The Road To New England -- October 18, 2014

Updates

October 19, 2014: folks may have been following the story in Russia, the early snow in Moscow, and now the snow in Siberia. Ice Age Now/Bloomberg is reporting:

Last year, the snow level across Eurasia was the fourth highest for the month in records going back to 1967. In January, frigid temperatures dubbed “the polar vortex” slid out of the Arctic to freeze large portions of the U.S.

With the snow now piling up across Eurasia, will this winter be a grim reminder of last year’s?

While “the snow has gotten off to an incredible start,” [Judah Cohen, director of seasonal forecasting at Atmospheric and Environmental Research in Lexington, Massachusetts] Cohen said he needs to see how much covers the area through the entire month before he can make an accurate forecast.

Stay tuned.

By the way, the weather in Moscow: a short blurb here. The forecast is for snow tonight. The temperature in Moscow has been trending lower this year than historical norms. Regardless of one's position on global warming climate change extreme weather ice age now, this cold weather in Europe will impact the natural gas story, Putin vs EU.

Original Post

Boston.com is reporting:

Many Massachusetts households are going to see their electric bills shoot up 37 percent this winter, a rate increase that some advocates fear will put additional strain on low-income families.

State regulators approved the increase for National Grid household customers that would mean an average of $33 per month more for the typical residential customer and would push a typical monthly bill higher than $150.

Large-business customers will see even higher increases. [which will pass costs on to consumers]

National Grid has almost 1.3 million residential and business electric customers in Massachusetts.

The new rates take effect in November. [folks will see their November statements after the election]

‘‘This is pretty bad, and it’s going to really have a bearing on a lot of Massachusetts households’ abilities to just make ends meet this winter,’’ John Howat, senior energy analyst at the National Consumer Law Center in Boston, told The Boston Globe.

When my utility bill (electricity only; no natural gas) here in Texas goes above $95/month, I know it's been a hot month, lots of air conditioning, or we've used the washer/dryer a lot more than usual.

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Just Another Bad Nightmare

Remember ObamaCare? The website that let you keep your doctor, that let you enroll online.  After a gazillion hours and the smartest folks in software land, Oregon failed to enroll one single "customer." FoxNews is reporting:

Oregon has moved online customers to the federal site after software bugs and other technical problems kept the state from fully enrolling a single customer online.

I had forgotten that; I knew it was bad; didn't know it was that bad. 

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Obama Hits The Links

The Prisoner