Work is usually full of nerd stuff which typically bores most people, but there are a few cool programs where if people understood a few of the engineering concepts behind them, they'd be much more interested in participating. For example, take the PeakRewards program. Essentially, the program allows BGE to remotely control your central air conditioning during a few days throughout the summer for a lump sum rebate paid back to you. Now the obvious benefit is that it forces the customer to conserve energy then and there at the cost of potential minor discomfort. The other part is that on the whole, energy is more expensive for BGE to buy during those peak times when your AC would be running, so the energy market will eventually reflect lower prices as per the lower demand. One of the bigger benefits that most people don't realize is that transmission, distribution, and all equipment associated with electricity delivery become less efficient if heavily loaded at those peak times, and typically the design only calls for appropiate peak capability. Significant shaving of peak loading can lead to exponentially fewer losses on the transmission and distribution systems. Lastly, the least addressed benefit is the curtailment of capital expenditures associated with designing for peak loading operations. For example, when everybody turns on their AC from 5-7 pm in the summer, the load on a transformer may reach 35 MW for a 30 minute period. If the transformer is only designed to facilitate 33 MW, we'd have to spend $5 million on upgrading that transformer. Sufficient enrollment in PeakRewards may shave that peak below 33 MW, thus deferring or all together dismissing the need for spending all that money on an upgrade. Eventually, those savings to the company are passed back to the customer through rate casing.

I may be a nerd, but everybody wins.