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Electricity over $900/MWh in most of Western US now

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Re: Electricity over $900/MWh in most of Western US now

#211

Post by morninglight »

tomc1985 wrote: post #31

The state that brought us Enron now getting Enron'd itself. Turnabout is fair play! Sucks for the regular folk, though...

Many young people have no memory of Enron. Instead of pointing fingers, it would be better if we presented them with historical facts. Because of fraudulent energy market manipulation, many thousands of people from around the world lost their jobs, homes and savings in the blink of an eye. Hopefully, we are not seeing a repeat of that fiasco, but if we are not vigilant, it could happen again.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=e5qC1YGRMKI

You might also be interested to know that former Enron CEO, Jeff Skilling, is no longer in prison and was reported to be starting a digital energy marketplace.

https://www.bizjournals.com/houston/news/2020/06/05/former-e...

Re: Electricity over $900/MWh in most of Western US now

#212

Post by cbmuser »

hristov wrote: post #164
lsllc wrote: post #139

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The UK has Dinorwig Power Station which is a pumped storage hydro station to supply spot demand when it's time for tea: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dinorwig_Power_Station But at the end of the day, it uses more energy than it generates due to the inefficiencies of pumping water up to the top of the mountain (basically, it's playing arbitrage with spot electricity pricing & demand).

By hydro i did not mean pumped storage hydro but ordinary dam hydro. It does not technically store energy but it is a very effective on demand power producer because you can turn it on or off at will (provided there is enough water in the reservoir). Also, it is very good for intermittent generation, because when you stop it, you can fill up the water in the reservoir and give yourself potential energy for the next t…

Hydro has very specific geographical requirements and in countries like Germany, all almost all potential for hydro power has already been put to use and yet it provides only a fraction of the electricity generation here.

Hydro only plays a large role world-wide in countries with low population densities such as Norway.

Re: Electricity over $900/MWh in most of Western US now

#213

Post by konjin »

telchar wrote: post #109
lsllc wrote: post #71

I'm a big fan of renewables, solar/wind/hydro. But we still need that baseline generating capacity for these dark icy winter days. It's clear now that coal/oil isn't it (pollution) and we should reserve natural gas supply for home heating (because it's efficient and "relatively" clean) and spot-demand generators. So that leaves Nuclear. But we just need to get it right this time -- i.e. don't build them near earthqua…

Baseload + peakers is one concept that allows a grid to meet demand. But it's not the only way - decorrelated intermittent generation + peakers could work too. But what doesn't work well so well is baseload + intermittent generation. If you must have baseload (i.e. nuclear) as the foundation of the grid, intermittent renewables (solar/wind) aren't going to have much of a place because you need dispatchable power gene…

Saying solar is cheap when the sun shines is like saying coal is cheap at the mine.

You need electricity produced at the right time as well as the right place. I don't understand how people can get that producing electricity in the middle of the Sahara is useless, but producing it at 12pm on June 15th when you need it today isn't.

Re: Electricity over $900/MWh in most of Western US now

#214

Post by scruple »

function_seven wrote: post #149
mayli wrote: post #138

Earlier quoted context omitted.

https://www.pge.com/pge_global/common/pdfs/rate-plans/how-ra... https://www.pge.com/tariffs/assets/pdf/tariffbook/ELEC_SCHED...

Yikes. I’m in California but pay 17¢/kWh including the fixed monthly costs. (My tiers are 10.5¢, 16.8¢, and 19.1¢) I love my municipal utility.

On SCE, in Orange County, I'm currently paying $0.22, $0.28, and $0.35.

Re: Electricity over $900/MWh in most of Western US now

#215

Post by jennyyang »

nimos wrote: post #14
jedberg wrote: post #2

I need more context. Is that a lot? Is that low? Is it a big change from before? In what direction?

900/Mwh is 90c per kwh. Normal wholesale is about 5-7c. Retail national average is about 14. Higher cost states are around 20c with Hawaii near 30c.

PG&E charges much more than 20c. Depending on the tier, it could be over $0.30/kWh. If you have time of day charges, it's even higher during the day, something ridiculously high.

