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California creates power shortage

OCMerrill

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Today in SCE territory the coastal cities subsidize the inland cities. I always fought for the same base and rate for all in the SCE service area. PUC got a lot of pressure not to change it.
Us costal cities are also paying to decommission SONGS. Like $10 bucks a month. How awesome that is.

Always on the back of the consumer.
 

jailbird141

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Yep, solar only works till about 4pm then what..... O'shit now we need to buy power and resell it to keep everyone's lights on. Hence CA has the highest energy rates.

The consumer get hit and CA politicians can pat themselves on the back for being green.... 🖕
Can't we just adjust our clocks so that 4 pm is closer to when the sun is brightest? Then we could keep using solar energy later into the day?
 

rivrrts429

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GE built a $1.1 billion NatGas plant in 2005 in Romoland, CA. Totally decommissioned last year. One of my partners who targets these jobs says they’re demoing these NatGas plants all over the country 🤷‍♂️
 

mesquito_creek

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GE built a $1.1 billion NatGas plant in 2005 in Romoland, CA. Totally decommissioned last year. One of my partners who targets these jobs says they’re demoing these NatGas plants all over the country 🤷‍♂️

That's interesting... Arizona is adding  820 megawatts (MW) of new power generation produced by 16 gas turbines in Collidge Arizona for the greater Phoenix Metro.

 

rivrrts429

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That's interesting... Arizona is adding  820 megawatts (MW) of new power generation produced by 16 gas turbines in Collidge Arizona for the greater Phoenix Metro.



Your guess is as good as mine. This is the article on the one I was talking about. GE said it was no longer economically viable and retired 20 years early 🤷‍♂️

Makes no difference to me as I make money building them and demoing them.

 

mesquito_creek

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Arizona already has Nuke, lol. https://www.paloverde.com/

not to split hairs, but AZ has the plant physically located in Arizona, but the 24.7% power is owned by Califormia electrical stakeholders.

Ownership summary:

APS 29.1%
SRP 17.5%
El Paso Electric Co. 15.8%
Southern California Edison 15.8%
Public Service Co. of New Mexico 10.2%
Southern California Public Power Authority 5.9%
Los Angeles Dept. of Water & Power 5.7%
 

spectra3279

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If the p
And you have to realize as the grid becomes less stable and less able to meet our needs the sale and use of personal generators will be way more common. It may make more sense to get a natural gas generator and run it in your side yard. Government is dumb. LOL


If the power is out, what's gonna pump the natural gas to your house?
 

spectra3279

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Your guess is as good as mine. This is the article on the one I was talking about. GE said it was no longer economically viable and retired 20 years early 🤷‍♂️

Makes no difference to me as I make money building them and demoing them.


From the article

The closure illustrates stiff competition in the deregulated energy market as cheap wind and solar supply more electricity, squeezing out fossil fuels. Some utilities say they have no plans to build more fossil plants.


How are they defining cheap electic in California?
 

rivrrts429

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From the article

The closure illustrates stiff competition in the deregulated energy market as cheap wind and solar supply more electricity, squeezing out fossil fuels. Some utilities say they have no plans to build more fossil plants.


How are they defining cheap electic in California?


Meanwhile we’re on flex alerts during peak summer times because there’s not enough electricity to support demand.

It’s all a bunch of Tom Foolery for the consumers while politicians line their pockets.
 

Bugginout

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Your guess is as good as mine. This is the article on the one I was talking about. GE said it was no longer economically viable and retired 20 years early 🤷‍♂️

Makes no difference to me as I make money building them and demoing them.

Me too but demo on Romoland seems crazy I feel like we just built it.
 

TCHB

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Us costal cities are also paying to decommission SONGS. Like $10 bucks a month. How awesome that is.

Always on the back of the consumer.
Yes when the plant or any other plant in the utility base goes out of service all costs with the decommissioning gets paid by the public.
 

TCHB

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When San O switch was turned off they were offering tours of the facility and explaining why. I took the tour with my kids in tow and was satisfied to learn how safe that plant really was. A years production fuel would fit in a one car garage and could be re-enriched after 20 years and used again.

San O radio active steam water is in a sealed system 3 layers deep, in other words Sea Water cooling the 1st stage using heat exchangers, cooling the second stage same and on the the dirty water stage. In other words three cooling stages down with sensors in each stage looking for a radio active problem. There is little to no chance of a complete release unless California broke off and fell into the ocean.

The proclaimed do-gooders are running the show and for some reason have more say than a Nuclear Engineer. Turns out the Do-Gooders froze the shit out of Texas last season.

So power demand will get worse and to combat that CA and Gruesome will ban the use of generators.

Politicians and their agendas are running us down a rabbit hole.
Today the future of power generation will be Independent Power Producers with a specific Power Purchase Agreement for at least 10 years. The independents normally can produce the power much cheaper and they take the performance risk on reliability and costs. The utilities put out a RFP for a specific need including location area. The IPPs bid on the specific RFP. The utility will award the contract and the new plant will get built by the IPP. All the risk on the new build and performance issues are in the IPPs house.
 

