STAY HOME!
March 16th, 2020
From the STrib: Tracking Coronavirus in Minnesota
Just do it — no excuses. Neighbors, relatives, friends, need to help each other get through this, self-isolation and social distancing is not easy, and is for sure nearly impossible for too many. HELP AS YOU CAN!
Coronavirus and the Sun: a Lesson from the 1918 Influenza Pandemic
2019 PJM State of Market
March 12th, 2020
PJM’s annual State of the Market Report has been released by Marketing Analytics:
What I’m looking for first is demand info, so I’m searching. Here ya go:
It looks like peak demand/load, at 148,228MW is above what it was in 2006. From FERC – Electric Power Markets PJM:
All time peak demand: 144,644 MW (set August 2, 2006), and down to 139,438 in 2007.
Peak demand growth (2006-2007): Peak demand declined 3.6%. See PJM State of the Market 2008, below.
| 2006 | ||
|---|---|---|
| Summer Peak Demand (MW) | 144,644 | 139,438 |
| (Source: PJM) |
And about wholesale cost, from the 2019 State of the Market report:
One of the benefits of competitive power markets is that changes in input prices and changes in the balance of supply and demand are reflected immediately in energy prices. PJM real-time energy market prices decreased significantly in 2019 compared to 2018. The load weighted,average real-time LMP was 28.6 percent lower in 2019 than in 2018, $27.32 per MWh versus $38.24per MWh. Of the $10.92 per MWh decrease, 41.5 percent was a result of lower fuel costs. Other contributors to the decrease were the dispatch of lower cost units, decreased load and lower markups (2019 SoM,Intro, p 3).
Once more with feeling –wholesale energy costs and prices are DOWN, DOWN, DOWN, yet rates are going UP, UP, UP. DOH! It’s because, like Xcel, utilities are changing their business plan. They’re not making the money anymore on selling electricity, and can make a LOT more by building infrastructure that we don’t need and charging us ratepayers for it. Transmission costing billions; the rebuild and start up of Sherco 3 after 22 months off-line, and then announcing shut down of 1 & 2; the rebuild of Monticello costing twice the estimate; request to PUC to sell surplus Sherco and King plant generation on MISO market (just how is running it for sale elsewhere consistent with cutting CO2?!?!?)…
Another thing I do see is that the Capacity Market is deemed “Not Competitive,” and this has been a documented problem since 2007. DOH! Yet it continues.
If it’s not competitive, why hasn’t the market structure been changed? After all, it’s all about “let the free market decide,” and where it’s not competitive, that isn’t happening, eh? As Marketing Analytics states, “Structural market power is endemic to the capacity market.” From a wiki definition of endemic, “In epidemiology, an infection is said to be endemic in a population when that infection is constantly maintained at a baseline level…” Houston, methinks we have a market problem…
More to follow, but wanted to get these tidbits out there.
9th Anniversary of Fukushima Daiichi meltdown
March 11th, 2020
Nine years ago, when this happened, I posted as much as I could find about it, and it was hard to nail info down, but this photo above pretty much said it all, massive explosion.
Today, the release of SimplyInfo.org’s 9th Anniversary report:
View The 9th Anniversary Annual Report Here
SimplyInfo.org, a group of talented volunteers deep-researching this issue, has been tracking this for 9 years now. From their site’s “about us” page:
Back when it happened, I put these up on my Legalectricsite, and shortly after it happened, Day 3 I believe, I had over 4,000 hits in ONE DAY! People were hungry, desperate, for information. When I’d reported the explosion, the first one, someone commented that “no way was it melting down,” and that made no sense, even given what little objective information we had. And in fact, it was a lot worse than those folks thought. I knew it was a disaster, but as it kept getting worse, well, stunning… and the impacts are still affecting us, will be for thousands of years. Right now, they’re on the verge of dumping radioactive water into the ocean!
These Legalectric posts below were no real scoop, “just information lite,” a compilation of public info, news reports, but its information that we in Minnesota should take into account because our Monticello nuclear plant is the same design as Fukushima Diiachi:
The “peaceful atom” strikes Japan March 12th, 2011
Fukushima Reactor 3 blows… March 13th, 2011
Nuclear saga continues in Japan March 21st, 2011
Fukushima Daiichi update March 26th, 2011
Another Fukushima Daiichi update March 30th, 2011
More on Fukushima nuclear disaster April 8th, 2011
Fukushima can’t happen here? Uh-huh… right… June 6th, 2011
Fukushima admittedly a mess… August 9th, 2011
One year after Fukushima Daiichi meltdown March 10th, 2012
Fukushima Daiichi — 4 years ago today March 11th, 2015
Sick with COVFEFE-20!
