Should California's Grid Join a Larger Regional Electricity Market? (latimes.com) 65
One in every 9 Americans lives in California. And right now its Congress is debating a bill that "would help establish a regional electricity market capable of tying together the American West's three dozen independent power grids," according to the Los Angeles Times' newsletter about climate change and energy issues.
But that bill "has bitterly divided environmentalists," with some seeing it "as a plot by greedy energy companies to enrich themselves." Supporters say it would smooth the flow of solar and wind power from the sunny, windy landscapes where they're produced most cheaply to the cities where they're most needed. It would help California keep the lights on without fossil fuels, and without driving up utility bills... [S]olar and wind power are still cheaper than planet-warming coal and fossil gas. Which is why Michael Wara, a Stanford energy and climate scholar, isn't worried that SB 540 will leave Californians drowning in dirty power. In a regional market, solar and wind will usually outcompete coal and gas. "Any energy source that requires fuel to operate is more expensive than an energy source that doesn't," he said.
California also needs to prove that a grid powered entirely by clean energy is affordable and reliable. The state's rising electric rates are already a big concern. And although the grid has been stable the last few years, thanks to batteries that store solar for after dark, keeping the lights on with more and more renewables might get harder. Regional market advocates make a strong case that interstate cooperation would help.
For instance, a market would help California more smoothly access Pacific Northwest hydropower, already a key energy source during heat waves. It would also give California easier access to low-cost winds from New Mexico and Wyoming. Best of all, that wind is often blowing strong just as the sun sets along the Pacific. Another benefit: Right now, California often generates more solar than it can use during certain hours of the day, forcing solar farms to shut down — or pay other states to take the extra power. With a regional market, California could sell excess solar to other states, keeping utility bills down. "This is about lowering costs," said Robin Everett, deputy director of the Sierra Club's Beyond Coal Campaign.
"Unlike with past regional market proposals, California would retain control of its grid operator, with only a few functions delegated to a regional entity," the article points out. But opponents still worry this would give new powers to an outside-of-California group to thwart clean energy progress if not gouge customers. Amendments passed this week add a "Regional Energy Markets Oversight Council" to address that concern — but which lost support for the bill from some of its earlier supporters.
"The amendments would make it easier for the Golden State to bail," notes the climate newsletter, and "Out-of-state utilities don't want to waste time and money committing themselves to a California-led market only to lose California, and thus many of the economic benefits..."
But that bill "has bitterly divided environmentalists," with some seeing it "as a plot by greedy energy companies to enrich themselves." Supporters say it would smooth the flow of solar and wind power from the sunny, windy landscapes where they're produced most cheaply to the cities where they're most needed. It would help California keep the lights on without fossil fuels, and without driving up utility bills... [S]olar and wind power are still cheaper than planet-warming coal and fossil gas. Which is why Michael Wara, a Stanford energy and climate scholar, isn't worried that SB 540 will leave Californians drowning in dirty power. In a regional market, solar and wind will usually outcompete coal and gas. "Any energy source that requires fuel to operate is more expensive than an energy source that doesn't," he said.
California also needs to prove that a grid powered entirely by clean energy is affordable and reliable. The state's rising electric rates are already a big concern. And although the grid has been stable the last few years, thanks to batteries that store solar for after dark, keeping the lights on with more and more renewables might get harder. Regional market advocates make a strong case that interstate cooperation would help.
For instance, a market would help California more smoothly access Pacific Northwest hydropower, already a key energy source during heat waves. It would also give California easier access to low-cost winds from New Mexico and Wyoming. Best of all, that wind is often blowing strong just as the sun sets along the Pacific. Another benefit: Right now, California often generates more solar than it can use during certain hours of the day, forcing solar farms to shut down — or pay other states to take the extra power. With a regional market, California could sell excess solar to other states, keeping utility bills down. "This is about lowering costs," said Robin Everett, deputy director of the Sierra Club's Beyond Coal Campaign.
