[Note: This story is also published at The Daily Caller]
The states of California and Texas have provided stark contrasts in their respective approaches to building and maintaining reliability and stability in their power grids for decades now. Two stories from the past week show this dynamic remains unchanged.
In California, where “electrification of everything” has become a bit of a societal mania, public utility companies like PG&E have largely been denied the ability to build new dispatchable generation capacity powered by natural gas, coal, or nuclear. This reality has led to the hatching of all manner of novel schemes as companies, activists, and policymakers alike scramble to prevent the system from tumbling down.
ABC7 News out of San Francisco reported on the latest novel scheme, this one from PG&E CEO Patricia Poppe, to tap into the batteries in privately-owned electric vehicles to help stabilize the power grid during times of high demand, an idea Poppe herself somewhat modestly calls “unconventional.” But there’s just one problem: The technology needed to make this scheme a reality doesn’t currently exist. (RELATED: DAVID BLACKMON: The Media Fawns Over Judge’s Climate Ruling — There’s Just One Problem)
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