Cheryl Ellington's blog

As I sit here putting together information for this piece, I am dressed in layers of clothing and blankets while my feet rest on a hot water bottle to insulate me from the chill in my 63 degree home. After moving to Wilson from Charlotte six years ago and reeling from the sticker shock of that first electric bill, I accepted that cold winters—indoors—were going to be a way of life if I wanted my electric bill to remain remotely close to where it was when I was a Duke Power customer. You cannot pay a reasonable rate in this town to stay reasonably warm. The opposite is true in the hot months—somehow we adjust to the balmy 79-80 degree thermostat setting. Thus began my intense curiosity and crusade to understand what went so terribly wrong to drive our electric rates into the stratosphere.