Big Brother now wants to control the heat in our bedrooms….and every other room in our homes.
First the Federal Government mandated what kind of toilets we flush, then what type of light bulbs we can use, now they are turning up (or down) the heat on us by utility companies offering programmable thermostats that enable your air conditioners to be “cycled” on and off by some remote, unseen entity.

I recently received a mailing from my local utility company (PSE&G), touting this hip sounding “Cool Customer Program.”

http://www.pseg.com/home/save/manage_costs/cool_customer.jsp

Sounds great right? Who doesn’t want to be a “cool customer?” After all, the king of cool, our president Obama was elected in large part by young people who thought he was cool: not so much anymore. http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1395009/Obama-loses-youth-vote-poll-finds-white-students-dont-think-hes-cool-anymore.html
But I digress.

Being a Cool Customer becomes very uncool when you read into the program details. “At the same time, it will help customers conserve energy, save money, and help protect the environment. Once you enroll, PSE&G will install a new state-of-the-art programmable thermostat with a large touch-screen digital display (a $250 value) at no charge to you. If summer energy demand in our service area is extremely high, PSE&G may cycle your air conditioning compressor on and off to limit demand on the electric system. In return, you will receive credit on your electric bill of up to $50.”

So in return for a few shekels; a $50 credit and programmable thermostat you can get at Home Depot for under $100, by enrolling, the Cool Customer sells his right to control the climate in his own home for his own family.

The funding to PSE&G for this credit and thermostat (and the other utilities for their versions of the scheme)comes courtesy of you, the taxpayer through $3.4 billion in stimulus money granted in the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act. Please see the link to KEMA below.

http://www.kema.com/services/consulting/utility-future/smart-grid/follow-the-money-stimulus-funding-begins-to-flow-into-smart-grid-section.aspx

Isn’t that great? We hand over control of our home environment to government and we get to pay for it too!
But don’t worry. It’s ok to give up your right, your responsibility to take care of your family and manage your home as you see fit. You see, ceding your rights to government is a small price to pay to “help protect the environment” as PSE&G’s material puts it. Xcel Energy even has a catchy “green” video and website (responsiblebynature.com) for their version of the scheme.

http://www.responsiblebynature.com/save_energy_money/nd

We have already offered up too many of our private property rights (via increased costs of regulation) at the altar of environmentalism through among other things onerous government Corporate Average Fuel Economy (CAFE) standards, increased fossil fuel and Cap and Trade regulation and subsidies to “green energy sources.” We have all seen how well those sacrifices have turned out.

So when you hear the coolest customer of them all preaching about the shared sacrifices we have to make, remember what he really means is he wants you to sacrifice more of your rights to him.

And that my friends, like this sinister promotion, is not cool.