re: Op/Ed by U of CA Professor: Expect financial fallout when the fossil fuel bubble bursts

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Why does everyone scream electric cars are the answer? Where do we get the electricity to charge these damn cars? Texas can’t keep their AC turned on in a heat wave and are expected to be able to charge all these cars?

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The narrative that we don’t have enough generating capacity to cover the needs and more isn’t really true. The main problem with electricity is once it is generated, it’s either used by the consumer or lost. This means energy market traders and transmission operators have to forecast the load for the day and dispatch enough generation to cover it. The forecasts leave slim margins for going over and in extreme events like last summer in TX or the winter storm in 2021, you get rolling blackouts as overloading the system results in the Northeast blackout in the 2010s. You lose an entire portion of the country.

If they did not operate with the slim margins they do, and run plants all the time, the cost increase would be astronomical. It’s also not that easy to bring a plant online at the flip of a switch. It takes a lot of time. That’s why the real answer is customer distributed generation like home or community solar, along with battery storage to eliminate the use it or lose it aspect, combined with SMRs across the system. If this were in place, the grid would have zero issues, but the government won’t take off the reins and let what needs to be done be done.

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Texas can’t keep their AC turned on in a heat wave ….

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sarcasm?

as someone who lived in Texas last summer and the previous 14 summers, i don’t remember this being a problem. In fact, in my area last year we had 23 straight 100+ degree days. Many of which topped out at 108/109. never lost power.