Re: Electricity over $900/MWh in most of Western US now

#216

Post by adanto6840 »

hnburnsy wrote: post #181
wahern wrote: post #132

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Nevada or even Mexico could play regulatory arbitrage, build nuclear plants in their jurisdictions, and export the electricity to California. I suppose Mexico might be cheaper as Nevada lacks water, particularly in remote regions where there'd be the least local resistance. Baja California has the Pacific and the Gulf of California; Sonora has the Gulf of California. California's unique history of opposition to nucle…

Arizona does this (see Palo Verde Generating Station, the largest power plant in the US by generation) and I benefit with $0.05230 per kWh off peak (off peak is 8 pm - 3 pm on weekdays, all day on weekends and 10 holidays).

That's about the same as the non-summer part of ToU plan in NV -- both peak & off-peak. It's about a cent cheaper off-peak right now.

On the TOU plan in NV, weekdays in June thru Sept, from 1PM to 7PM, it's ~0.45/kWh -- but rest of the time it's under 6c/kWh -- comparable [or less] than your rate.

Hard to believe we haven't figured out efficient, reliable, & redundant long-distance electricity transmission at this point.

I generated almost 100kWh today & have used ~half that; it sure seems like transmission is almost as big of an issue as storage.

Re: Electricity over $900/MWh in most of Western US now

#217

Post by abandonliberty »

akamaka wrote: post #203

There’s an elegant solution to all this: better energy efficiency for buildings. It’s funny seeing people in this thread jumping right past the root cause and suggesting elaborate solutions like nuclear power. And before you say it’s not feasible to upgrade hundreds of millions of buildings in the USA, you should be aware that upgrading homes to be more energy efficient actually pays for itself (albeit in the long ru…

I'd love to see us start building energy efficient homes. A bit more up front investment would give huge returns.

Re: Electricity over $900/MWh in most of Western US now

#218

Post by cbozeman »

TylerE wrote: post #206
cbozeman wrote: post #176

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I feel like what we need to do is dump $50 to $100 billion per year into nuclear fusion reactor research, then get them online around the world as soon as possible. If the patents are to be believed, then Lockheed-Martin's Skunkworks has developed a portable fusion reactor the size of an intermodal shipping container. I'd like to see those scaled up significantly for usage around the world, for a variety of reasons..…

Uh, last time I checked we weren't able to do above-unity sustained fusion even at the mega-project level. Source?

The United States Patent Office.

And https://www.lockheedmartin.com/en-us/products/compact-fusion...

I admit I myself am highly skeptical of this project... but I welcome it with open arms if its true.

Re: Electricity over $900/MWh in most of Western US now

#219

Post by wumpus »

yumraj wrote: post #144
jeffbee wrote: post #82

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The average price paid for residential^W power in California last year was 16 cents, not 30, not 40.

Not sure where you’re getting 16 cents, the lowest PG&E tier is 24 cents [0] [0] https://www.pge.com/pge_global/common/pdfs/rate-plans/how-ra... To add, Santa Clara city is served by Silicon Valley Power which I believe has substantially lower rates than PG&E.. there may be other such local providers..

I'm in Palo Alto and I pay 14 cents. Yes, we also have our own local provider.

Re: Electricity over $900/MWh in most of Western US now

#220

Post by akamaka »

konjin wrote: post #209
akamaka wrote: post #203

There’s an elegant solution to all this: better energy efficiency for buildings. It’s funny seeing people in this thread jumping right past the root cause and suggesting elaborate solutions like nuclear power. And before you say it’s not feasible to upgrade hundreds of millions of buildings in the USA, you should be aware that upgrading homes to be more energy efficient actually pays for itself (albeit in the long ru…

>It’s funny seeing people in this thread jumping right past the root cause and suggesting elaborate solutions like nuclear power. The root cause is extreme weather events which will will get more of. Non-renewables are not affected by the wind and sun. Since we don't want to go extinct by pumping more CO2 into the atmosphere we are left with nuclear. I don't understand how people can want to return to feudalism where…

Did you know that one third of US carbon emissions come from buildings?

Upgrading buildings would massively reduce emissions, and we’d never have to generate the electricity in the first place. It pays for itself.

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