Heat and electricity are two items that affect one another in various ways. It’s important to look at both to understand how they interact with each other.
How Temperature Affects Your Electrical Transmission Line
Temperature affects your electrical transmission line. Here heat increases the resistivity of the wires. When this happens the wires lose power as the voltage drop increases. Throughout all of this, power generators maintain a constant voltage at your local power plant though. It’s just the fact that increased load increases the temperature.
How the Weather Affects Your Electric Bill
As temperature affects your electrical transmission line, weather also affects electricity bills. This is something that people know happens, but oftentimes they don’t understand why. However, in southern states such as Texas, you’ll definitely notice this throughout the summer months. Regardless of how diligent you are with your thermostat or that you’re on a fixed rate plan, you’ll still see fluctuations in your electric bill. There are several reasons for this, including:
- Bills go up in the summer because the weather gets hotter. This is because generators have to work four times harder than when it’s cooler outside. The harder your generator works, the more you’ll pay for your electric bill. Of course, you’ll also pay more money for the generator’s additional work.
- In the wintertime, despite the fact that it’s still warm enough to be outside in many states, more people head inside. There they use the lights, entertainment systems, and other appliances more often.
- Weather catastrophes (e.g. tornadoes, hurricanes) disrupt local power plants and lines. In turn, this disrupts your electric flow. It’s important to understand that even minor weather issues (such as flooding) disrupt electricity as well.
These are just a few ways that temperature affects electricity. When you opt in for a variable rate electric plan you’ll notice these fluctuations much more than you would with a fixed rate electric plan. Nevertheless, it’s still interesting to note temperature’s effect here.