"Unlike with past regional market proposals, California would retain control of its grid operator, with only a few functions delegated to a regional entity," the article points out. But opponents still worry this would give new powers to an outside-of-California group to thwart clean energy progress if not gouge customers. Amendments passed this week add a "Regional Energy Markets Oversight Council" to address that concern — but which lost support for the bill from some of its earlier supporters.
"The amendments would make it easier for the Golden State to bail," notes the climate newsletter, and "Out-of-state utilities don't want to waste time and money committing themselves to a California-led market only to lose California, and thus many of the economic benefits..."
Requisite California Bashing (Score:1, Troll)
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Happy to be one of the eight.
Yup. Dunno about the other 7, but this sounds an awful lot like a personal problem to me.
It’s also called States Rights. Californians have every right to vote with everything from their voices to their wallets, which no one was bitching about having that Right when they were the first state to legalize weed for medical use. Or when they decided to enact “sanctuary” status for the unhoused and undocumented that also choose to mainly congregate in that state.
For all that bullshit bragging about how California has its own GDP and how we’d all be dead without them, California is quickly showing its true colors with regards to costs and expenses. They don’t want to create a combined grid sold under the guise of a “market” (as if this has a chance in hell of being a co-op). They fucking need to.
Should we help them? Sure. We’re the United States after all. Should we trust them? FUCK no. Audit every penny and “need” to spend it. California’s insanely expensive “economy” doesn’t need to be infecting the rest of the country. Time to stop lying about how that would benefit anyone other than those drunk on greed who created California-flavored costs.
So basically your real world name is Captain Ahab McMAGA and your California is your white whale?
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So basically your real world name is Captain Ahab McMAGA and your California is your white whale?
Do you always try and abuse feminist SIGN language to try and Shame your point across, or did you actually have a valid retort that might be worth more than the Cali-politik selling this story? Proof is in the pudding. Let’s see if California evidence can argue the benefits of this far better than their politicians do when they sit down with Shawn Ryan.
Most are more than willing to help out a fellow American. The burden of proof, is now on California to prove they are wanting and worthy of others h
Re:Requisite California Bashing (Score:5, Informative)
I think their point is your overly dramatic anti California stuff under an article about combining regional power grids is ridiculous. You're acting like California is in desperate need of some kind of charity and setting up strawmen left and right.
It's crazy what right wing news has done to American's conceptualization of California and the level of irrational, frothing rage we now get from conservatives every time the state is brought up. This is why you were referred to as essentially a MAGA nut.
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So basically your real world name is Captain Ahab McMAGA and your California is your white whale?
Do you always try and abuse feminist SIGN language to try and Shame your point across, or did you actually have a valid retort that might be worth more than the Cali-politik selling this story? Proof is in the pudding. Let’s see if California evidence can argue the benefits of this far better than their politicians do when they sit down with Shawn Ryan.
Most are more than willing to help out a fellow American. The burden of proof, is now on California to prove they are wanting and worthy of others help instead of just looking to reduce their insane costs created by thy own fucking hand. Go figure a lot of other struggling taxpayers are not looking to merge and absorb the cost burden of California.
If their grid was SO next-gen amazing, California wouldn’t have to sell this idea as if their life depended on it. Gotta love how TFS tries to sell the idea of “low-cost wind”. As if it’s a horrific collusion between God and Mother Nature established in the 3rd Century that’s always screwing California over with a horrible blow job..
No, you are completely overthinking this, I was merely using sarcasm to mock you and your angry little political manifesto.
Re: (Score:3, Interesting)
Itâ(TM)s also called States Rights. Californians have every right to vote with everything from their voices to their wallets, which no one was bitching about having that Right when they were the first state to legalize weed for medical use.
I recall complaints about an isolated electrical grid when the lights went out in Texas. Did people praise state's rights then?
