Ultimately, the power company needs to bill us for the amount of coal that they burn plus a little extra for wear-n-tear and to service the capital required to build out the generation and delivery infrastructure. Toasting a single slice of bread does not require much coal.

Similar to our slipperty use of terms when referring to Modem/Router/Access Point/Gateway, typically calling the box a “router”, we slur the difference between VI “power” and KWH “power”.

With respect to a lightning strike, VI is high, but KWH is low. You can think of this as dropping a large brick on an outhouse vs subjecting the outhouse to a hurricane. Bottom line is that the outhouse is flattened, or in the case of a hurricane, possibly carried away, but the overall “energy” expended during the event is quite different.