This article was originally published at The Empowerment Alliance and is re-published here with permission.
When it comes to energy, the main concern for working class Americans and families in general is affordability.
For large tech corporations – and specifically, the huge data centers necessary to fuel the emerging artificial intelligence boom – the focus is on access to abundant and reliable energy.
Are those divergent concerns inherently incompatible?
In fact, what at first might seem like competing objectives should, thanks to free markets, dovetail into a confluence beneficial to all, as an all-of-the-above approach to energy resources coupled with a modernized electric grid boosts overall output while simultaneously lowering costs.
Bolstering such a prospect would be congressional passage of the Affordable, Reliable, Clean Energy Security Act (ARC-ES) recently introduced by Ohio Congressman Troy Balderson (R), which guarantees that our most affordable and reliable energy sources remain crucial components of the overall energy picture.
Right now, U.S. electricity reliability is hampered by the fact that from coast to coast our nation is served by a patchwork network comprised of three major grids.
As described by EBSCO, a leading provider of research databases, “[T]he grid’s infrastructure has a number of problems. One major problem is the age of the infrastructure. The energy grid was pieced together over the course of a century, and all the parts were introduced at various times. Many of these parts are getting older and becoming less reliable.”
Another drawback is that “the U.S. energy grid has no real way of storing power for use in the future. All the power that people use at a particular time must be created at the moment it is needed.”
Yet another challenge is the fact that the grids were originally built to convert traditional energy sources like coal and gas. “Renewables” such as wind and solar are not easily integrated into the existing grid, in part because of the relatively remote areas in which they have been built.
“Today’s transmission system simply is not designed to ingest all that remote power,” as explained by the Energy Department’s national laboratory for energy systems. “Bursts of power on an especially sunny day in the desert could cause grid faults – little blips that can propagate and cause outages – or overload power lines.”
Pressure from the Biden administration to set artificial deadlines to transition from traditional energy sources to renewables was a recipe for disaster, as our outdated grid system was simply not equipped to handle such a rapid conversion. Had those unrealistic objectives been maintained, the result would have been disastrous on two fronts – falling far short of meeting the energy demands of evolving technology while leading to greater price hikes for average households.
The Energy Department’s Grid Modernization Initiative is working with partners to create the “grid of the future [that] will deliver resilient, reliable, flexible, secure, sustainable, and affordable electricity.”
As an Energy Department analysis shows, a modernized, integrated grid can better meet the demands of emerging technology by making the grid “smarter and more resilient through the use of cutting-edge technologies, equipment, and controls that communicate and work together to deliver electricity more reliably and efficiently can greatly reduce the frequency and duration of power outages, reduce storm impacts, and restore service faster when outages occur.”
For average consumers, a modernized grid allows them to “better manage their own energy consumption and costs because they have easier access to their own data.” The grid of the future will also feature meters and sensors adjusting to power ebbs and flows, voltage regulation reducing waste, and lower operational expenses for utilities, resulting in lower costs for typical households.
Environmentally, a modernized grid more efficiently integrating an array of energy resources for cleaner outputs is a much more realistic way to reduce emissions and protect our environment than “net zero” objectives or “carbon credit” schemes that can never realistically be achieved.
It will be crucial that modernization initiatives utilize the all-of-the-above approach represented by ARC-ES to keep reliable and affordable energy at the forefront of electricity generation while allowing time to upgrade the grids and eventually accommodate the cautious integration of renewables as part of the energy mix. Why? Because reliability is a national security imperative.
A key component of the ARC-ES philosophy is a requirement that energy resources must guarantee that electricity is dispatchable 24 hours a day, seven days a week. Reliable sources such as natural gas must be available “to complement and provide backup to renewable energy sources during periods of low availability.” Also crucial is “the capability to ramp up or down electricity generation within one hour, stabilizing the electrical grid.”
The “all-of-the-above” approach of ARC-ES creates a tide that lifts all boats, providing electricity that is both reliable and affordable – not defective and wasteful because the government is picking and choosing winners and losers.
