Why Texas Will Resist the Call for a Unified Smart Grid

"'If you go to either of the other two grids you've got to get 20-something state utility commissions to agree on something,' B.J. Stanbery, the founder of the Austin-based solar manufacturer HelioVolt, says. 'In Texas, we've only got one to persuade. Now, that's a big benefit.' As a result, Texas has, in very short order, erected enough wind turbines to become the national leader in wind-energy production--by a wide margin."

It was surprising to learn this fact in the article about how the regulatory environment influences innovation in energy production. I expected a completely different spin from the article title.

For internal economic reasons, Texas may not want to export electricity. To do so would bring it under federal regulation, and additional taxes.

This reminds me of Andy Grove's article http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2008/07.... Most thought-provoking was about foreign dependence: Electricity can be transported only over land. Consequently, it will stay in (or stick to) the continent where it is produced.

In any large scale (ie, too large for social sanctions to work) cost or risk sharing system, the careful and competent get screwed over to benefit the sloppy and stupid. Large scale insurance schemes were where I first noticed this. And during one of the French Republics, Bastiat wrote in his classic "The State"; "Government is that great fictitious entity by which everyone seeks to live at the expense of everyone else."