Joe Manchin was right in this case. The US really needs permitting reform so green energy can be added to the grid much much faster. The demand is immense, but the bureaucratic hurdles are insane....
Joe Manchin was right in this case. The US really needs permitting reform so green energy can be added to the grid much much faster. The demand is immense, but the bureaucratic hurdles are insane. Jurisdictions are also banning new solar and wind projects faster than they can be built...
as things are right now, with 'soft costs' (regulatory phone tag) being a majority of the cost for new grid projects? I think the only way a lot of this shit gets done is when it starts breaking...
as things are right now, with 'soft costs' (regulatory phone tag) being a majority of the cost for new grid projects? I think the only way a lot of this shit gets done is when it starts breaking catastrophically and the army corps of engineers shows up and just ignores permits for a bit.
And the article doesn't have a single word devoted to the significant, rising U.S. electricity consumption for mining proof-of-work cryptocurrencies (mainly Bitcoin). Let's ban cryptominers, for a...
And the article doesn't have a single word devoted to the significant, rising U.S. electricity consumption for mining proof-of-work cryptocurrencies (mainly Bitcoin). Let's ban cryptominers, for a start.
I would like to see legislation outlawing proof-of-work itself for any cryptocurrency to be accepted by the U.S. This could incentivize Bitcoin to go proof-of-stake, but from what I understand it...
I would like to see legislation outlawing proof-of-work itself for any cryptocurrency to be accepted by the U.S. This could incentivize Bitcoin to go proof-of-stake, but from what I understand it is going to continue to be exceedingly difficult to make happen. As it stands Bitcoin is going to continue to be mined for decades, with growing power requirements to do so. I don't know if even the power of the U.S. government could exert enough influence to change it to POS.
If we outlaw mining only, it's either going to make operations just work illegally, or move them to other parts of the world that have less stringent power generation laws (possibly resulting in dirtier energy being used).
That's exactly what's happening. You probably saw this article from a few days ago about Chinese bitcoin miners moving operations to Ethiopia for cheap energy, but it's worth posting again so...
If we outlaw mining only, it's either going to make operations just work illegally, or move them to other parts of the world that have less stringent power generation laws (possibly resulting in dirtier energy being used).
That's exactly what's happening. You probably saw this article from a few days ago about Chinese bitcoin miners moving operations to Ethiopia for cheap energy, but it's worth posting again so people read it and see that for a variety of political and environmental reasons bitcoin miners are doing the same thing that blood diamond operations were doing in the 80s and 90s. They shift operations to less stable regions -- or regions in need of financial backers without the morals of the west -- and continue doing business as usual. At least with diamond wholesalers in the west there was some attempt at oversight and a desire to avoid laundering illegal gemstones -- or at least look like it.
I expect that they will keep chasing low electricity prices until there aren't any good loopholes to be found. It seems hard to say whether the end result is good or not? Extra demand for...
I expect that they will keep chasing low electricity prices until there aren't any good loopholes to be found.
It seems hard to say whether the end result is good or not? Extra demand for electricity in unlikely places encourages more electricity generation (of any kind) that could be used for other things after the Bitcoin thing doesn't work out.
The article (archive) has a lot of forecasts, but also some detail about what's happening now: ... ... ...
The article (archive) has a lot of forecasts, but also some detail about what's happening now:
In Virginia, which bills itself as the world’s biggest hub for data centers, about 80 facilities have opened in Loudoun County since 2019 as the pandemic accelerated the shift online for shopping, office work, doctor visits and more. Electricity demand was so great that Dominion Energy Inc. was forced to halt connections to new data centers for about three months in 2022. [...]
Dominion says it expects demand in its service territory to grow by nearly 5% annually over the next 15 years, which would almost double the total amount of electricity it generates and sells. To prepare, the company is building the biggest offshore wind farm in the US some 25 miles off Virginia Beach and is adding solar energy and battery storage. It has also proposed investing in new gas generation and is weighing whether to delay retiring some natural gas plants and one large coal plant.
...