As bad as that outage was in Texas it appears that outages in California are worse. The difference is that in California the outages tend to be more localized, so not as many people are impacted at a time, and there's rarely freezing temperatures where power outages could threaten life and limb. In general California has pretty mild weather through every season due to the benefit
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If California wants to use state's rights to continue having their electrical grid isolated from neighboring states then that's fine by me.
California's grid is not isolated from other states, it's part of the Western Interconnection [wikipedia.org], one of the 3 major grids in the US - the others being the Eastern and the Texas interconnections. This article is about electricity wholesale markets and pricing, not how grids are interconnected. California already brings in a bunch of power from throughout the west. For example, the Pacific DC intertie [wikipedia.org] is a 3.1 GW transmission line that brings hydro power from the Columbia river to southern California.
Yes (Score:3, Interesting)
If California joins the larger grid, it would most likely lower the electricity price in California and also in the rest of the USA. It would also most likely lower CO2 emissions. It would also most likely lower the probability of peak prices and blackouts. IMHO only losers would be fossil energy providers.
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This could go very right or very wrong.
Re:Yes (Score:5, Interesting)
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PG&E tier pricing works well for people who use little electricity.
It sucks for those with big families.
Re:Yes (Score:5, Insightful)
This is the future. Highly interconnected grids that can move energy from where it is available to where it is needed.
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That would sound promising, but as long as trucks work on fossile fuel ...
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We have EV trucks in Europe. Big batteries, decent range, fast charging.
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Also hybrids, if you're into that.
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Ah, when I say "trucks", I mean heavy goods vehicles with trailers. I'm not sure exactly what we would call an F-150. Maybe a light truck, but I tend to think of something smaller for those, like a Japanese Kei truck.
Anyway, big rigs like this: https://www.youtube.com/watch?... [youtube.com]
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Even here in the USA an F150 is properly called a "pickup" or "pickup truck" and not just a "truck", but America doesn't care about what's proper.
The law in the USA refers to what you call a "truck" as a "heavy truck", though it's not only semi-tractors but just also any other truck over a certain gross weight rating.
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We have EV trucks in Europe. Big batteries, decent range, fast charging.
That's hardly a fair comparison. The EU has more people than the USA, in less than half the land area, and has plenty of waterways, canals, and access to the sea for cheap transport by water. While the EU is technically connected by roads and rail to Asia there's a political boundary defined by Russia that further discourages long distance travel by land.
I suspect that there are very few truck drivers in the EU that are unable to sleep in their own beds every night because the routes they'd travel would b
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If you are driving a lorry load of lemons from Sicily in southern Italy to Dartford in the south east of England, that is a 29 hour drive assuming no rest breaks.
Even if you are driving between Glasgow (Scotland) and London (England), about 8 hours, then realistically you are only doing a run in one direction each day. Or sometimes, if it is a big company, the drivers might meet up half-way and swap vehicles.
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If you are driving a lorry load of lemons from Sicily in southern Italy to Dartford in the south east of England, that is a 29 hour drive assuming no rest breaks.
Why drive that far when it's likely cheaper to make that trip by sea? Or by train?
Even if you are driving between Glasgow (Scotland) and London (England), about 8 hours, then realistically you are only doing a run in one direction each day. Or sometimes, if it is a big company, the drivers might meet up half-way and swap vehicles.
What I'd expect other than swapping vehicles is that at some halfway point there would be a warehouse that would unload the truck, sort out the boxes by destination, then pack the boxes on a different truck or trailer. That kind of process likely means more travel time but more efficient use of the space on each truck.
Re:Yes (Score:4, Interesting)
This is the kind of willfully ignorant, close minded pathetic responses that really pisses me off.
So because some vehicles still use fossil fuel, we should make absolutely no advancements towards renewables? If it can't be a 100% changeover all at once it's not worth doing?
I wish stupidity was painful.
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This is the future. Highly interconnected grids that can move energy from where it is available to where it is needed.