A modernized grid following the principles of ARC-ES that utilizes all of our crucial energy resources – including renewables when their integration is reasonable and affordable – will provide the volume and reliability sought by businesses, and the affordability crucial for average household budgets.
Gary Abernathy is a longtime newspaper editor, reporter and columnist. He was a contributing columnist for the Washington Post from 2017-2023 and a frequent guest analyst across numerous media platforms. He is a contributing columnist for The Empowerment Alliance, which advocates for realistic approaches to energy consumption and environmental conservation.
This article was originally published by RealClearEnergy and made available via RealClearWire.
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Nice article but I see no reason to make accommodations for wind and solar. Your generators can either produce what we need when we need it or not. Wind and solar can’t so stop wasting money on them.
Wind and solar will only ever be supplemental producing electricity mainly at times not peak demand. If gas, coal or nuclear turbines need to keep spinning whilst ruinables generate, then that cost of the ruinables must include the spinning reserve. If that cost is below gas, coal or nuclear then use it, if it isn’t then tough luck you own a white elephant.
This article is an off-the-charts, hype piece for more of expensive, highly subsidized wind, solar and batteries systems, which already have proven to be economically and financially disastrous in the UK, Germany, Ireland, Spain, etc., and which, on top of that calamity, are importing tens of million of unvetted, government-program sucking, Muslim, misfits from the worst neighborhoods of dysfunctional Third World countries, to further spiral downwards to ignominious oblivion.
That’s a lot of words about the “grid” that would be entirely unnecessary if not for the intentional proliferation of unreliable, intermittent wind and solar sources that are allowed to inject their output when available with no responsibility when calm or dark.
Ideally, the only time wind and solar sources should be built is when a reliable source (say coal or gas) decides to invest with their own money in wind or solar purely to reduce fuel cost. If that looks attractive to them, fine.
Oh, and please stop talking about “emissions.”
Thank you.
If they’re not talking about “emissions” then they’re talking about “clean” energy, which means the same thing to an “all of the above” activist.
David, good pickup.
Presumably the author thinks that adding CO2 to air will make thermometers hotter, but cannot bring himself to say it, for fear of being laughed at.
That’s part of the sales pitch..
Wind and solar are not “allowed” to inject their output to the grid. As I understand it, utilities are required to take wind and solar power whenever it is produced, leading to the problems we now have.
Just a different way of saying essentially the same thing. Developers are allowed to apply for local connection to the utility on the premise that their output is prioritized when available. Yes, the utilities are required to process the request by state rules and also to meet state mandates for “renewables.” The ISO’s are involved too, in the load forecasting and dispatch processes.
Maryland does this. Solar farms supplement the grid when the sun is shining and that reduces fuel costs.
Unless they add back in some portion of solar farm cost there no way to know if there is a reduced cost of fuel.
There is on my bill.
“For average consumers, a modernized grid allows them to “better manage their own energy consumption and costs because they have easier access to their own data.”
I assume the “average consumer” in this statement is not a home owner or apartment renter. Industries and businesses might want to manage their energy but if I’m having a big group at Thanksgiving I want electricity all day long. I don’t want to cook a turkey and a pecan pie in the middle of the night and then eat cold turkey by candles at 2:00pm.
Yum.
“In fact, what at first might seem like competing objectives should, thanks to free markets, dovetail into a confluence beneficial to all”
Wind and solar lose in a competing market. If they aren’t propped up by gov’t, they will fail quickly. And instead of a confluence, we end up with effluent.
Not instead…the confluence will be coal, gas and nuclear; the effluent wind and solar.
And as soon as the bowels of the grid have been evacuated by the excretion of the waste, only confluence.
That was my point. I worded it poorly.
Normalized FLCOE Outlook to 2028 (60-Year Horizon, No Subsidies)Full levelized cost of energy Source: Copilot AI
(USD/MWh)
CCGT
Solar PV
Onshore Wind
Offshore Wind
Key Points:
Comment: There is no role for RE (Ruinous Energy) on a modern grid;. N2N, Natural Gas to Nuclear with SMR leading the way.
