Electricity Price Increases

[Jstpssng]

Except wind and solar can not provide base load power, and that energy has to come from somewhere.

I call BS on this.

 

[ultrarunner]

They are now building the 2nd largest wind farm in the U.S. about 50 miles east of my place. Everyday I see lines of wind turbine towers and blades going down the interstate on trucks. It is going to produce far more than the state can use and the power will be exported to the grid. I don’t know why you say coal is cheaper than natural gas? The local plant ownership say that conversion from coal to gas will save approximately $10M annually in plant operations. Coal requires transport costs, gas comes in a pipeline. Coal requires more people to operate the plant, keep it clean and dispose of waste, gas turbines operate efficiently with little maintenance and personnel needed. And it is abundant and cheap. There will come a time when solar will be the greatest source of power in my area and I think within the next 10 years. As a forester, I’ve been hoping for biomass because it helps us to thin our forests and reduce high severity fires, but the hurdles have been cost as you stated. If we would look at costs to society, biomass would be a bargain when you consider the costs of wildfire management, rehabilitation, reforestation, and community infrastructure and lives lost to high severity fires that could be forgone by forest thinning to use as biomass. But of course the power isn’t as cheap as other options.

Maybe the mandated scrubbers to use coal make it not cost effective?

 

[ultrarunner]

There was a time when Nuclear was celebrated as the future to abundant low cost electricity… so abundant that talk was it could be offered at a residential flat rate…

California’s Nuclear plant was schedule to close with that being the goal for many years…

At the eleventh hour someone ran the calculations saying state going all electric can’t happen losing Nuclear… at least in the near future… so closing delayed…

 

[ponytug]

Except wind and solar can not provide base load power, and that energy has to come from somewhere.

Well, there's about 16GWh of batteries online in California at the moment for this and other reasons. About 14GWh is utility battery storage, and about 2GWh are homeowners. All of that soaks up energy when the cost is low, from any source, wind, solar, nuclear, hydro, whatever, and dumps it back to the grid when needed, effectively base load power.

Power companies are businesses, and coops aside, are in business to make a profit. If the power companies are adding gas turbines, wind, solar, and batteries, it is because they can make money doing so.

For reliability and grid stability, I think that we need a mix of power sources, as well as more interconnections to help regions out when they have atypical power demands.

I think anll energy sources have advantages and disadvantages; adding them is a change in the status quo, so something is different.

All the best,

Peter

 

[ponytug]

Maybe the mandated scrubbers to use coal make it not cost effective?

"Clean coal" with carbon capture is not even close to economic. Personally, I don't see how the cost can be lowered to the point of being competitive.

Without carbon capture, coal is becoming more expensive, as things like the hazardous elemental content (mercury, arsenic, etc.) of the ash start to make the ash disposal costly. That's not a US specific statement, that's true globally. China is adding solar farms and wind faster than coal.

Things change. It is a fact of life.

All the best,

Peter

 

[jyoutz]

Maybe the mandated scrubbers to use coal make it not cost effective?

Would you want a plant without scrubbers?

 

[jyoutz]

Except wind and solar can not provide base load power, and that energy has to come from somewhere.

Very true. There’s a mix of base load possibilities: natural gas, coal, hydro power, biomass, nuclear….

 

[tracter]

I have to call BS on this!

I call BS on this.

Call it what you will but it is not BS

 

[Larry Caldwell]

Not one superpower has ever had expensive energy. Remember that important piece of context.

In Wyoming, 2 old coal power plants have reopened to supply power to the data centers for Meta, Amazon, and Microsoft. We're all dependent upon Coal. Remember that important piece of context.

There are after treatments on the exhaust. It's a pretty clean power source at this point. Plus it's very cheap to produce a KW/Hr. Remember that important piece of context.

Every area has unique power generation abilities. There shouldn't be just one form of power generation, ie. renewables are great, but they can't provide sustainable base power supply. All power generation should be cheered on...

I have flown over the coal trains heading for Illinois from Wyoming. They stretched for miles. Wyoming certainly won't run out of coal. I have my doubts about digging up the Carboniferous Era and burning it. I am somewhat taken aback at a thousand megawatts of computing power.

 

[ultrarunner]

Would you want a plant without scrubbers?

It’s a cost of doing business…

What might be low cost in one area isn’t in another…

The 100 year old union foundry which had many well paying jobs left the Bay Area for Texas…

California officials celebrated its leaving and Texas officials celebrated its arrival…

According to the foundry it could not continue to operate given the ever increasing California compliance costs.

Texas, apparently does not have the same regs?