Xring01

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Today the future of power generation will be Independent Power Producers with a specific Power Purchase Agreement for at least 10 years. The independents normally can produce the power much cheaper and they take the performance risk on reliability and costs. The utilities put out a RFP for a specific need including location area. The IPPs bid on the specific RFP. The utility will award the contract and the new plant will get built by the IPP. All the risk on the new build and performance issues are in the IPPs house.
This is probably the most accurate statement on this entire thread.
TCHB is extremely accurate in whats currently happening. Which I totally agree with.

But what he / she is not articulating are the reasons why?
Which dates back to policy’s and regulations that where passed 20 years ago that impact the decisions made by the utilitys that put us in this situation.
I chime in on all of these threads when I have time.

For those of you who truly give a shit about the bill you pay every month. Then you need to look into the cause and effect of the NERC/FERC, Ca ISO, EPA, CARB, etc etc etc regulations that impact the decisions that utilitys are forced to make.

Combine that with the lawsuits of starting wildfires, when there is an un precedented drought. Get sued for having an energized power line that could have started the fire, but if you choose to cut the power off during a high wind event that could cause a wild fire. You are still the bad guy and you still get sued. Lose lose for the Utility. So why be in that business? No Win situation. But why?

Utilitys are literally put in a NO WIN SITUATION.

Argue with me all you want. But I promise you one thing. I have over 25 years of experience in this field…

Bottom Line is quite simple.
The political goals of various government admnistrations over the last 20 plus years, do not align with reliable/affordable electricity to the rate payers. Thats a fact. I can prove it over and over and over again.

Don’t blame the Utility, blame the politicians that force the policy’s and regulations that dictate the utilitys’s actions and budgets.

Its very very simple. Its all politics, until we change the politicians, then we will continue to have the same problems.
 

Done-it-again

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Get ready for a surcharge when it’s cloudy or raining in CA. Power is going to get very expensive.
 

TCHB

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One thing to always remember that a utility makes money on regulation. When EPA passes a new law the utility spends a billion and makes the 10% return on that investment. It is love/hate relationship. In 2000 SCE sold 80% of its generation to IPPs to start deregulation which did not go well due to technical issues as well as market issues. I am going golfing!
 

DaveC

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I am dead set against solar for my home various reasons. Cost, reliability, reduced production in the winter, tied up capital. Makes no economic sense today for most especially me.

I am a numbers guys so I have looked. I even got solar on my other house so I know first hand.

However there is one BIG factor that changes everything…..Future price increases.

Having said that one big factor is cost escalations for various reasons. If you assume large cost increases for electricity going forward into the future then that changes things quite a bit

Large future price increases cause solar to make more sense. Especially with a battery.

For the reasons stated above price increases are a real probability in Cali. Assuming future price increases are large and are realized then solar might be the way to go.
 

JDKRXW

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If the power is out, what's gonna pump the natural gas to your house?
If they're smart, the supply companies will use some of the gas they are pumping to power gas turbines or their own gensets, which will drive their supply pumps. This is what the big operators do.
 

Mandelon

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Didn't San Onofre shut down because Mistubishi fucked up the coolant lines?
 

mesquito_creek

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Today the future of power generation will be Independent Power Producers with a specific Power Purchase Agreement for at least 10 years. The independents normally can produce the power much cheaper and they take the performance risk on reliability and costs. The utilities put out a RFP for a specific need including location area. The IPPs bid on the specific RFP. The utility will award the contract and the new plant will get built by the IPP. All the risk on the new build and performance issues are in the IPPs house.
This is probably the most accurate statement on this entire thread.
TCHB is extremely accurate in whats currently happening. Which I totally agree with.

But what he / she is not articulating are the reasons why?
Which dates back to policy’s and regulations that where passed 20 years ago that impact the decisions made by the utilitys that put us in this situation.
I chime in on all of these threads when I have time.

For those of you who truly give a shit about the bill you pay every month. Then you need to look into the cause and effect of the NERC/FERC, Ca ISO, EPA, CARB, etc etc etc regulations that impact the decisions that utilitys are forced to make.

Combine that with the lawsuits of starting wildfires, when there is an un precedented drought. Get sued for having an energized power line that could have started the fire, but if you choose to cut the power off during a high wind event that could cause a wild fire. You are still the bad guy and you still get sued. Lose lose for the Utility. So why be in that business? No Win situation. But why?

Utilitys are literally put in a NO WIN SITUATION.

Argue with me all you want. But I promise you one thing. I have over 25 years of experience in this field…

Bottom Line is quite simple.
The political goals of various government admnistrations over the last 20 plus years, do not align with reliable/affordable electricity to the rate payers. Thats a fact. I can prove it over and over and over again.

Don’t blame the Utility, blame the politicians that force the policy’s and regulations that dictate the utilitys’s actions and budgets.

Its very very simple. Its all politics, until we change the politicians, then we will continue to have the same problems.


Just don't assume every large service territory is created equal and plays by the same set of rules. I think your opinion reflects the CA market and others beyond in AZ. But there are other players that are basically large scale non for profit co-ops enshrined into state constitutions as municipalities with a distinct set of advantages. I.E. they don't pay corporate taxes or have PUCs to deal with.... They are in AZ and TX etc... The AZ examples get to play on your CASIO market too!
 

