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Jan 08
Love62

Seven Chicken Bones for 2024

By Energy Rant No Comments
I was going to skip predictions for 2024, but due to popular demand, I’ll throw some chicken bones at the tarot card enthusiasts. Like other things in my life, I don’t make safe bets or set goals of high probability. If my guesses aren’t 50% wrong, I’m not sufficiently aggressive. Clean Energy Investment Curtailment Inflation will continue to chop block the economy, including clean energy investment. I have a saying that many have heard in recent months: inflation is no problem for those of us who don’t need food or shelter. The Wall Street Journal recently reported that manufacturing in…
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Jun 01
Love31
Image shows graphic of a dollar sign and lightning bolt with text "CenterPoint Customers to See Rate Hike as Utility Recovers $200M Spent on Emergency Generation."

CenterPoint Customers to See Rate Hike as Utility Recovers $200M Spent on Emergency Generation

By Grid Capacity No Comments
Original Source: PUC: CenterPoint can recover $200 million from Houston customers (houstonchronicle.com) CenterPoint used one of Life Cycle Power's mobile generation units, shown here, to provide power to a community center in Lake Jackson after Hurricane Nicholas. CenterPoint has leased 500 megawatts of mobile generation, which will cost ratepayers about $200 million. Critics argue CenterPoint rushed the contracting process. Electricity customers in Houston are about to see their bills increase after the state Public Utility Commission gave a green light for CenterPoint to increase its rates. The increase comes as CenterPoint seeks to recoup $200 million in costs it incurred to to lease mobile…
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Jun 01
Love31
Image shows electricity with text "America is being hit by a surge of blackouts - and it's only going to get worse!"

America is Being Hit by a Huge Surge in Blackouts- And it’s Only Going to Get Worse

By Grid Capacity No Comments
Original Source: Why Blackouts, Power Outages Are Becoming More Common (businessinsider.com) Normally, Scott Gann's air conditioning kept his house in Columbus, Ohio, cool during the Midwest's increasingly hot summer days. But in June, as the heat index climbed to 110 degrees Fahrenheit, Gann — along with more than 600,000 Ohioans — suddenly lost power, leaving him sweltering in his home. "It's just a different kind of experience when you're at your house trying to sleep and it's literally 95 degrees," he told me. Many who could afford it decided to flee to hotels in unaffected areas, but Gann and the…
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May 25
Love31

Appalachian Power Updates its Annual Clean Energy Plan

By Storage No Comments
Original Source: AEP Appalachian Power - Appalachian Power updates its annual clean energy plan (electricenergyonline.com) Appalachian Power updates its annual clean energy plan. March 20, 2023 Clean energy projects that deliver affordable, reliable power while creating jobs and tax base are integral parts of Appalachian Power's plan to meet its renewable energy obligations in Virginia. The information is included in the company's annual update filed this week to comply with the Virginia Clean Economy Act (VCEA). The VCEA is a law that requires the company provide its 542,000 Virginia customers with carbon-free energy by 2050. With its passage, Appalachian Power…
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Mar 28
Love21
illustration of the earth asking for help

Are You Serious About the Climate Apocalypse?

By Energy Rant, Featured Energy Rant No Comments
Washington Post headline last week: “World is on brink of catastrophic warming, U.N. climate change report says.” Wolf! Wolf! People aren’t serious about decarb, and this post will prove it, but I provide ways to get it done. Is Solar Plus Storage Competitive? Solar is nice, but the numbers are ugly. If solar and storage with batteries were a serious contender for a clean energy grid, electric utilities would be soiling themselves because solar and batteries would put them out of business as customers would install their own and cut the cord. Let’s look at some basic arithmetic. Lazard pegs…
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Jan 31
Love11

Power Grid Vulnerabilities; Eyes on the Prize

By Energy Rant No Comments
In this year’s twelve-pack of predictions for 2023, I forecast that the attacks on the U.S. power grid would continue, and the media would desperately attempt to blame their ideological opponents as extremists. Yawn. The attacks certainly risk public welfare, safety, and security, but what’s behind them? I took a couple of hours to investigate. Terrorism The Time article I referenced includes a quote, “’ Domestic terror groups understand that citizens losing power from gunfire or sabotage is an easy way to receive media attention, which they crave,’ says Brian Harrell, a former Assistant Secretary for Infrastructure Protection at the…
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Oct 26
Love0
Wild Energy Ride

Next Up: A Wild Energy Ride

By Energy Rant One Comment
It has been a frothy year for the energy industry, and it will continue well into next year and beyond. How far? Heh heh. Let’s start with coal. After plummeting 30% in 2020, consumption bounced back, gaining 35% in 2021. Doing the math, that doesn’t quite get coal back to 2019 consumption. Coal plants are still closing at a breakneck pace, so consumption in the United States is bound to decline in the long haul, but will load balancers and utilities be able to keep the lights on in 2030? This is a concern to me because no source of…
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Jan 22
Love0

Untold Story of Disappearing Energy Jobs

By Energy Rant No Comments
On the subject of electricity generation sources and price, I’ve been reading numerous articles from various bona fide sources and started connecting dots. Public Utilities Fortnightly (PUF) has written about historically low electricity prices, as a percent of GDP or household spending, numerous times in the past year. Electricity price escalation has not kept pace with the consumer price index. As of last August, Steve Mitnick, of PUF shared data, which I plotted on the chart below.A year ago, I wrote about this topic as well in Low Electricity Prices - For How Long?. In that post, I explained how…
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Oct 02
Love1
Capacity Factor

Renewable Energy, Bad Parents, and Midwest Strawberries

By Energy Rant 2 Comments
If you enjoyed the greatest modern decade of sports, when MJ went six for six in the NBA finals, you would remember this McDonald’s commercial nearby. In it, Larry challenges Michael to a game of trick shots for Michael’s Big Mac and Fries. (I don’t know why my adolescent idol, MJ, would agree to play for something he already paid for, but…) As you can see, the game quickly progresses into an outlandish game of “first to miss, loses.” It leaves off with a shot from the top of Chicago’s fourth tallest building, the Hancock Tower. Cost of Electricity I…
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Mar 23
Love0

Clean Energy Disconnect Between Say and Do

By Energy Efficiency, Energy Rant No Comments
This article, Americans could pay more for clean energy.  But will they really?, from Utility Dive reminds me of my own life experiences with squirrelly people.  They talk a good game, but where is the action?  It also reminds me of the folly in precise net-to-gross, or attribution studies. The article highlights findings of a University of Michigan study regarding consumer concerns over energy prices and the environment.  The findings include: Ninety three percent say energy prices are affordable. The threshold for unaffordable is a 140% increase! Energy markets are inelastic (I said this a long time ago). Self-reported willingness…
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All things energy. That’s our jam.

We talk a lot about energy – from the serious to the satirical.

All things energy. That’s our jam.

We talk a lot about energy – from the serious to the satirical.

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