Or put another way -- power utilities and grid failing to keep up with consumer demand.
> The power grid is also grappling with supply chain and worker shortage problems that have cause some power facilities to delay or cancel maintenance aimed at getting the system primed for summer. Specifically, NERC warned that low inventories of replacement transformers could derail efforts to restart power facilities following hurricanes and severe storms.
> Wind plays a central role in meeting demand in Texas as well as the two power grid regions that cover most of the central part of the United States. Drought conditions and low levels of major reservoirs could also hurt hydro power generation.
> NERC also flagged concerns about new environmental rules that restrict power plant emissions, warning these regulations will limit the operation of coal-fired generators in 23 states, including Nevada, Utah and states along the Gulf Coast, mid-Atlantic and Midwest. This is the first summer since the implementation of the EPA’s Good Neighbor Plan, which aims to reduce cross-state smog from power plants and other industrial sites.
This is pretty clearly regulation/environmentalist caused. Not that we shouldn't pursue a climate friendly grid, but we're not there yet and forcing the timeline is causing creaks and issues.
My point being is that the other option wasn’t to do a gradual, planned rollout, given the political realities
But nope...
Yes, some people are stupid, a lot of "the greens" included here, but choosing unreliable and unstable power sources while demanding more power use (ban on ICE cars, ban on burning stuff for heat and cooking, etc.), is well.. stupid too.
Apparently you’re missing some context since nearly every politician is risking daily blackouts vs ramping up nuclear production.
Do you think that every single one is mistaking what will go over well with the people or that there is maybe a political issue that changes the calculus that you are either undervaluing or have missed entirely?
Edit: I didn’t even engage with your question correctly. That’s a false dichotomy. The politicians are banking that moving us towards renewables with its associated risks is a better path forward than moving us towards nuclear with its associated risks. Moving to a new energy paradigm like nuclear also could come with the risk of “daily blackouts” as whatever that migration would look like plays out. It’s not a “risky” choice vs a “risk-free” choice
You could just as easily say that this is caused by greed and the desire for more profits. Wind power is extremely cheap (almost half the cost per megawatt hour compared to fossil fuel). So utilities are actually making more money when they sell their customers wind power. Where is the profit margin going? Not back into the infrastructure, that's for sure.
In every major outage the true cause is utility companies not investing back into making sure that their infrastructure is resilient. That includes resiliency against wind power going offline, such as building battery storage, gravity power storage, etc.
Naturally theres a wide spectrum of options between fixed prices and dynamic pricing that leads to shocking results.
It didn't produce enough for widespread smartphone adoption, either. Until it was needed.
We can "force the timeline" on the machinery and infrastructure that we control, or nature will force the timeline on the environmental factors we can't control. All the extreme weather is showing the latter is already happening.
Actually reading the details of the report, I don't think the power plant emissions regulations is actually a major impact; it seems that the lower efficiencies of power plants during extreme heat waves is having more of an impact on potential shortfalls rather than emissions cutoff. Except maybe for Texas, but Texas in general looks extremely screwed regardless.
Links to detailed analyses can be found in the link above.
Key notes:
"... overall, the North American bulk power system (BPS) remains highly reliable and resilient. However, extreme weather events continue to pose the greatest risk to its reliability and stability"
"Today’s BPS transmission system is continuing to show improvements in reliability and resilience, despite more common and extreme weather trends. However, higher overall outage rates for coal and gas generation, as well as some utility-scale solar generation not operating as necessary for reliability, indicate that there is still significant work to be accomplished"
"In 2022, conventional generation experienced its highest level of unavailability (8.5%) overall since NERC began gathering GADS data in 2013 as measured by the weighted equivalent forced outage rate. Figure 3 shows consistently increasing outage rates for coal over the observed five years, correlating with higher numbers of startups and maintenance outages."
Yes, there are issues to contend with when implementing new power sources. But those issues are nothing compared to the lack of investment in infrastructure more generally.
Are there no workers? Or no money? So a lack of educated people (electricians, electrical engineers) in the country? Or do those people get paid more to flip burgers and do other stuff?
- The Baby Boomers reaching Medicare + Social Security eligibility age.
- An Intransitive stance on immigration, leading to fewer workers, and especially an inability to hire trained workers
- Migrated from trades education ~30 years ago in favor of college preparatory
- Historically low unemployment (likely from the other factors)
- A very difficult to navigate minimum wage, costs of goods trap; where the dog food store near me is hiring at $15/hr; while a nearby alterations place was looking for a trained head seamstress for $10/hr, and grocery chains and Amazon are offering $30/hr warehouse jobs, while waitresses make $2.25 with little enforcement on tipped wages.
It's time to start hunting and punishing those who pay illegal immigrants less than minimum wage (I dont think we should bother trying to fight illegal immigration against the immigrants, punish the citizens who are breaking their local laws ie paying too little)
>Historically low unemployment (likely from the other factors)
I actually think this is more about the historically low amount of folks participating in the economy. A lot of these bureau stats only consider folks who want a job. But what is also really eye opening is the percent of the population who does some work. That number is hitting 40yr lows, and approaching numbers seen in 50/60s when it was far less common for women to work.
Why does this matter? Imagine society has N hours of labor required to keep it functioning? If fewer people are willing to work, then the remaining worker pool must do more hours of work (or become far more productive).
Personally, I would disagree. The utility companies have had notice for quite some time that they are have very real capacity issues. However, the cost of bringing new generation on line is not worth it to them. They would rather keep things as is, and then ask customers to cut back, or issue rolling outages if they don't. Take the infamous Texas freeze as example where the utilities were recommended to take steps to protect against freezes, but they decided it was not worth the expense.
There's a difference between equipment and generating capabilities. Failed transformers are an issue, but it's not new. Not being able to meet demand is also not new, but it's only going to continue to be an increasing problem
edit: sure, downvote, but mandated increased demand without infrastructure first is a recipe for failure.