It takes more than just more wires to aid in moving electricity from where it is available to where it is needed. This was demonstrated with the recent outage on the Iberian Peninsula. The cause of the outage is being blamed on poor management, the powers-that-be decided that there was no need to add more mechanical inertia to the grid in spite of signs of an instability that comes with the high proportion of solar power and grid-following inverters.
I can imagine California making the same mistake. Calif
Re: Don’t tell me. SHOW me. (Score:1)
Have you heard of decoupling, which explicitly in law makes retail energy prices administered by a government commission populated by private utility executives who have a mandate to ignore supply and demand?
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If California joins the larger grid, it would most likely lower the electricity price in California and also in the rest of the USA. It would also most likely lower CO2 emissions. It would also most likely lower the probability of peak prices and blackouts. IMHO only losers would be fossil energy providers.
That’s *exactly* what the fossil fuel industry wants you to think. “Hey, just join the market! It’s all sunshine and savings!” Meanwhile, buried deep in the amended version of SB 540 is a shiny little trapdoor called REMOC — an unelected oversight council with the power to yank California out of the market with 120 days’ notice, even for vague or technical violations. That kind of political landmine all but guarantees other Western states will take their toys and go home
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"If California joins the larger grid"
They are already connected to Washington, or more exactly the BPA.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/... [wikipedia.org]
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If California joins the larger grid, it would most likely lower the electricity price in California
Almost certainly.
and also in the rest of the USA
This is far less likely, and in fact whoever they interconnect with probably ends up paying higher rates than they do today.
The devil is in the details (Score:4, Insightful)
The issue is not being part of a larger market. The issue is the deal signed and all the unanticipated consequences. Who is going to get rich doing this?
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If your gubernement was really serious about this they would start with texas. your TDS is clouding your eyes & mind.
This right here.
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The issue is not being part of a larger market. The issue is the deal signed and all the unanticipated consequences. Who is going to get rich doing this?
Is Enron's zombie involved in this?
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Who is going to get rich doing this?
It's good for the environment, but liberals oppose it because it will also be cost-effective and thus profitable.
Then liberals wonder why they keep losing elections.
Inevitable? (Score:3)
Impact assessments have shown various technical, economic and administrative benefits, resulting in significant cost reductions.
California's electricity grid should definitely be integrated, but with a clear strategy for transitioning to renewable energy. With a reduction in cost and less CO2 emitted, perhaps it is inevitable?
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Europe has been moving towards a common energy market since 2006, and currently most of Europe is integrated, and the transition to renewable energy is part of this. Impact assessments have shown various technical, economic and administrative benefits, resulting in significant cost reductions.
There were no electricity cost reductions in Europe in the past 16 years for households. There was a huge bump in price after COVID and when Russia invaded Ukraine. After that it somewhat stabilized but it is still up by about 64% in this period: https://ec.europa.eu/eurostat/... [europa.eu]
There was a small price drop for electricity for companies in 2023. But it is not dropping any more either now. And overall electricity price for companies went up by about 90% in the last 16 years: https://ec.europa.eu/eurostat/. [europa.eu]
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When a country produces more energy than it needs, it can export it and get paid for it. A possible downside is that this could push up prices locally when prices rise nearby, but it should result in a more reliable and efficient supply of electricity.
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That must be why Norway is looking to cut energy links [euronews.com] with Europe /s. There are pros and cons to linking up grids, and anyone trying to make out like the cons don't exist is doing a disservice.
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It is therefore unlikely that Norway will break its connection to the EU market and risk a trade war.
At the same time, the EU is investing in more cables for the common market, and all countries make money in the internal market.
Hard to believe anything would change (Score:3)
To make an effective western grid more transmission lines are needed. Yes, wholesale feed-in rates might go down due to the mechanics of pricing (oversimplifying: last MW committed determines the price everyone is paid, and you would have more generation competing for that last MW). The problem is that the transmission charges would make it difficult for energy to flow from point A to point B. You see this today in California's grid where some transmission lines and nodes have a negative marginal cost while others are quite high.