In Kansas City, construction is underway on a data center run by Meta Platforms Inc., while on the city’s outskirts, Panasonic Holdings Corp. is building a factory where energy-intensive robots will help assemble EV batteries. Both projects, as well as overall economic development in the region, are fueling some of the “most robust electricity demand growth in decades,” said David Campbell, chief executive officer of Evergy, the utility that serves the area, in a June 15 press release. In the same communication, the company said it would delay retiring a coal plant that’s been operational since the 1960s by five years, to 2028.
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Soaring electricity demand is slowing the closure of coal plants elsewhere. Almost two dozen facilities from Kentucky to North Dakota that were set to retire between 2022 and 2028 have been delayed, according to America’s Power, a coal-power trade group.
Many tech companies and clean tech manufacturers prefer their plants to be powered exclusively by renewable energy. But those aspirations are running up against reality, says Mark Nelson, managing director of energy consultancy Radiant Energy Group: “Factories say, ‘We want clean energy. At this point we’ll take anything.’”
Some corporations are now being forced to consider locations they had initially overlooked to secure energy within the timeframe they need, such as rural areas in Mississippi, says Didi Caldwell, who’s spent more than two decades helping companies find sites for their facilities and runs a consulting firm in South Carolina.
In Arizona, historic demand prompted the state’s largest utility to temporarily stop accepting new business in the fall from very large data centers that need power around the clock, according to people with knowledge of the matter. Arizona Public Service needed to do in-depth studies on things such as how many transmission lines are needed and where substations will be located before signing contracts, one of the people said.
“The number and the size of requests kept coming,” says Tony Tewelis, who works in APS’s transmission and distribution group, adding that some customers had asked for almost 2 gigawatts of power. “We wanted to make sure that we did our due diligence before we said yes.” APS says it will roll out a new process this year where it will perform case-by-case studies before taking on very large data centers as customers.
...
A big power company with operations in six states, Duke Energy has seen unprecedented demand growth, spurred by data centers, factories and EVs—including both manufacturing and charging. It plans to ask regulators for permission to build more gas-fired and solar power projects by the early 2030s. But Glen Snider, who heads resource planning, warns that even with that additional capacity, the company might have to keep some customers waiting if future demand growth outpaced its ability to add new generation and transmission.
Joe Manchin was right in this case. The US really needs permitting reform so green energy can be added to the grid much much faster. The demand is immense, but the bureaucratic hurdles are insane. Jurisdictions are also banning new solar and wind projects faster than they can be built...
as things are right now, with 'soft costs' (regulatory phone tag) being a majority of the cost for new grid projects? I think the only way a lot of this shit gets done is when it starts breaking catastrophically and the army corps of engineers shows up and just ignores permits for a bit.
And the article doesn't have a single word devoted to the significant, rising U.S. electricity consumption for mining proof-of-work cryptocurrencies (mainly Bitcoin). Let's ban cryptominers, for a start.
I would like to see legislation outlawing proof-of-work itself for any cryptocurrency to be accepted by the U.S. This could incentivize Bitcoin to go proof-of-stake, but from what I understand it is going to continue to be exceedingly difficult to make happen. As it stands Bitcoin is going to continue to be mined for decades, with growing power requirements to do so. I don't know if even the power of the U.S. government could exert enough influence to change it to POS.
If we outlaw mining only, it's either going to make operations just work illegally, or move them to other parts of the world that have less stringent power generation laws (possibly resulting in dirtier energy being used).
That's exactly what's happening. You probably saw this article from a few days ago about Chinese bitcoin miners moving operations to Ethiopia for cheap energy, but it's worth posting again so people read it and see that for a variety of political and environmental reasons bitcoin miners are doing the same thing that blood diamond operations were doing in the 80s and 90s. They shift operations to less stable regions -- or regions in need of financial backers without the morals of the west -- and continue doing business as usual. At least with diamond wholesalers in the west there was some attempt at oversight and a desire to avoid laundering illegal gemstones -- or at least look like it.
I expect that they will keep chasing low electricity prices until there aren't any good loopholes to be found.
It seems hard to say whether the end result is good or not? Extra demand for electricity in unlikely places encourages more electricity generation (of any kind) that could be used for other things after the Bitcoin thing doesn't work out.
I wonder which parts of the US that is. (How much is Texas?)
The article (archive) has a lot of forecasts, but also some detail about what's happening now:
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