March 11th, 2020
Repeated sternutation, over and over. Hacking and wheezing for two days. Alan had it first, now moi. How do I know it’s not corona/COVID-19? No fever. Yup, for the record: NO FEVER, no aches and pains, just a head stuff to the extreme and going to explode, utterly unable to sleep. Until yesterday, slept all day. No work done whatsoever!
SO, if you’re looking for me to produce something, put your feet up, it’ll be a while. Drafting and pontificating on the computer is not a good idea when this loopy! Thanks PUC, Xcel, and whoever else, for stalling!
Senate Energy Bill… again
January 23rd, 2020
Last night in Performing Arts Center, Westonka H.S., Sen. Osmek held the second Senate Energy Committee meeting, taking testimony and discussing the bill. Good grief, burning garbage is RENEWABLE?!?! Eliminate the new nuclear prohibition?!?! CARBON CAPTURE AND STORAGE!?!?!?! Where on earth do these ideas come from? Lobbyists paid by who?
They put together a list of testifiers. This meeting’s list included TWO who had testified in Rochester! I spoke up and objected to allowing those two to testify before others who had not testified could, and near the end of testimony one was crossed off, BUT, well, guess who was second to the bottom, despite having requested to be put on list 8 days prior in Rochester, and didn’t get to testify.
For the first hearing, they put the three regular folks at the very bottom of the list, those not affiliated with an organization, those NOT paid to show up in suits and testify, and at the outset at Westonka last night, Osmek said, at least twice, “we may not get through the list.” They did in Rochester.
And at the outset of last night’s meeting, he again said, “we may not get through the list” and he limited testimony to 30 minutes total, but didn’t put any limit on individual testimony. AND he said, “we didn’t get through the list in Rochester.” FALSE, you DID get through the list in Rochester. Why say that? Prelude to a dis…
They’re talking about “carbon capture and storage,” “CCS” as if it’s real. It is not. No one else in the room has the knowledge and direct experience working on a project proposing carbon capture that I have, and no one else in the room had signed the non-disclosure agreement in the Excelsior Energy Mesaba Project and knows the details of cost and energy loss. Most of the Senators on that committee weren’t even around during the Mesaba Project, and I do not recall a single one of them weighing in on that boondoggle project. So what all do they know about it? Do they know only what paid toadies are telling them? Do some research! We do not need to reinvent the wheel, and folks, this is rock science, not rocket science.
We went through this “carbon capture” nonsense on the Excelsior Energy Mesaba Project, where it was talked about a lot, but wasn’t part of the actual project, and then, when it was clear the project Power Purchase Agreement “PPA” was tanking, SURPRISE, they popped in a “Plan” at the last minute, in Rebuttal testimony:
Suddenly, a Plan for Carbon Capture and Sequestration
October 19th, 2006
For sure it was utter bullshit, and not enough to save the day and get that PPA through. Here it is:
From MCGPs Initial Brief in Mesaba Project PPA docket (M-05-1993), but first the full brief, the CCS pages are 22-24, with references:
And the section on the Excelsior Energy’s Mesaba Project bogus “Plan for Carbon Capture and Sequestration”
Well DOH! What’s changed since then? Only a large funding of “research” and a larger funding scheme of promotion, a la Great Plains Institute, etc.,
… but carbon capture and storage is no more doable, either in percentage of capture feasible, or in potential for creating seismic activity and earthquakes, well, there is more evidence now that pumping gas into the earth DOES create earthquakes. It’s even made it into corporate news media, REAL NEWS from 2013 and 2016:
Fracking and energy exploration connected to earthquakes, say studies
7 million Americans at risk of man-made earthquakes
From USGS:
Are earthquakes induced by fluid-injection activities always located close to the point of injection?
Also from USGS, 2018:
What more information do you need? Do some research, folks.
Those of us who went through the 5+ years that was the Mesaba Project have the facts. If you want us to do this all over again, yes, phenomenal waste of time, but yeah, OK. Been there, done that, have the files, have the facts, here we go!
To look at the Excelsior Energy Mesaba Project docket at PUC (05-1993) go to eDocketsand search for PUC Docket 05 (year) 1993 (docket no.) in the search field.
p.s. LINK TO MESABA PROJECT ENVIRONMENTAL IMPACT STATEMENT