Really the best solution is microgrids where regions purchase/sell power to the grid but the grid doesn't control the majority of energy flow. The microgrids need multiple sources of storage and generation, but when things don't get averaged out over a larger area there is less opportunity to game things. I'd also personally like to see separate day-ahead and hour-ahead forecast rates, along with realtime rates for any delta. That creates an opportunity to better balance systems and keep high-cost energy off the grid and increasing the costs.
So California wants to suck up the power, water (Score:2)
Re: (Score:2)
So California wants to suck up the power from out of state like they do the water !! Just say no to them !!!
Arizona and Nevada have plenty of sunny deserts for making electricity.
They can't make more water.
The reality (Score:3)
The lived experience of the Australian East Coast grid is that whacking in loads of unreliables (solar wind) with inadequate storage (11 weeks worth) will kill the economics of the fossil fuel and nuclear plants, which work best as baseload providers, not infilling for the unreliables.
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Sorry, I forgot the conclusion... therefore all surrounding grids that rely on reliable energy sources will find they are rendered uneconomic by the often free but usually non existent unreliable power sources the CA grid has encouraged.
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Sorry, I forgot the conclusion... therefore all surrounding grids that rely on reliable energy sources will find they are rendered uneconomic by the often free but usually non existent unreliable power sources the CA grid has encouraged.
In his rush to try and blame renewable energy, he forgot to mention the East Coast power grid consits almost entirely of privatised energy companies. But he could never admit that's what is really wrong with it. Control was taken away and given to unaccountable firms that have done nothing but milk it for profit (except when they've got their hands out to the government for more public money, so they can build stuff to then milk for profit).
There's a reason Western Australia has cheaper power despite it
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The lived experience of the Australian East Coast grid is that whacking in loads of unreliables (solar wind) with inadequate storage (11 weeks worth)...
11 weeks of storage? That's an enormous amount. Some quick searching shows California currently has something like 11 hours of battery backup.
Whether that's enough, well, I don't recall ever having 11 weeks of still air and clouds when I lived there. I'll let others with more real knowledge explain the actual math.
UK (Score:3)
Yeah they should connect to the UK, that way the solar panels would compliment each other. (when its daytime in CA its night in the UK.)
Amazed the USA doesn't have a National Grid (Score:1, Redundant)
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Dude, England, Wales, and Scotland are less than 60% the size of California and your population is about 50% greater. You simply have no idea how big this place is or how spread out we are.
NO! (Score:3)
It would violate the law, Betteridge's law of headlines with a question mark.
Those are always to be answered with NO!
Enron 2.0? No thanks (Score:2)
Does Betteridge's law apply? (Score:2)
From the fine article:
Some consider regional power-trading a crucial market-based tool for accelerating climate progress. Others see it as a plot by greedy energy companies to enrich themselves.
How dare anyone try to make a profit on the sale of goods and service, am I right?
Profit isn't good, or bad, but it is necessary to keep a business going. If energy companies aren't making a profit then the people running them will close the company and find someplace else to invest their money. What keeps the greedy from gouging people for profits is competition, and with a larger electrical grid there would be more opportunity for competition to keep people from being too greedy.
Looks good, except for the fossil-fuel poison pill (Score:2)
SB 540 started out as a smart evolution of California’s grid strategy — enabling them to join a broader Western electricity market that cuts costs, reduces emissions, and boosts reliability by sharing renewables across state lines. And it *still could be* — except for the poison pill that the fossil fuel lobby buried in Section 2(c): the Regional Energy Market Oversight Council (REMOC). This unelected new oversight council sounds like a watchdog but functions like a trapdoor, with the powe
No thanks (Score:1)
Funny (Score:2)
How americans roam around the planet dictating who should use what source of which energy yet can't fix their own energy issues...