said by AsherN:TOU billing works. It's about giving custmers an incentive to change some habits. And in most cases, it does not even require much change, other than a few buttons to push.
Bingo, this is it exactly. Customer demand is quickly approaching generation capacity. Currently it is really tough for the POCOs to build new plants (with environmental regulations and the overall cost of a new plant) so they need to figure out how to make the current system go further.
The bottom line approach is to more efficiently pass along the generation costs to the customer. You do this through 1) more accurate billing and 2) TOU billing (charge the customer more when it costs more to make the power).
Lazy, rich people will change absolutely nothing and throw a lot of unnecessary money away. Smart people (regardless of income) will change some habits (turn lights off when leaving a room, program washing machine/dishwasher/etc to run at night, turn up the thermostat a couple of degrees in the summer) or start to look at alternative power sources.
Personally, we will be going the route of PV with a new system scheduled to be installed this month. The system will be capable of generating our total monthly power usage during most months (we don't use much power, about 250-300 kWh /month for a family of 3) and will knock down our bill in the July and August. Based on power costs and the various incentives and tax rebates, it will pay for itself in 1.75 years.