62 Comments

It is almost as if the state governments are seeking to destroy their own economies via renewable and zero carbon mandates. apparently they haven't observed how Germany's Energiewende program is destroying the German economy, but they are going down the exact same road. Remarkable and incredibly stupid!

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I agree. Minnesota is, arguably, the worst case of energy myopia. The governor has banned the addition of any new nuclear plants. WTF?

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Maybe residents of Minnesota and others could contact their governors offering to name power blackouts after them? "The last Whitmer lasted two days." "May I have the next Walz?"

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Love it. the lore can be carried down over time. but I think it needs to be a bit more specific, something like, the Democratic Governor Walz lasted 3 days, while the Democratic governor Whitmer lasted a week. was much worse

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Andy, the comment about Walz banning nuclear is hogwash.

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Ian, please see my reply to Robert Borlick.

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I live in Minnesota. Governor Walz has never banned nuclear plants in Minnesota. Minnesota placed a moratorium on the building of nuclear plants in 1994. In 2009, when Tim Walz was a US House Representative, he called for a repeal of that 1994 law. In 2023 he joined with Republicans and some Democrats to call for a $300,00 study of emerging nuclear technologies. The clean energy bill that he signed is flexible. Electric companies can appeal to the Public Utilities Commission if ratepayers find it too expensive to make the shift by 2040 or if carbon-free alternatives such as solar and wind aren't reliable enough to keep the lights on.

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On the other hand, the legislature did not lift its moratorium on building new nuclear power plants as part of its 100 percent carbon free mandate.

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True. I wish they had lifted the moratorium.

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I also think that legislation should have included automatic off-ramps for costs and reliability that the democrats refused to enact.

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Sounds reasonable. I think Walz had to appease some of his Democratic colleagues but what do I know? What needs to happen is that pro-nuclear (or nuclear ambivalent) Democratic voters need to voice their concerns about the reliability of our grid to their representatives and Walz. That’s what I intend to do.

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I live in Michigan. My spouse is employed as a consulting engineer, primarily on energy issues. Yesterday we installed a whole house generator. Our regulators seem determined to impoverish them freeze our state.

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We are doing the same here in the Upper Peninsula. Our state representative was the deciding vote on last year's energy legislation that aims to turn the U.P. into "the Saudi Arabia of wind and solar."

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I'm sorry your representative is doing such a bad job, but they've been systematically mis-informed by Gov. Whitmer's appointees to the Michigan Public Service Commission.

If you want a real eye-opener, check out the investments that Marc Mallory, Whitmer's husband, has in various solar and wind developers and suppliers. There's a reason she wouldn't sign off on the new disclosure requirements for MI elected officials until they conference committee eliminated the requirement for disclosure of spouse's employer and significant investments in individual companies/partnerships (not 401k-type accounts).

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That sounds like a bogus attack on Governor Whitmer's integrity.

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Whitmer's requirements for signing the reporting requirements bill were widely publicized in both Detroit and Lansing news outlets.

Dr. Mallory's investments are less well known, except to lobbyists who help people get wind and solar projects approved by the MPSC or the MI legislature, since they eliminated local government zoning controls.

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Smart move. It’ll get used

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How are you storing which generator fuel for how long?

Several of the slides suggest longer electricity shortfalls, not just occasional blackouts.

EnergyBadBoys omitted what Ontario called the best, largest source of new electricity : CONSERVATION

How are you and your husband reducing your electricity demand?

Sorry, that’s crazy - none of us are willing to reduce our luxurious lifestyles, why should you do it?!

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The new generator is natural gas fueled, and will be permanently connected to our utility's gas supply. It replaces a portable unit that was gasoline-fired, for which we tend to keep 10-20 gallons of gas (in 5 gallon gas cans) on hand to fuel the mowers, the garden tractor, and chain saws as well as the generator.

Last year we reduced our electricity demand by about 15% per year by replacing our 33-year-old ground-water source heat pump and 35-year-old builder-grade gas furnace with a high efficiency air conditioning unit, and the highest available efficiency gas furnace. While we were at it, we also replaced the high-efficiency but 12-years-old gas water heater with an on-demand gas-fired unit. The combination of changes means we run our well-pump less, our forced-air fans in the furnace/chiller system much less, and are using less gas, more efficiently.

Payback on the overall investment is almost 12 years at current electricity and gas rates, but because of wrong-headed state mandates for renewable power, I expect the cost of electricity in particular will continue to rise, even if nat gas prices stay comparatively stable, as they should since Michigan has naturally-occurring salt domes in which to store LOTS of natural gas cheaply.

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This is a perfect example of a natural, market-driven energy transition. Government interventions (banning gas stoves, gas grills, hyping EVs, etc) do little more than add costs and reduces efficiencies, and ultimately reduces freedom. Governments should be a referee, not an active player.

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Thanks again EBBs. I have two questions:

1) I see EVs in the list of future demands, but not explicitly heat pumps - do you believe these are factored in?

