The climate change religious freaks were wrong that we could power our country completely on renewable energy. Our electricity system has become increasingly unreliable and energy shortages are a "when", not an "if," because we closed too many fossil fuel generators that can run at peak when needed. Oops. But in order to cover up that lie, they have made up a new one. They purport that if we only triple the amount of electric transmission in this country that we could reliably power our entire country with only renewable sources of energy.
Fool me once, shame on you. Fool me twice, shame on me! I'm done listening to the climate change preaching because it's become increasingly clear that it is nothing but a control method thought up by a bunch of people who know nothing about electricity. Spending trillions (that's with a "t") on new electric transmission lines won't make renewables reliable. It will just compound the problem and turn electricity into a commodity only obtainable by the elite. See how that works? It's all about control.
And how do you control the people? Propaganda. If you say something often enough, then it becomes fact in the minds of the unenlightened. We are currently awash in Big Transmission propaganda. Only if we build an unobtainable amount of transmission before 2030 can we meet Grandpa Joe's climate change goals (as if that old fart is any more than a puppet being controlled by Big Green). Big Media is stupidly repeating big lies because they think that makes them "smart." They are currently pretending that the age of some transmission components is the reason most of the country is expected to experience blackouts, instead of the fact that we have closed too many peaking dependable generators. Did they not even read the report they are "reporting" on? They also like to pretend "the energy grid" is responsible for the potential blackouts. Do they really think transmission lines are the problem? Or are they just so exceptionally stupid that they think electricity is produced by the wires?
Take a look at this week's Big Propaganda from the inaptly named "Energy Intelligence." Snicker, giggle, haw haw. We're supposed to believe that "red tape" is the reason we can't have renewable energy. This piece is brimming over with mind control.
It complains that every wind and solar project cannot connect to the existing transmission system quickly and cheaply. There's a reason for that, and it's not what they think. We designed our system of generators and transmission lines for efficiency, not source of energy. The system is designed to make the generator pay for its own connection to the system. After all, the generator is the one who is going to make money selling power at that connection. There is no other magic pool of money to pay for connection. If the generator does not pay, then all the electric customers pay (even ones that won't use that generator). That's not fair. Another reason for making the generator pay for its own connection is to encourage efficient siting of new generators. We should build the most cost effective generators in order to keep electric rates low. Making the generator pay to connect forces them to site their plant efficiently. They would not build a coal plant in Lower Slobovia because connecting it to the system would be way too expensive. They would build it in Upper Slobovia instead because the transmission system is closer and stronger there. Fuel source is not a consideration. If we instead build generators using fuel source as the only consideration, then the connections get really expensive. Whining about that is a way to attempt to shift the cost of inefficient generator siting to electric consumers, even though the renewable generator is literally generating buckets of taxpayer dollars from thin air. Heaven forbid they have to use a little of your gold to pay for their own connection!
There's a huge interconnection backlog because renewable developers take multiple spots for the same generator, hoping to find the cheapest connection. A huge percentage of projects in the queue (80%) never get built because greedy developers are clogging queues with speculative connection requests. Those projects were never real to begin with. It's just developer gaming.
NO, we will not shoulder more cost burden so renewable developers (many of them foreign corporations) can connect anywhere it's cheap and easy to build in order to increase the amount of taxpayer dollars they walk away with.
Somehow, Big Wind + Big Solar + Big Transmission are "choked by regulation", but yet we need MORE regulation on fossil fuel energy systems? Are they really saying that we should let an invasive industry do whatever it wants?
This OpEd makes regional transmission operators/independent system operators (RTO/ISO) look like nothing but utility cartels that somehow got control of the electric system. While incumbent utilities have made up the majority of the organization memberships for decades, there's nothing stopping Big Wind + Big Solar + Big Transmission from participating, except for the fact that they're not really needed for any reliability or economic purposes and therefore would not be ordered by the RTO. Merchant generators and transmission cannot shift their costs to captive ratepayers without an RTO order. Seems fair enough, with the federal government tilting the playing field to favor renewables and whatever they want by showering them with out tax dollars and giving preference to generation source (something they claimed they would/could not do for years). No need to be coy any longer. Renewables get special favors and the power houses that keep the grid from crashing get financially starved until they close. We're headed for disaster here.
But, pushing regulated utilities aside in favor of "independent" generators and transmission developers isn't the solution either. "Independent" energy companies are often market-based merchants that escape regulation. Merchant transmission lines are not the answer because today's merchant is not accepting any financial risk and not negotiating its rates in a free market. Today's merchant wants government loan guarantees, transmission tax credits, and guaranteed customers so it has no financial risk at all. When that happens, it is no longer a merchant project, but one that is being involuntarily supported by taxpayers who will never use it. A merchant transmission project also escapes regulation and scrutiny of need for it in the first place. Want to make a bunch of money? Propose a "merchant" transmission line that might be profitable if utilities use it, then leave the government holding the bag when the project fails.
