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North American Network Operators Group Date Prev | Date Next | Date Index | Thread Index | Author Index | Historical Re: California electric power on the ragged edge
I sent a half hour at IETF or so learning some of this from Phil Karn, an old friend who lives in San Diego. The capacity of the transmission lines into southern Cal is the limiting factor. There's power out there (in various places), but no incentive for PG&E to carry it. It's virtually impossible for a "competitor" to add capacity, as right of way for power lines is even worse than for fiber. The cost of power is passed right to the customer. There's no incentive for PG&E to find lower cost power; thus, the bid price is either very low (at night, maybe not even covering the cost of production), or at the peak allowed (50 cents per kilowatt hour), in an obvious step function. (Such a high price would cause riots in the heartland states.) In short, the microeconomist's wetdream (demand bidding) simply doesn't work without hundreds of competitors, cost containment on the distributor and a low barrier to entry, none of which apply. Meanwhile, Phil has added another 16 solar panels and more batteries, and is selling power back to the grid. Buy low, sell high! PG&E is not happy, and wants to change the rules for microgenerators -- the very thing that could add competition! (Phil already had solar panels and batteries for his EV1. See his web pages at http://people.qualcomm.com/karn/pv/pv.html. Barriers to entry without such a motivation might be higher.) [email protected] Key fingerprint = 17 40 5E 67 15 6F 31 26 DD 0D B9 9B 6A 15 2C 32
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