2) Do you foresee a 28th Amendment: "A reliable and well regulated electricity supply, being necessary to the security of a free State, the right of the people to keep and use gasoline and diesel Generators, shall not be infringed"?

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I don’t know the answer to the heat pump question but I would assume not because states haven’t enacted policies enforcing that and miso seems to be reactive.

The amendment wouldn’t fly because the coasts will never go for it haha

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The early California capacity based blackouts actually got a “Republican” (Arnold) elected governor. he fixed it, for a while. I think he was the last republican elected to a statewide office, and the blackout threats are back. People REALLY hate blackouts. I’m surprised MISO has gone this far with no sign of turning back. I wonder what it will take to reverse this?

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Probably multiple blackouts unfortunately

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I will be sharing this with my MISO buddy when it goes up on LinkedIn.

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And the math is not even that hard, but they still don’t get it.

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As one who knows the near term math, Ian Braithwaite, what do You propose to avoid EnergyBadBoys’ future forecast for MISO ?

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I don't think I merit your description, but since you ask, and without doing sums, I would have thought the rational approach is to put the brakes on the retirements, build more gas plant, including enough to phase out coal, and for the longer term, build nuclear, starting as soon as possible. At first sight, solar and wind look small enough to cope with, and I don't know if there are any further prospects for hydro, or pumped hydro for short-term peak demand.

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Michigan has one existing pumped hydro system at Luddington, and is well positioned to build a couple more.

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Perhaps it will be permitted before you have great grandchildren...but don't bet on it. I worked for 25 years to get permits for a run-of-the-river hydro on a canal. No change in flows, no change in land ownership, no impacts, just a very, very prejudiced regulatory agency. Hydro brings all sorts out of the woodwork!

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Get ready for a true revolt if the lights go out. The politicians need to be voted out before they are rousted out.

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If the general public in MISO are hoping their various legislatures will somehow wake up and realize they have made some monumentally bad assumptions which will lead to monumentally bad results, guess again. If you have ever testified before a State Legislature committee on utilities and or energy matters, you quickly realize how absolutely stupid these elected officials are, with some glaring exceptions. The only way the wind and solar grift gets corrected, is cold and dark and dead people in winter and hot and dark and dead people in summer. Indeed at that point of inflection the public will reflect and their public officials will direct a change. That assumes the pitchforks and lanterns don’t come forth first.

Further if MISO as the RTO/ISO thinks they are going to get supplemental electric generation from say PJM, they better get ready to pay, and pay a lot for that power. The 30 July capacity auction for 2025/2026 cleared nominally at $270.00 zonal net load price or $22.50 1MW, roughly a 800% increase from the last auction. Why does it matter? Because there is bilateral support between the ISO’s and PJM is under pressure to retire the remaining coal stations it has and new generation is slow in coming on line if it is coming at all. Point being there just may come a time when there is just not enough generation of any kind to meet demand. The specter of massive megawatt eaters in the guise of “data centers” (400-500 megawatts are not uncommon numbers being tossed around loosely) and the stillborn electric vehicle markets are a drain currently not planned for or if planned for, no current method of execution to meet the “planned” demand.

Perhaps disaster is the best remedy for poor policy making and the resultant pain people will feel and observe. The public needs to wake up to the fact that rolling brown and black outs are coming to a region near you. The leadership at the state level is rudderless and at the federal level is nonexistent. Perhaps the best remedy is to take on the Alfred E. Newman milieu and motto “What me worry?”

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Amen to that! Well said, thank you.

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Didn’t fully realize that all utilities in MISO are vertically integrated. Nice piece!

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There are some IPPs especially for wind and solar but the utilities are monopolies for the retail side

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Not in Illinois and Michigan.

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Got it, makes sense

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All utilities are NOT vertically integrated. Illinois and Michigan are Consumer Choice states that allow retail customers to choose their suppliers.

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EPA shows Michigan as a "partial" retail choice, whatever that means. As you seem to be knowledgeable in such matters, I will ask you the same question I asked the Electric Grandma today: Do you know if power densities are considered in any of the pricing structures or in the policy directives, by any utility, vertically integrated or not? Seems to me that this should be the “first line of defense” in establishing prices. Those sources that furnish energy with a minimum of resource usage at greater capacity factors should get best prices. Sort of an opportunity costs for energy choice.

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I think being able to choose your supplier is different than having a competitive wholesale market where generators bid in unless I’m thinking about it in the wrong way

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All of the generators, including those owned by vertically integrated utilities, competitively bid into the MISO energy market and pay the market prices for the energy that their distribution companies withdraw from that market. There is also an independent market monitor that assesses the degree of competitiveness on an annual basis.

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I’m not sure Michigan is still a retail choice state but @Jason Hayes will know. For most of the region the utilities ultimately are able to pass losses or savings on to the customers.

