WaPo: Vast swaths of the United States are at risk of running short of power as electricity-hungry data centers and clean-technology factories proliferate around the country, leaving utilities and regulators grasping for credible plans to expand the nation’s creaking power grid.
In Georgia, demand for industrial power is surging to record highs, with the projection of new electricity use for the next decade now 17 times what it was only recently. Arizona Public Service, the largest utility in that state, is also struggling to keep up, projecting it will be out of transmission capacity before the end of the decade absent major upgrades.
Northern Virginia needs the equivalent of several large nuclear power plants to serve all the new data centers planned and under construction. Texas, where electricity shortages are already routine on hot summer days, faces the same dilemma.
The soaring demand is touching off a scramble to try to squeeze more juice out of an aging power grid while pushing commercial customers to go to extraordinary lengths to lock down energy sources, such as building their own power plants.
“When you look at the numbers, it is staggering,” said Jason Shaw, chairman of the Georgia Public Service Commission, which regulates electricity. “It makes you scratch your head and wonder how we ended up in this situation. How were the projections that far off? This has created a challenge like we have never seen before.”
A major factor behind the skyrocketing demand is the rapid innovation in artificial intelligence, which is driving the construction of large warehouses of computing infrastructure that require exponentially more power than traditional data centers. AI is also part of a huge scale-up of cloud computing. Tech firms like Amazon, Apple, Google, Meta and Microsoft are scouring the nation for sites for new data centers, and many lesser-known firms are also on the hunt.
…
The situation is sparking battles across the nation over who will pay for new power supplies, with regulators worrying that residential ratepayers could be stuck with the bill for costly upgrades. It also threatens to stifle the transition to cleaner energy, as utility executives lobby to delay the retirement of fossil fuel plants and bring more online. The power crunch imperils their ability to supply the energy that will be needed to charge the millions of electric cars and household appliances required to meet state and federal climate goals.
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Washington Post’s is concerned that this power shortage “threatens to stifle the transition to cleaner energy, as utility executives lobby to delay the retirement of fossil fuel plants and bring more online.”
“When you look at the numbers, it is staggering,” said Jason Shaw, chairman of the Georgia Public Service Commission, which regulates electricity. “It makes you scratch your head and wonder how we ended up in this situation.“
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One way to control the potential under supply would be to require all new electricity intensive non manufacturing businesses (like data centers) that will require multi-MW services to be CoGen customers. Make them supply their own electricity and purchase their oversupply for the grid. Then the energy hogs won’t sap power from the grid but assist in supply for the grid.
Another ‘way to control the potential under supply‘ would be to return to reliable conventional power?
When the lights start going out people will begin to understand the cost and consequences of climate alarmism, and that perhaps the cure is worse than the disease.
On the other hand, ‘stupid got us into this, maybe stupid can get us out.’
Why only non-manufacturing? Don’t manufacturing plants also consume lots of power?
Why stop there, wouldn’t it be even cheaper to simply require everybody to supply their own power? Then you wouldn’t need a power grid in the first place.
Ireland several years ago decided to become a major host for data centres and this has been quite successful for them. However it is now estimated that if all the data centres currently proposed are built they may be using up to 70% of the country’s electricity by 2030.
No, not you too WaPo, sick to death with reality.
How can the Washington Post be this stupid?
Be an innumerate Green.
That is what Bezos pays them for, to curry favor with the Dems.
EVERY Washington Compost article is a Democrat talking point directly, or an attack on ANY Republican viewpoint as an indirect attack for the Democrat party.
After a very short Google search on “fossil fuel power plant closures US”
This comes up:
Michael Bloomberg, former mayor of New York City, has announced that he will invest $500 million into his energy transition campaign, which aims to shut down all coal plants in the United States and reduce gas-fired capacity by half by 2030.
Follow the link for more depressing news
He’s not trying to shut them down to support clean energy. His objective, per the WEF, is to crash the economy and replace it with socialism.
And yet , just a month back Halper was writing this ‘sort of story’
SEC Approves Climate Rule‘Corporations will have to share key details about their role in driving climate change and the threat that warming poses to their operations under a newly approved rule from the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC)’
by: Evan Halper and Maxine Joselow
No worries as there’s tradeys Greening your digital charge bar-
The Melbourne electricians offering mobile EV charging | Drive
Interestingly, while the pair originally started their business – Mobile EV Charging – with the sole purpose of rescuing EV owners with flat batteries, a lot of their customers have simply been drivers unwilling to wait in long lines at public charging stations.
“We’ve had people wanting to skip the lines, they just don’t want to wait an hour or so, we just come and charge [their vehicles] and send them on their way,” Mr Henry says.
The business model only works so long as they’re not driving an EV..!
Yeah. I saw a Tesla service vehicle. It was a Ford ICE van.
Excerpt from Observa’s attachment
A 60kW DC charger sounds like it’ll recharge 1 car to 80% then need to be recharged. (Useless as teats on a boar) Or else it’s a diesel generator and you have diesel powered EVs
“diesel powered EVs” You mean like the ‘coal powered’ EVs we now have?
Like railroad engines?
No, not like railroad generator/motor setups. That would actually make sense, as in current hybrid vehicles.
Oh they’ve got a diesel genny onboard their diesel truck alright as you can hear in the first video-
Gallery – Mobile EV Charging
They couldn’t possibly offer that 60kW DC 24/7 charge service battery to battery so what’s the point of a virtue signalling battery truck under the circumstances.
So are they allowed to act as a utility with the associated “pollution” produced in Aus?
This is not like just delivering gas or diesel that has already been taxed when pumped into a portable container. This is actual theft of funds that the local electrical utility has the only RIGHT to sell.
Asking for a friend.
