That massive spike of 50c/kWh at the left looks tiny compared to today even though that's already insanely expensive

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[–] 137 points 2 years ago (5 children)

RIP to those running a 4090 on their rig.

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  • [–] 78 points 2 years ago (2 children)

    I get the joke, but in contrast to heating, you can easily just... not run demanding games while the electricity is insanely expensive for a day.

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  • [–] 66 points 2 years ago* (3 children)

    It would literally not matter since it all ends up as heat in the end which is what you're looking for anyway

    Minus 5 watts on the three fans or something

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    [–] 87 points 2 years ago (4 children)

    50 Euros a day is insane. That's a good portion of what I pay for a whole month.

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  • [–] 68 points 2 years ago

    Part of it was faulty pricing from a Norwegian electricity exporter. Also, they have almost finished the new infrastructure, so they do not have to import as much in crisis situations. I think a new nuclear power plant goes online and lots of renewable stuff. The problem OP is maybe talking about seems to be very well handled by the state and already solved. https://www.helsinkitimes.fi/finland/finland-news/domestic/24708-electricity-prices-in-finland-return-to-normal-levels-in-2023-down-64-from-previous-year.html

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  • [–] 18 points 2 years ago* (12 children)

    Lucky you. 175 square meters, 25cm styrofoam on walls and 30cm rock wool on ceiling and I pay 200€ per month in winter for gas heating in Poland. Solar panels are not economical in current regulations and billing rules have changed so those with heat pumps pay at least twice us much in coldest months.

    We are fucked from every angle.

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    [–] [S] 68 points 2 years ago (12 children)

    Tomorrow is back to normal. Even the 37c/kWh spike hardly registers on the graph compared to today even though that's still pretty expensive.

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    [–] 62 points 2 years ago (1 child)

    Do most Finnish people pay spot prices for electricity?

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  • [–] 42 points 2 years ago (2 children)

    Is there a specific reason the price spiked that much? That's a 950% price hike within four hours.

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  • [–] [S] 51 points 2 years ago (6 children)

    We've had negative 20 temperatures for over a week which happens about once every 10 years so the demand is extremely high and on top of that few of our powerplants are out of service for maintenance so that electricity has to be bought from abroad too.

    Few cold days in a row is not an issue as buildings still have heat stored up in the structures but when it lasts for a long time the demand for more heating goes up drastically.

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    [–] 37 points 2 years ago (2 children)

    If you're in a granny cottage then just burn wood instead? Doing this rn and am very happy to go off-grid for ca. 48 hours

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    [–] 35 points 2 years ago (1 child)

    Have you tried burning reindeer?

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  • [–] 26 points 2 years ago* (last edited 2 years ago) (2 children)

    Hang a few blankets or bubble foil against the windows for isolation insulation.

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    [–] 24 points 2 years ago

    what the fuck?

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  • [–] 23 points 2 years ago* (1 child)
  • [–] 19 points 2 years ago (8 children)

    -49.9°F is insane. A couple of years ago in the upper US Midwest, we set our record for around -45°F (-42.7°C) but that was with wind chill, the base temp. was something like -30°F (-34.4°C). People who've never experienced those kinds of temperatures really cannot comprehend how miserably cold it is and just how extremely dangerous it can be. I know there's probably arctic dwellers that are used to those kinds of temps regularly, but it blew my mind when I had to go out into it and still got cold under 3 layers of clothes.

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  • [–] 20 points 2 years ago

    wow that is crazy. my bill for December was $77 in the US.

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  • [–] 20 points 2 years ago (44 children)

    How are you using 21kWh/day heating a small home? Do you have any insulation at all?

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  • [–] 27 points 2 years ago (17 children)

    That's a perfectly normal number for any home that isn't very new and perfectly insulated.

    My 37sqm appartment needs approximately 5000 kWh in natural gas per year, 876 kWh last December, so 28 kWh per day on average. The building is admittedly old and not perfectly insulated but it's also not a log cabin out in the open in Finland, but instead a flat enclosed within 3 other flats in the middle of cosy, never below -8C Germany.

    21 kWh in a log cabin in Finnland actually seemed pretty low to me. It's sort of obvious OP is using a heat pump and the cabin must really be absolutely tiny.

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  • [–] [S] 25 points 2 years ago* (last edited 2 years ago)

    50kWh and closer to 90kWh on days like this. It's a log cabin and I'm keeping my root cellar and insulated shed above freezing aswell. Even running a 1kW heater all day would result in a consumption more than 21kWh and that wouldn't keep any house warm.

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  • [–] 18 points 2 years ago

    A tiny heater running all day would do that.

    1kw is a small heater. 0.8kw is a tiny one. 0.8x24 is 19.2. Assuming they have other basic appliances, that's already more than enough to account for their usage.

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    [–] 19 points 2 years ago (6 children)

    Is heating with electricity common in Finland? That seems like it would cost a fortune even in good times.

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  • [–] [S] 34 points 2 years ago* (5 children)

    Older houses burn oil for heating the house and water but even most of them have heatpumps installed. New houses usually also have heatpumps or geothermal so direct electric heating is more and more uncommon. Apartment buildings generally all have district heating and even some private homes do.

    Yes it's expensive but so is everything else too. Our houses are way better insulated than in most places though so that helps a little.

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    [–] 19 points 2 years ago* (3 children)

    Wouldn't there be a price cap in events that the wholesale market has anomalies like this? That's standard in most jurisdictions. The wholesale price is still "real" because there's some system or market condition reflected in this spike, it's just not normal for ratepayers at the distribution level to not have a price cap protection. It's like the opposite scenario if the price isn't high enough to cover the cost in actually delivering the energy and running the grid, so a Global Adjustment would come in to effect to cover the difference. There can even be surplus conditions where the price is in the negative.

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    [–] 19 points 2 years ago (7 children)

    i keep a pile of coal in the cellar for the extra cold days

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    [–] 18 points 2 years ago (4 children)

    Finland has more than 330 hydro power plants, with total capacity of over 3,100 megawatts in 2022. Hydro accounted for 18% of Finland’s total installed power generation capacity and 22% of total power generation in 2021.

    WTFINLAND

    Hydro-Québec Production main power plants (2020) Total Others (49 hydro, 1 therma) - 13302 MW

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