$3.1B annual cost estimated for fossil fuel plants DOE won't allow to retire

https://www.utilitydive.com/news/doe-mandate-fossil-fueled-power-plants-emergency/757653/

23•toomuchtodo•5mo ago

Comments

TheChaplain•5mo ago

Well, it's not surprising.. To have a reliable grid there needs to be some backup the few days solar/wind fails. Grid stability and black starts are no joke.

Firerouge•5mo ago

Not applicable, "their owners and state regulators have determined they are no longer economic or needed"

dkiebd•5mo ago

And DOE disagrees.

amanaplanacanal•5mo ago

So where is the data? They should show their work on this one. Except they probably haven't done any, and it's strictly political.

toomuchtodo•5mo ago

That’s the neat part, you can just ignore them. Any consequences for continuing to shutdown and decommission these generators would be cheaper than what ratepayers would be paying to continue to run them. “You can just do things.” By the time any legal actions are resolved, it’ll be years from now after this admin is over.

You cannot be forced to turn coal generators back on that cannot be turned back on, or no longer exist.

blitzar•5mo ago

Fraud, waste and abuse to own the libs.

spwa4•5mo ago

Let's be a little bit generous here. It is true that entire communities, and a lot of them, depend on the coal mining industry. It is misguided to keep coal energy generation operational, but it's not "waste and abuse to own the libs".

We should come up with a better solution, including, of course, for those communities.

scotty79•5mo ago

> a lot of them, depend on the coal mining industry

Which means they depend on government subsidies that keep coal mining afloat. Which means they could be better served if they just received personal subsidies in form of basic income and be free to do literally anything else.

blitzar•5mo ago

Its extremely generous to assume that anyone thought about the 42,600 employed by the coal mining industry when it came to this policy.

_kulang•5mo ago

For a group that is so against social welfare…

flgb•5mo ago

A similar cultural statement to this X post, just with a higher price tag … https://x.com/energy/status/1950904421669318868?s=46&t=bC_eC...

thoughtstheseus•5mo ago

$30B over ten years to reduce blackouts and grid instability is a good deal. For reference, the 2021 Texas blackout caused ~$100b in damage.

Very very few people in the power industry want to run coal plants- but they cannot in good conscience turn them off. The whole “turn off the lights” mantra is not funny. It’s unfortunate the grid is fragile and facing increased demand. Operating coal plants, preferably at zero or super low utilization rates, for another ten years or so until the grid is more resilient seems reasonable.

dubious2•5mo ago

what happened to the invisible hand and free market?

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