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Energy Rant

Sep 02
Love146

Regulatory Bureaucracy Drives Electricity Prices Higher

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I like to stay ahead of the curve here at the Rant, but I would have needed to call play-by-play like Kirk Herbstreit on a college football game to keep up with the Cracker Barrel makeover fiasco. The CBRL fiasco played out faster than a college football game, which now averages two days, four hours, and twenty-three minutes. Cracker Barrel executives and their ad agencies seem clueless about their clientele. Executives need to understand and keep the pulse on their customer base. Steve Jobs was famous for this, but less known for it are Susan Morris, CEO of Albertson’s Supermarkets,…
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Aug 26
Love146

Renewables, The Scam of the Century?

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First, A Branding Whetter. Two weeks ago, I peppered the Big Three Automakers, Ford, General Motors, and the company formerly known as Chrysler, for forgetting their cash-cow customer base, which loves large gas-guzzling sport utility vehicles and big honkin' pickup trucks. Last week, Cracker Barrel laid a more epic duck-up right in the grill of their core customer and fan base. In full disclosure, I've never been to a Cracker Barrel (ticker: CRBL). But even before that, The Wall Street Journal reported in June that CRBL is "decluttering" its stores. The clutter included farm tools, butter churns, and other folksy…
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Aug 19
Love145

The Chinese Communist Hedgehog’s Dam Project

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Doing a minor cleanup on personal transportation this week, here in the beloved City of La Crosse, I have one perennial gripe: road construction that takes an entire season. The saying goes, there are two seasons: winter and construction. Winter lasts three months, December through February, and I've come to love winter because it guarantees the end of excessive lane closures, in both number and duration. For example, there is a four-lane thoroughfare, one of only three that move north to south across the city, which is boxed between the river and the bluffs. It's long and narrow. They close…
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Aug 11
Love144

Automobile Preferences and Adolescent Food Fights

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Last week, The Wall Street Journal quietly mentioned that the transition to electric vehicles died months ago. "After the highly anticipated EV boom in the U.S. fizzled out, President Trump and Congress set out to eliminate state and federal regulations they argue were designed to mandate battery-powered vehicles for American consumers." I missed the news stories and headlines declaring the EV market dead. I don't think it's dead. Consistent with my 15-year-old prediction, I believe they are headed for a niche slice of the market with a steady 5-10% U.S. market share. They have their place in the market. In…
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Aug 05
Love144

Defending Utilities and RTOs

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This week, I'm providing the other side of last week's Less for More Train. From my 30 years of observation in and around the utility industry, utilities were driven into the oncoming mess of less reliability for higher electricity costs. I use the word bizarre to describe the utility industry to people who are new to it. Utility executives must position and finagle their companies within the boundaries of state and federal rules and mandates, quasi and typically poorly-functioning, half-pregnant competitive markets, turning a profit to attract capital from investors, and trying to keep prices reasonable for customers. Oh, and…
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Jul 28
Love143

All Aboard the Less for More Train

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Michaels Energy was founded in 1984 in the wake of the 1970s energy crises when fear of energy starvation gripped the nation and world. Forecasts indicated natural gas and crude oil reserves would soon be depleted. Policymakers were so freaked out that, for a short period, natural gas was banned from new buildings, not for greenhouse gas reductions, but because we needed to save it for, I don’t know, manufacturing or something. Indeed, Michaels’ first office building, located at 811 Monitor Street in La Crosse, was all electric, with a horrifically designed HVAC system with perimeter ceiling diffusers delivering heat…
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Jul 21
Love142

A Dive Into Nuclear Power Financials

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Saving the best for last, there was a session at the Mid-America Regulatory Conference entitled Nuclear, Go Small or Go Home. I could call that false advertising because there was almost no discussion on SMRs, or small modular reactors. Only a University of Illinois-Champaign researcher panelist mentioned SMRs. Why might this be? The freeze on nuclear power is thawing, brought to you, in part, by Springfield. Are SMRs the answer? We shall see a little bit in this Rant post. Long term, time will tell. Nuclear Power and Public Opinion Suzie Jaworowski, Indiana’s Secretary of Energy, said nuclear power has…
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Jul 15
Love141

Precedented Times in the Utility Space

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This week, I am just about wrapping up everything from the Mid-America Regulatory Conference held in Indianapolis. However, there is so much content that I’m saving the best (nuclear power) for last, next week. Cyber Threats An early session featured a panel of cybersecurity experts discussing the relentless and ruthless threats to our grid and utilities. As I listened to that with my cybersecurity training background and reading about it, I realized that the most significant vulnerabilities are soft targeting and social engineering, rather than brute force hacking. What is soft targeting? Tailgating through a security gate is one example.…
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Jul 07
Love141

MARC: Hawkeye Heist to Natural Gas

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During one of my weekend rituals of reading ZeroHedge over lunch, I noticed this article detailing The (Falling) Price Of A July 4th Cookout. It featured Figure 1 from Statista. Although I think it’s impressive that the feast can be purchased for $7 per head, my brain went to the more interesting statistics. Wow, that is a ton of food and calories for 10 people! – 1,865 per person, says Sam Altman, OpenAI / ChatGPT. See the breakdown in Figure 2. Pass the watermelon. Thank you. Figure 1 Cookout Cost for Ten Figure 2 Cookout Caloric Breakdown I know what…
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Jun 30
Love140

Press and Utility Strategies From the Mid-America Regulatory Conference

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Last week, I spent two and a half days at the Mid-America Regulatory Conference (MARC). This was my third consecutive attendance at the annual MARC. Each conference has featured substantially different, new, and engaging content. Last year's conference in Minneapolis featured many discussions on data-center load growth, nuclear power development, energy storage, workforce development, and my favorite quote, "We're not going to build our way out of this ." This year's conference in Indianapolis featured an amazing presence of utility executives and their visions for their companies, a little chatter about energy efficiency, load management, and demand response, some discussion…
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