Posted on 01/15/2009 3:56:14 PM PST by Coleus
IMAGINE if the nation's transportation infrastructure had been designed to serve only small regions, with wheat from Iowa easily reaching bakeries in Des Moines but not New York or computer products from the Silicon Valley easily reaching stores in Los Angeles but not Chicago. Costs of goods would vary widely among regions, and the economy would suffer. Welcome to the world of electricity, where separate transmission systems - the "transportation" infrastructure of electricity - built by local utilities for local customers now serve as a national network.
While not a "third-world transmission system," as some said after the huge East Coast blackout in 2003, the US transmission network is far from being an efficient national-delivery system. It hasn't seen significant investment for more than 30 years, wasn't designed to support today's electricity markets and isn't adequate to meet the expected growth in demand. The lack of sufficient transmission capacity makes it harder to bring online renewable electricity sources like wind and solar. The best sites for utility-scale wind or solar farms typically are in regions with few population centers and not enough transmission access to move the energy to areas of demand. To supply 20 percent of America's electricity needs with wind by 2030 (a target often mentioned by legislators) and deliver that electricity to areas of demand, America needs 19,000 more circuit miles of extra-high-voltage transmission.
The Department of Energy projects that US electricity sales will rise between 18 percent (with low growth) to 39 percent (with high growth) from 2006 to 2030, even with current efficiency efforts.
(Excerpt) Read more at nypost.com ...
There is plenty in Texas.
--wonder what is to supply the other 80%?
Wheat grows better in Iowa and sells better in New York. Ships find better harbor in New York than in Iowa. Natural market processes created an interchange of produce for imported products between Iowa and New York.
From where is electricity best generated? We’ll never know because governments created local monopolies called utilities.
“There is plenty in Texas”
http://www.renewableenergyworld.com/rea/news/recolumnists/story?id=53616
Not
20 Whole percent at what cost? Coal supplies about 70% looks like wind leaves a 50% deficit? Where will that come from?
At least Texas isn’t hooked up to the national grid. Same goes for Alaska. When the national grid collapses, only Alaska, Hawaii and Texas will have power throughout the entire state.
One of the interesting facts about Texas is that your power grid and telecomm interface to the rest of the nation make Texas quite nearly able to pull out of the US national grid/network and wander away on your own.
Texans really have taken to heart that whole bit about secession. If you invent your own currency and banking system, you’re closer than any other state other than AK/HI to being able to pull it off.
Florida being a peninsula should be fairly easy to partition off from the rest of the grid if need be...
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