That seems backwards. The aggregate preferences and habits of humans should be seen as an incentivizing force for the creations of new technologies, not the other way around.
Yikes. Yes, of course technology is driven by human preferences. But, No, humans must occasionally accept that certain habits are not sustainable given current and near-future technologies.
I generally agree with your position but in this particular scenario the people with the greatest capacity to adjust their behavior are the people who will be affected the least financially by a hike in peak prices and thus less likely to change or more likely to invest in solar at home, while those with the least flexibility in work arrangements and spending, e.g. lower income earners working in the services sector, will be affected negatively the most and unable to work around it.
If the spot market was the status quo, and someone was suggesting a change to the current system of flat prices, one could make the same argument. (Ie already well off people are flexible enough to make use of the new system better.)
More variant pricing will better distribute usage. The unfortunate effects on the poor can be negated by a sales tax paid back to all citizens equally as a lump sum.
Well, in that case, pricing electricity differently through the day will encourage people to develop new technologies for cheaply generating and/or storing electricity for evening consumption peak.
That's like saying market economies are backwards. We need to match resources to people somehow, and markets are a very popular way to do that fairly and efficiently.
I'm not saying that markets should be unchecked but it's very strange to see such naked Marxism on this site.
It doesn't have to incentivize new technologies. It could just as easily incentivize new business models. Imagine a laundromat that sells "FREE DRYING" during the day. Heck, I bet you a lot more people will do laundry during the day time. Similarly, power companies can give incentives for more day time power usage. A lot of people already follow night time power usage today so its no reason to think it wouldn't work.