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I think Michigan is a choice state for both electricity and gass. I've had clueless retail associates pounce on me in wholesale club aisles claiming they can "save you up to 30% on your energy bills". All I have to do is sign an agreement that some company can inject gas or electricity into the distribution systems somewhere, but if they haven't been prudent enough, I would have to pay spot prices. For up to a month at a time.

Nope. None of the salespeople had a clue what I was on about when I mentioned "that major winter storm in Texas" as a reason I wasn't willing to even look at their literature.

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That's true but the existence of the MISO market encourages the utilities to compete in order to use the profits to avoid seeking rate increases. which their regulators dislike. The MISO market makes those profits and losses more transparent.

As I recall, Michigan is only a partial retail choice state in that the large C&I customers can choose their suppliers but the residential customers cannot.

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This is where I don’t agree. The biggest competition I can see in MISO is the competition to retire depreciated assets and build new wind and solar to pad the ratebase. If I’m not mistaken, the revenues from the MISO markets are pass through so those don’t really influence their thinking when regulators are happy to rubber stamp wind and solar projects.

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Well, I guess Oley and Leana had better by some more blankets, heah Oley?

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Loved the article. Wondering why the contribution of hydroelectric power is mentioned so minimally. Here in WA and OR we rely heavily on hydro power through the Bonneville Power Administration, with the stunning system of dams along the Columbia River and Lower Snake River. This system really does provide a major amount of power and irrigation to farmlands, as well as navigation for commercial interests and recreation for the people of the Pacific Northwest.

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The PNW has great hydro resources that MISO doesn’t have. We have very minimal hydro availability and most suitable sites are already operating.

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What will happen in WA & OR as FirstNations change the Columbia’s dam situation to restore Salmon habitat and Pacific fishing resources?

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Here’s what I think will happen: We will see years ahead of the Columbia flooding its banks, no increase in salmon populations, and HUGE energy price hikes. When you take into account the irrigation for farming and ranching (food) from the Columbia’s dam systems, food prices will increase. When you consider the low energy prices we enjoy from reliable, clean hydroelectric power from the Bonneville Power Administration’s dams along the Columbia and Lower Snake River systems, we will see astronomical increases in our local energy costs. When you look at the amount of commercial use of the rivers for industrial and commercial transport from the Ports at the Pacific up river, the costs of everything we import from cars to equipment to household products to building materials will increase. And then you look at the Orca’s in the Puget Sound, and you will see no appreciable increase in their health and population, because Canada and Mexico continue to dump raw sewage into the Pacific Ocean and the Puget Sound directly from their plants with impunity. That dumping straight into the habitat of the Orcas is what affecting them, not the salmon population. And the Orcas sure won’t benefit from “ocean breezes and sunshine” - sourced power!

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An Engineer friend once opined that NatGas may be Renewable :

- constantly generated underground

- fairly easily mined

- clean burning to CO2 and H2O as least polluters of air, water, soil, Health.

(leaking CH4 is a another problem)

If NatGas is Not a forever fuel, what can we use that doesn’t have problems?

- HYDRO (dams damage & burst)

- COAL (pollutes air, water & soil)

- OIL (ditto)

- WOOD (ditto+drought wildfires)

- WIND (needs Storage and NetZeroMiningPollution)

- SOLAR (ditto)

- NUCLEAR (Risky without Longterm commitment by Engineers to solve:

Affordability, Insurability, Storability, Life Expectancy, Defendability)

- CONSERVATION (Won’t happen!)

Every source of providing energy for human societies causes problems.

Because humans are short term thinkers, unable to learn from previous history, we will most likely suffer the results that EnergyBadBoys forecast for MISO.

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No source of energy is without risk. We are currently in a rush to renewables because:

1. Climate risk has been grossly over stated.

2. Resource risk has been completely undervalued.

3. Green sells print, gets votes.

Literally, it will take several cold days in hell before the average voter opens their eyes to the madness of the green new deal, and figures out what they are seeing is a con game worthy of Madoff, Helmsley and others.

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Great description: "the opposite of Motel 6"

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That's a bit of clever hyperbole.

No doubt, demand response is not costless to the customer who chooses to forego consumption but that customer typically is rewarded for doing so, thereby profits curtailing some marginal value loads. There is room for MISO to increase its demand response resources, perhaps as much as by 100 percent.

But that still won't compensate for the Coal plant retirements. The utilities need to add new gas-fired capacity in the near-term and (hopefully) more nuclear capacity when the new reactor designs become available around the end of this decade.

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Aside from my snarky pun, this is seriously some virtue signaling, economy crashing stupidity. The sad part is that it will have terrible effects on the grids that sell east from the west.

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What about the existing MISO contract North<>South with Manitoba Hydro winter<>summer?

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Well it is a thing right, the stupid of Canada, coupled with the stupid of us, and the fact we cannot, and they cannot fulfill it nor can we if we continue down this road... I do not have an actual answer for that. Black outs.

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