76sanger

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Man I would GTFO of California before you cant even fill up to move your ass out. What is wrong with liberals? They really do believe they can control "everything".
 

Wolskis

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GE built a $1.1 billion NatGas plant in 2005 in Romoland, CA. Totally decommissioned last year. One of my partners who targets these jobs says they’re demoing these NatGas plants all over the country 🤷‍♂️
That plant was a catastrophe from the day it first fired the gas turbine. Those "H" machines sucked. The "HA" on the other hand are the next generation. I'm going to visit a plant we operate sometime in December and will get a first hand look.
 

rivrrts429

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That plant was a catastrophe from the day it first fired the gas turbine. Those "H" machines sucked. The "HA" on the other hand are the next generation. I'm going to visit a plant we operate sometime in December and will get a first hand look.

But to completely tear it down and not retrofit to something better seems crazy. There is a building, maybe two, remaining on that property. Basically a billion $$ worth of infrastructure gone.
 

Xring01

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So to continue where I left off.
How does the Ca ISO plan to solve these problems of achieving the “renewable goals”, and maintaining a reliable grid.

Well their plan is to mandate Energy Storage systems at all levels of the grid. Large 250mW ish size systems placed at the Generation Power Plant level, 25-100mw systems at the substation level, smaller systems in the distribution level, and alot the residential level.

In theory it works, and can work on many aspects.
But that theory does not address the following
Is it Cost Effective?
Is it a mature technology?
are the discharge rates of these systems meeting the goals of the grid? How long will the battery’s last?
what are the impacts to the electric rates of the customers?
is Lithium Iron Phosphate the best technology for these applications? Probably not, but why are they using it?

Saying all of that.
Energy storage systems do not provide any “enertia” to restart a large scale black out.

So in theory, and cost is not a concern, energy storage is broadly installed can prevent alot of outages.

What happens when we have another major wild fire in Oregon, and Bonneville Power cuts the 500kv lines that power Ca.
If we have alot of Energy Storage capacity, then we are probably good to go for 8-10 hours.
Hummm but what happens if they cut the power for a few days? Hummm could we have rolling blackouts, because we cant transmit enough power from the other transmission lines… Yep, probably on to something here.

As you can see, these are huge problems, with no simple solutions, based on the regulations that the “Major Investor Owned Utility’s” are forced to comply with. These regulations are set for by Politicians. Specificallly the Governor of Ca, who “Appoints” the Director of the Ca Public Utility’s Commission. So you think that person has a Power Plant or Utility Background?

Yep right again, its a Politician…

So, now you truly understand why I no longer own a Tesla. Its a great car that solves alot of problem. But I got stranded twice where power outages prevented me from getting to where I needed to go. Combine that with what I know about the grid… It was a very easy decision.

Ca needs Base Load Natural Gas Power Plants in order to meet the needs of the citizens, however that concept is unacceptable to the Green Goals of the Politicians, who are willing to put the citizens safety in jeopardy and doesnt care what the costs of energy are to the end customer.
 
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TCHB

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Just don't assume every large service territory is created equal and plays by the same set of rules. I think your opinion reflects the CA market and others beyond in AZ. But there are other players that are basically large scale non for profit co-ops enshrined into state constitutions as municipalities with a distinct set of advantages. I.E. they don't pay corporate taxes or have PUCs to deal with.... They are in AZ and TX etc... The AZ examples get to play on your CASIO market too!
There are many huge IPP generators that do not pay any taxes.. The only taxes they pay is property taxes. Long story but not going to get into that jar.
 

Wolskis

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But to completely tear it down and not retrofit to something better seems crazy. There is a building, maybe two, remaining on that property. Basically a billion $$ worth of infrastructure gone.
First consideration is the new air permit. Both Federal and State would be needed. The current permit is for the existing technology and any change, i.e., a different gas turbine requires a new permit. What’s the likely hood CA would sign on the dotted line?
 

rivrrts429

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First consideration is the new air permit. Both Federal and State would be needed. The current permit is for the existing technology and any change, i.e., a different gas turbine requires a new permit. What’s the likely hood CA would sign on the dotted line?


Solid argument that I didn’t take into consideration. CA would rather have rolling blackouts at peak times than to issue a permit lol
 

Boat 405

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New Homes in encinitas are required to be 100% electric. Lol. No more gas or LP. So dumb
 

Wheeler

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DaveC

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I appreciate xring‘s insightful, in-depth analysis that is clearly knowledgeable. Great information there.

But I thought everyone here already knew Cali’s electrical plans are a train wreck disaster waiting to happen???…. No!?!?

The problem is the average California voter who thinks the state is a actually gonna deliver on these pie in the sky promises.
 

TCHB

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here is today’s mix of power which is very typical in the morning.
CB8742B0-A612-4E9A-B6CC-F006296CE0F0.jpeg
6D3B8625-7B45-494D-B7CB-2DE6AA008A75.jpeg
 
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