So what if incumbent utilities get right of first refusal to build new transmission? It's not like merchant transmission serving renewable generators can even compete. Apples and oranges. Only needed transmission is planned and ordered by regional organizations, and charged to captive ratepayers. Merchant transmission is not needed, it's optional, therefore it has to pay its own costs and shoulder all the financial risk. The propagandists are trying to change this paradigm to independently find merchant transmission "needed" outside the regional organization process, and then shift cost responsibility and risk to consumers and/or taxpayers. If that happens, why even have regional transmission organizations and reliability organizations? Why have any organization or regulation of the grid? Why not just let private investors build what they want and hope the lights stay on? Because they wouldn't, not without reliability organizations and independent transmission planners. Electricity would become a commodity available only to the rich, who can afford their own private systems. How far will they go to try to control the rest of us?
Fool me once, shame on you. Fool me twice, shame on me! I'm done listening to the climate change preaching because it's become increasingly clear that it is nothing but a control method thought up by a bunch of people who know nothing about electricity. Spending trillions (that's with a "t") on new electric transmission lines won't make renewables reliable. It will just compound the problem and turn electricity into a commodity only obtainable by the elite. See how that works? It's all about control.
And how do you control the people? Propaganda. If you say something often enough, then it becomes fact in the minds of the unenlightened. We are currently awash in Big Transmission propaganda. Only if we build an unobtainable amount of transmission before 2030 can we meet Grandpa Joe's climate change goals (as if that old fart is any more than a puppet being controlled by Big Green). Big Media is stupidly repeating big lies because they think that makes them "smart." They are currently pretending that the age of some transmission components is the reason most of the country is expected to experience blackouts, instead of the fact that we have closed too many peaking dependable generators. Did they not even read the report they are "reporting" on? They also like to pretend "the energy grid" is responsible for the potential blackouts. Do they really think transmission lines are the problem? Or are they just so exceptionally stupid that they think electricity is produced by the wires?
Take a look at this week's Big Propaganda from the inaptly named "Energy Intelligence." Snicker, giggle, haw haw. We're supposed to believe that "red tape" is the reason we can't have renewable energy. This piece is brimming over with mind control.
It complains that every wind and solar project cannot connect to the existing transmission system quickly and cheaply. There's a reason for that, and it's not what they think. We designed our system of generators and transmission lines for efficiency, not source of energy. The system is designed to make the generator pay for its own connection to the system. After all, the generator is the one who is going to make money selling power at that connection. There is no other magic pool of money to pay for connection. If the generator does not pay, then all the electric customers pay (even ones that won't use that generator). That's not fair. Another reason for making the generator pay for its own connection is to encourage efficient siting of new generators. We should build the most cost effective generators in order to keep electric rates low. Making the generator pay to connect forces them to site their plant efficiently. They would not build a coal plant in Lower Slobovia because connecting it to the system would be way too expensive. They would build it in Upper Slobovia instead because the transmission system is closer and stronger there. Fuel source is not a consideration. If we instead build generators using fuel source as the only consideration, then the connections get really expensive. Whining about that is a way to attempt to shift the cost of inefficient generator siting to electric consumers, even though the renewable generator is literally generating buckets of taxpayer dollars from thin air. Heaven forbid they have to use a little of your gold to pay for their own connection!
There's a huge interconnection backlog because renewable developers take multiple spots for the same generator, hoping to find the cheapest connection. A huge percentage of projects in the queue (80%) never get built because greedy developers are clogging queues with speculative connection requests. Those projects were never real to begin with. It's just developer gaming.
NO, we will not shoulder more cost burden so renewable developers (many of them foreign corporations) can connect anywhere it's cheap and easy to build in order to increase the amount of taxpayer dollars they walk away with.
Somehow, Big Wind + Big Solar + Big Transmission are "choked by regulation", but yet we need MORE regulation on fossil fuel energy systems? Are they really saying that we should let an invasive industry do whatever it wants?
