Today's question: What has been the cost per customer for Yukon Energy's recent advertising on radio, print and the newest "novelette" distributed to households?
Thanks for your question. Last year Yukon Energy spent about $51 million to bring power to Yukon homes and businesses. That works out to approximately $1,700 a person. Of that amount, about $8 per person was spent on a public information campaign to keep Yukoners informed about what we are doing and how we are planning to meet future energy needs. That $8 per person represents about 0.05 percent of our total capital and O & M budgets for the year. While it's a small number, it is an important one. Since Yukon Energy is a publicly owned utility that is operated for and by Yukoners, we believe Yukoners have the right to know how we are meeting the energy needs and what our vision is for the future. We can't keep you informed without spending a bit of money, but Yukon Energy believes it's a necessary expenditure.
by Land
I was just having a conversation about this with my parents last night. We were talking about being able to see the consumption chart online being interesting but the education on how it can be useful wasn’t there. I told them because of my talking about that, we now use the delay feature on our appliances so that they are running at non peak times. My mom said she had never even thought of doing something like that, she just does a load of laundry when it is needed. They felt that there needs to be better education around power reduction. We were remembering that probably 20 years ago there was a store front in Whitehorse set up to educate people about reducing their power consumption. I remember being a small child and winning a hot water tank blanket in a draw there; so excited but not realizing it was for the hot water tank and not me. This store front had lots of information and staff to help explain why using fluorescent lights is a good thing.
I guess what I am getting at is that my parents felt there wasn’t enough education for power consumption reduction. They need somewhere they can go and have people talk to them.
01.19.2011
by Yukon Energy
This is very good feedback. While there is a store front in Whitehorse (the Yukon government’s Energy Solutions Centre) there is certainly more Yukon Energy can do. For starters, we will include an explanation on our website about the purpose and value of the energy consumption charts, and how Yukoners can use those charts to reduce energy consumption and save money. You and your parents might also like to visit the Energy Savings House on our site. It provides lots of tips on how to reduce electrical use. It can be found at yukonenergy.ca/customer/residential/home_tour/.
We are in the process of developing a Demand Side Management (energy conservation) program and education will be an essential element of that. But in the meantime we will look at improving the information we provide on our website. Thank you.
01.19.2011
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