Coal should also be in the mix, along with nuclear, as baseload.
Unlike NG, you can stockpile coal so your plants don’t shut down if there are supply delays or interruptions.
Whether or not clusters of Small Modular Reactors can produce power at a reasonable price has not been established. NUSCALE tried to do that in Idaho with their pressurized water reactors (using proven reactor technology and materials) but could not produce power at a price the utilities could pay so the project failed. The arguments for SMRs is somewhat like concluding that a city bus system can be made better by replacing the busses with hundreds of Ford Fiestas. At least the Fiestas would work, but many of the SMR proposals probably will not (homogeneous, liquid salt , liquid metal or sodium cooled) for the same reasons such systems failed in larger versions plus the added complexities of operating, maintaining and repairing lots of very small reactors at a single site. We shall see.
Data centers and AI have were basically the nail in the coffin that killed net-zero. They need power 24/7 and there growth in power is impossible for renewables to meet even under green fairytales.
For those who think AI will burst its bubble, NVidia just posted a 3rd quarter profit of $54.9B and guidance is for $65B for 4th quarter,
AI stocks are falling in the NYSE.
No bubble burst yet, but we have seen the pattern before.
The pattern is not predictive, but merely limns possible outcomes.
Only if people want it, and are prepared to pay for it – which often is assumed, possibly wrongly. If the only source of electricity is intermittent and limited, consumers just have to live with it. If the choice is light at night, or food on the table, people might choose food over light.
Of course, most of us demand that everybody else supplies everything our little hearts desire, and we threaten to have tantrums if we don’t get our own way. However, what if the choice is 24/7 power at ten times the cost of say, 10/6 power? It’s a case of “horses for courses”, in my worthless opinion, and the economics of reality will ultimately prevail.
Not easy to find one size that fits all.
There’s no first world country that should suddenly have to accept less than 24/7 electricity, which has never been an issue for such countries until the gross stupidity of attempting to replace reliable 24/7 generation with worse-than-useless wind and solar.
Now those points are worthy of discussion.
First detail is food on the table. There is much that can be done that does not need food to be cooked or reheated. So the 1/0 choice of light versus dinner is not as clean as the post suggests.
Second detail is heating and cooling.
Where does that fit in the mix of choices?
Then there are tiers. Individual domiciles/families versus offices and factories versus schools and hospitals versus (cough, cough) government versus military/first response/fire/police/other community safety functions. Each of these has a different parameter set for choosing. In some cases mandatory 24/7 is the only solution.
Just some grist for the mill.
Cheers.
Another writer willing to use words without meaning:
I have had solar panels on my roof for 15 years now and there is no sign of them renewing. In fact they are ageing and do not even self-clean. I anticipate that they will stop working some day without ever renewing.
It is accurate to describe them as weather dependent generators if you do not want to call them what they are – intermittent generators.
Useful as supplemental power if your grid could supply affordable, reliable electricity 24 x 7?
If the grid goes down, or there’s a local outage (more likely, unless the wind and solar stupidity continues), I want a propane fired generator, not some useless solar panels (or fire hazard storage batteries).
The dictionary definition of renewable is not exhausting fuel. No replenishment needed.
Then there is Logan’s Run version of renewal.
Magazine subscription renewal.
This is a case where the common socially context driven definition is misleading.
The real problem with applying a definition of renewable to WTG and SV is the fuel source is not constant and not present 24/7/365. Given that point, I strongly vote against defining WTG and WV as renewable.
My positive side says: yes, better technology will save the day. My skeptical ( more realistic?) side says: yes, in an optimum world but when i see ‘smarter’ i think ‘more complex’ and more elements that can (and will) go wrong. A normal, standard grid is already very delicately balanced and complex.
Maybe im getting too old..
