Doug Sheridan critiques a column by one of Mike Bloomberg's shills for the Big Green Grift:
Liam Denning writes in Bloomberg, Energy Sec Chris Wright recently lamented that the Trump admin would be blamed for rising electricity bills, even though it was really Democrats' fault.
Wright's jab at Dems centered on their penchant for green power, which he has dismissed as costly and unreliable. Again, however, there is no discernable correlation between a state's reliance on wind and solar power and electricity costs. Indeed, Iowa, a Republican stronghold where Wright gave his interview, is a renewables standout and its bills are relatively low as a share of income.
Our Take 1: No serious statistician would use the analysis Denning leans on here . Rather, they'd compare the *change* in prices over time against the *change* in market share of renewables over time. Bloomberg analysts likely know this, even if Denning doesn't. But since that analysis likely wouldn't produce the more favorable conclusion for renewables, we get the analysis that does.
Indeed, focusing on generation misses the bigger picture, according to Jim Murchie of Energy Income Partners, LLC (EIP), who notes, "... the lower-voltage networks delivering power locally has accounted for roughly over the past decade." This observation fits with trends in utility investment, with capex on distribution having doubled in real terms over the past decade compared with flat spending on transmission and generation.
Our Take 2: Okay, but the obvious culprit for higher distribution costs is the effort to "electrify everything." New wires and equipment for new customers and higher loads was always going to mean higher distribution costs. This is obvious, yet Denning doesn't mention it.
Rather than states pushing a lot of utility-owned capacity into the market, Al giants adding hefty new loads should be made to contract for new, competitive generation that can boost the grid's resilience without burdening households. Indeed, done right, this could end up reducing costs across the system, Murchie points out.
Our Take 3: Nope. The smart play for Big Tech is going to be avoiding the grid altogether... lest they be blamed for every blackout, brownout, blinkout, and rate increase to come over the next 20 years. Our guess is companies like Microsoft, Meta, Amazon Web Services (AWS), and Google will go out of their way to build their own on-site, fully self-contained generation. Otherwise, they be America's political whipping boys for the higher rates and reliability problems almost certain to plague our grids going forward.
Our Take 4: We've followed Denning for years—first as a Bloomberg reporter covering energy, and now as a columnist. Our sense is there's no dataset or theory he won't attempt to argue is proof the green economy is poised to take over the world, stealing fossil fuel market share along the way. This column is no exception.
My Take: What's causing electric bills to go up is subsidized intermittent power that must be duplicated, for safety's sake, by baseload power that then must operate less efficiently as a result. It's really that simple. We pay twice for green energy and Denning wants us to pay a third time for the infrastructure needed by wind and solar. Fuggedaboutit!
Secretary Wright is the person who can start turning the ball around. America got suckered 30 years ago when this unreliable energy was first rising on the horizon, and because of some governments that did not do do diligence homework, America has been robbed of how many Billions of dollars, and has given up how much good farmland? I'm OK with them doing their experiments out in the deserts and placing these wind machines where they can't be seen on hilltops, but not alongside roadways or visible on the horizon. They are not pretty. And the worst part is they are Unreliable. These companies that get the contracts they appear to install, get their last payment and run. How many solar panels don't you see alongside the roads facing the wrong way. And how many wind machines have major oil slicks running down the towers, and the blades are not turning. A good percentage at both. America got taken to the cleaners, and the governments paid them in full. Why? And no maintenance contracts. Is anybody checking how much electricity is actually being produced at each location? Are the actually even connected into the grid? Yes we know some are, and we know that they are just part time employees or suppliers.
Secretary Wright is the person who can start turning the ball around. America got suckered 30 years ago when this unreliable energy was first rising on the horizon, and because of some governments that did not do do diligence homework, America has been robbed of how many Billions of dollars, and has given up how much good farmland? I'm OK with them doing their experiments out in the deserts and placing these wind machines where they can't be seen on hilltops, but not alongside roadways or visible on the horizon. They are not pretty. And the worst part is they are Unreliable. These companies that get the contracts they appear to install, get their last payment and run. How many solar panels don't you see alongside the roads facing the wrong way. And how many wind machines have major oil slicks running down the towers, and the blades are not turning. A good percentage at both. America got taken to the cleaners, and the governments paid them in full. Why? And no maintenance contracts. Is anybody checking how much electricity is actually being produced at each location? Are the actually even connected into the grid? Yes we know some are, and we know that they are just part time employees or suppliers.
America can do so much better. Yes it can!!
It’s time to embarrass Bloomberg News in public!