The article doesn’t state explicitly how the power they use to recharge the EVs is coming from, but reading between the lines it would be a safe bet that the generator is also diesel powered.
It states that the truck itself is diesel. Though I suspect that if they were carting around huge batteries, they would be bragging about it.
What could be more greener than no power at all?
Indeed. The idea of the Greens is to transit in a disorderly fashion, as quick as possible. Their nonsense is deliberate. Less stuff, less people. If the grid gets..mmm..gridlocked it is a good thing. Slow everything down and have the government take all control. Make everything super expensive so you will have to consume less. Degrowth is the aim. Depopulation as well.
Sensible people believe there have to be sensible solutions to existing and future problems. The Bjorn Lomborgs of this world try to create a clear picture and do the math. The Greens don’t care. Not even about the actual environment. They are in essense anti capitalism, neoneo marxists. Destroy, disrupt, clamp down, take control. NGO’s and big business are there to eliminate the competition and write the rules f the masses.
Just picture 9 billion hunter gatherers, cooking over campfires, wearing animal skins.
Why don’t climate protestors “live off the grid”?
The Chinese must be chuckling.
In my opinion, the “downslide” began in the late(?) 70’s when America’s Power Generation was deregulated and became a “for profit business” rather than a Public Service.
So all the current problems with power generation is being caused by power plants being run on a profit basis? Are you really sure that more socialism is the answer to this problem?
BTW, can you name a single utility that is free of government regulations?
No, he cannot.
As a mater of fact “utilities” are monopolies guaranteed a profit due to the “tariff” agreement between the controlling political entity and the corporation.
True deregulation did not really happen anywhere. States like Texas allow customers to buy their power from individual producers but he customer still pays for maintenance of ALL the power transmission equipment. There has been at least one post here on WUWT that discussed a town in Texas signing up the electrical supply from green sources, eventually costing the electric customers a bundle.
I am old enough to remember when the deregulation of the airline industry happened. Are you Rich? Any pictures inside a public airliner from the 60s show men in suits and ladies well dressed. That is because the riff raff could not afford to fly DUE TO REGULATION. Everyone not wealthy rode Greyhound or Trailways. Those with moderate income could, if available, ride a train.
Airline employees pitched a fit. Their union contracts stopped an ever increasing rise in wages. What do you think the cost of a ticket would be now if deregulation did not happen?
BTW, electrical generation is far more “regulated” today that it was before “deregulation”.
For example in Nevada, the utility MUST purchase a large % of it’s electrical supply from unreliables. It is required to accept “power” from residential rooftop solar installations. All or these regulations greatly increase the cost of electricity to the ratepayers. This is repeated in MOST states. In Virginia, the state legislature and governor, when both were controlled by democrats, forced the electrical utility to build the off shore wind generation that is currently killing whales. Nope, no regulation there, LOLOLOL!
“It makes you scratch your head and wonder how we ended up in this situation.”
duh!
That statement was slipped in as cover for his failure to cover the reasons for “this situation”
It is a typical leftist lie. He KNOWS how this all happened and agrees 100% with the steps taken to make “this situation” come to pass.
It is amazing that none of the engineering analyses and cost-benefit analyses that they did were able to predict this situation. Absolutely none.
How many did they do? Absolutely none.
The enviros have been battling new copper mines for years====>
“Montana Supreme Court weighs arguments in second lawsuit over Smith River copper mineCurrent lawsuit concerns the legality of proposed Black Butte Mine’s water usage.”
https://montanafreepress.org/2024/03/29/montana-supreme-court-weighs-arguments-in-second-lawsuit-over-smith-river-copper-mine/#:~:text=In%20a%205%2D2%20decision,a%20mine%20in%20Meagher%20County.
It was recently also disclosed that there was a significant discovery of a rare earth deposit in the Bitterroot.======>
https://www.mtpr.org/montana-news/2023-03-29/mining-company-says-theres-a-big-deposit-of-rare-earth-minerals-in-the-bitterroot
It seems the enviro/greens are having a problem with the transition to an all electric society’s
need for minerals like copper,
https://flatheadbeacon.com/2018/07/11/copper-silver-frustration/
It starts with the lack of leadership.
Unless the goal is to collapse society altogether, in which place the plan is working perfectly.
Bingo—exactly the plan…
The greens have no problem with the need for more copper as long as it comes from somewhere else where they don’t need to acknowledge that the mines exist. Preferably they would like all these materials to appear by magic not mining.
If industries have to heat everything with electricity, you will run out of electricity rather quickly, and run out of new industries shortly thereafter.
With the Long March through the education sector we reckon most are too dumb now to understand the need for radical TOU power pricing with fickle power so that’s a problem with the ingrates-
Australian Energy Regulator admits to serious concerns over time-of-use tariffs (msn.com)
The tame dumbasses will end up paying too much and blame us.
Question:
” artificial intelligence, which is driving the construction of large warehouses of computing infrastructure that require exponentially more power than traditional data centers ”
Can someone explain the above? Is there something about “AI” computations that make them “exponentially” more demanding of power or is it simply that the activities are growing as many other innovations have grown. That is, are we seeing the early stages of a “technology adoption lifecycle.”
I believe the point is that AI takes a lot of computer power.
How we ended up in this position — policy makers read the WaPo — and believe it.
the AI, cryptocurrency, and total surveillance states require much. No power for you!
It’s all fun and games until we begin the cycle of demand peaks beyond generative capacity, blackouts to protect grid frequency, grid shutdown to protect equipment because blackouts couldn’t protect frequency, black start to re-enable power plant shutdowns from grid shutdown, and repeats with demand peaking once again.
At which point we must push for legislation to require all electricity generated for the purpose of sale or consumption by use be generated on systems capable of 24/7 production with a continuous output and frequency.