From the article: “A key component of the ARC-ES philosophy is a requirement that energy resources must guarantee that electricity is dispatchable 24 hours a day, seven days a week. Reliable sources such as natural gas must be available “to complement and provide backup to renewable energy sources during periods of low availability.” Also crucial is “the capability to ramp up or down electricity generation within one hour, stabilizing the electrical grid.”
Wrong!
We should not be using reliable sources like natural gas to backup unreliable sources like windmills and industrial solar.
“All of the above” is a Big Mistake, and is the cause of all our grid problems.
There were no blackout warnings in the United States before windmills and industrial solar were added.
Now, with windmills and industrial solar on the grid, we have blackout warnings every summer and every winter.
Trump hates windmills and I suspect he hates industrial solar, too. Good luck with “all of the above” while Trump is president.
The windmills and industrial solar should be scrapped. They are not fit for purpose.
SV and WTG are niche application technologies.
There are places they work well. But, they are being pushed akin to a round peg in a square hole.
Supplementing the grid to a modest percentage will, when the wind is blowing or the sun is shining, help offset fuel costs. However the cost of implementation is not considered in that previous sentence.
We don’t need to reduce our emissions and doing so will not “protect our environment.” The author has swallowed the propaganda.
There is NOTHING “crucial” about worse-than-useless wind and solar, except this: It is CRUCIAL that we decommission it and remove it from our grid, while replacing it with coal, gas and nuclear.
Integration of wind and solar WILL NEVER BE “reasonable and affordable:” grid connected wind and solar are IDIOTIC.
“As described by EBSCO, a leading provider of research databases…[states that] Another drawback is that the U.S. energy grid has no real way of storing power for use in the future. All the power that people use at a particular time must be created at the moment it is needed.”
The US grid has several “real ways” to store power. Coal fired power stations store days or weeks of fuel on site to produce power when needed. Gas fired power stations generally don’t store fuel but could store some as compressed or even liquified gas if the economics work. Diesel generator plants have tanks of fuel sized to last for days or weeks to be used when needed. That is very much the same as pumped water “storage” systems advocated by some which can produce power when the water is released through turbines. All of these different types of generators produce AC power which can easily be coordinated in voltage and frequency with the grid. There are a few battery installations that are used to fill in short gaps in the power supply but they only last for a very few hours and they produce DC power which must be rectified introducing more complications. EBASCO does not seem to be a very competent “provider of research databases.”
‘…DC power which must be rectified…” should read ‘…DC power which must be converted to AC…’
“Environmentally, a modernized grid more efficiently integrating an array of energy resources for cleaner outputs is a much more realistic way to reduce emissions and protect our environment…”
What the heck does that mean? How does “integrating an array of energy resources” make anything cleaner? How do wind and solar sources “integrate” when to do that, spinning backup power is needed when they fail and that backup must often operate at zero or part load, i.e. ineffiently, because of wind and solar?
This article is a pile of word babble without any useful information, interpretation or guidance.
From article:”Reliable sources such as natural gas must be available “to complement and provide backup to renewable energy sources during periods of low availability.”.
This guy still wants to drive up the cost of electricity with bad ideas like this. He admits renewable are sporadic and unreliable but can’t bring himself to just admit the truth.
I saw a graph some time ago (wish I had kept it) that plotted the rise in GDP per capita prior to and subsequent to the start of the use of fossil fuels for energy production and the increase was staggering – not just a few percentage points but tens of thousands of percentages higher – that should be in the class rooms
William:
The graph you recall was a true hockey stick.
Here is a wonderful site for data & graphs:
https://ourworldindata.org/what-is-economic-growth
[scroll down to “Global Inequality” for a downloadable graph on GDP per nation]
Enjoy!
RINO alert. Bafflegab by a fake moderate. More green/red propa. The only new thing here is the author didn’t go off on a tirade about “deniers”.
In true perspective, wind and solar are the DEI components of the energy aspect of our society. Elevated not based on their true value to energy contribution but on their projection that all things should be equal.