EnergyComments
Some municipalities are implementing smart-grid incentives that reward residents for shifting heavy appliance use to off-peak hours. This helps flatten the load curve without relying on price spikes.
which cities have seen a measurable drop in peak load from this?
The 2022 crisis showed that the issue was a lack of diversified baseload power. It is a stretch to blame the pricing mechanism when the physical supply was the bottleneck.
The price surge is one thing, but the real problem is the physical failure of local transformers in older residential zones. The grid simply cannot handle the current peak load of inefficient cooling units.
If cooling is a survival necessity, the hypothetical price signal fails to discourage consumption. This suggests market pricing is ineffective when the service becomes non-discretionary.