This OpEd makes regional transmission operators/independent system operators (RTO/ISO) look like nothing but utility cartels that somehow got control of the electric system. While incumbent utilities have made up the majority of the organization memberships for decades, there's nothing stopping Big Wind + Big Solar + Big Transmission from participating, except for the fact that they're not really needed for any reliability or economic purposes and therefore would not be ordered by the RTO. Merchant generators and transmission cannot shift their costs to captive ratepayers without an RTO order. Seems fair enough, with the federal government tilting the playing field to favor renewables and whatever they want by showering them with out tax dollars and giving preference to generation source (something they claimed they would/could not do for years). No need to be coy any longer. Renewables get special favors and the power houses that keep the grid from crashing get financially starved until they close. We're headed for disaster here.
But, pushing regulated utilities aside in favor of "independent" generators and transmission developers isn't the solution either. "Independent" energy companies are often market-based merchants that escape regulation. Merchant transmission lines are not the answer because today's merchant is not accepting any financial risk and not negotiating its rates in a free market. Today's merchant wants government loan guarantees, transmission tax credits, and guaranteed customers so it has no financial risk at all. When that happens, it is no longer a merchant project, but one that is being involuntarily supported by taxpayers who will never use it. A merchant transmission project also escapes regulation and scrutiny of need for it in the first place. Want to make a bunch of money? Propose a "merchant" transmission line that might be profitable if utilities use it, then leave the government holding the bag when the project fails.
So what if incumbent utilities get right of first refusal to build new transmission? It's not like merchant transmission serving renewable generators can even compete. Apples and oranges. Only needed transmission is planned and ordered by regional organizations, and charged to captive ratepayers. Merchant transmission is not needed, it's optional, therefore it has to pay its own costs and shoulder all the financial risk. The propagandists are trying to change this paradigm to independently find merchant transmission "needed" outside the regional organization process, and then shift cost responsibility and risk to consumers and/or taxpayers. If that happens, why even have regional transmission organizations and reliability organizations? Why have any organization or regulation of the grid? Why not just let private investors build what they want and hope the lights stay on? Because they wouldn't, not without reliability organizations and independent transmission planners. Electricity would become a commodity available only to the rich, who can afford their own private systems. How far will they go to try to control the rest of us?
“We’re on the verge of energy abundance and independence if we can just get the energy from where it’s made to where it’s needed,” said Colorado Sen. John Hickenlooper who co-sponsored a bill that would establish a minimum-transfer requirement for regions to be able to transfer at least 30% of their peak electrical loads with other regions. “Show me a new power project in this country and I’ll show you red tape and haphazard grid planning holding us back.” Democrats pushed to have the bill included in the debt ceiling deal but Republican opposition prevented it.
The only thing Hickenlooper can show is his stupidity. He can't do what he pretends to do because he is stupid about how electricity works.
All these private entity, bought and paid for, politically-biased "studies" about the grid and what the grid needs are simply not enough to plan and operate a fair, balanced, cost effective electric system in the public interest. They only encourage failing projects like Grain Belt Express. In exchange for little to no regulation, including no evaluation of need for the project, transmission merchants agree to shoulder all risk and cost of the transmission project. But yet Invenergy is whining that it should not have to hold up its end of the bargain.
All these private entity, bought and paid for, politically-biased "studies" about the grid and what the grid needs are simply not enough to plan and operate a fair, balanced, cost effective electric system in the public interest. They only encourage failing projects like Grain Belt Express. In exchange for little to no regulation, including no evaluation of need for the project, transmission merchants agree to shoulder all risk and cost of the transmission project. But yet Invenergy is whining that it should not have to hold up its end of the bargain.
Often, transmission projects fall by the wayside because of the capital required upfront and the logistics of tying together buyers and sellers in regional marketplaces with different rules and processes. “If you’re going to inject power you have to put money down ahead of time for system upgrades. Independent developers are asked to say yes or no on those down payments before having firm interconnection permissions and timeline certainty from grid operators,” said Rob Taylor, director of transmission at Chicago-based Invenergy. “Our request is to standardize the processes, timelines and definitions so you can have a level playing field."
Invenergy’s Grain Belt Express transmission project, the highest-capacity line in development in the US, will connect four states across 800 miles, taking mostly wind from Kansas (in the Southwest Power Pool) and delivering it into MISO and PJM, the ISO/RTO covering much of the northeast. With a capacity of 5 GW, the proposed project will use HVDC technology. Since Invenergy acquired the project in 2020, it has progressed through key state approvals, with one remaining approval expected at the end of August. Assuming full construction starts at the end of 2024, the project will have been in the works for over a dozen years.
Well, well... you expect approval? Why is that? Did you put money down on it? If you don't like having to put up money and accept risk, then abandon the merchant transmission model and bid on one of the regionally planned and transmission projects ordered by an RTO.
The more electricity issues infiltrate main stream media, the dumber the story gets.
The more electricity issues infiltrate main stream media, the dumber the story gets.
RSS Feed