Power Insecurity

Power

Disneyland tourism image

From The General Electric Carousel of Progress at Disneyland, and then Disneyworld
There’s a great big beautiful tomorrow
Shining at the end of every day.
There’s a great big beautiful tomorrow,
And tomorrow is just a dream away.
Man has a dream, and that’s the start.
He follows his dream with mind and heart.
And when it becomes a reality,
It’s a dream come true for you and me.
Fondly remembering this attraction, and the promise of a bright future highlighted by the city of the future under glass as you leave to re-enter the park. Yes, there were flying cars and public transportation, light and spires reaching into the sky.

Lets start with a good overview of history and how things are supposed to work, and a definition of Distributed vs. Centralized power production:

The U.S. grid has not had substantial investment since it went live. Sure, powerplants are built and repairs happen, but that actual transmission is essentially the same. Power is generated at central plants and distributed via a transmission network through 10 reliability districts throughout the country. Lets be honest, investment reduces quarterly profits for IOU's, yes that is the acronym for an Investor Owned Utility, somewhat ironic. There are approximately 3,200 utilities operating in the U.S., roughly 200 of them are IOUs. These IOUs provide power to approximately 70 percent of all power consumers. An argument can be made that the hurdles to renewable energy lie in the investment required to shift production and delivery models, and the associated drop in revenue. The IOU's, the 800 pound gorillas, is the issue.

Clean Energy, or not
Traditional power, from resource use and production, through transmission and delivery, is horribly toxic. Are renewables, natural gas and nuclear any better?
All approaches have problems, all use resources to manufacture, all are manufactured for cost efficiency and pricing, and not longevity. Here are some things to be aware of:

We Need Solutions
Understanding that you are the visionaries and experts we are looking to, there are some things that we have identified as starting points:

Community Microgrids that have management and storage components and where excess power feeds into the existing grid.
A shift in priorities from powering the grid, to powering the home, then the community and finally the grid.
Restructuring of utilities to provide local infrastructure instead of selling power. This only really works with Public Utility Districts (PUD), not IOUs where profit is the motive and not service. Having financed the technology and installation, the utility would charge a flat fee to support the infrastructure. If done properly, this should be affordable and provide greater service security.
A full review of available technologies and the potential integrations for solar, wind, hydro, geothermal, based on maximizing production, not cost and profit i.e., solar on every roof does not work when cost of the panel is a greater concern that catching all available light for a community.
The development of a new federal incentive program that allows renewables to be applied across the board in every community.

We don't know what we don't know, maybe you do?

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