Will The Grid Hold? How's Renewable Energy Working Out In California? Meanwhile, Duke Replaces Coal, Nuclear With Natural Gas

Heat wave in California. 

Bloomberg is reporting:

California is grappling with a record drought that’s reducing hydroelectric supplies at a time when inventories of natural gas, a fuel used to produce power, are hovering near a decade low. While resources are adequate, the grid operator said last week, the state faces reliability challenges and higher prices, especially after the shutdown of the Edison International’s San Onofre nuclear plant.

On-peak power at Northern California’s NP15 hub, including San Francisco, for next-day-delivery rose $4.01, or 7.1 percent, to $60.25 a megawatt-hour at 4:51 p.m. New York time yesterday, the most for this time of the year since 2008, according to broker data compiled by Bloomberg.

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The Wall Street Journal is reporting:

On Tuesday Duke Energy unveiled plans to remake its power-generating facilities in Florida, including the construction of a natural gas-powered facility near its Crystal River facility. Data points:

• $1.5 billion
• 820 megawatts to come online in early 2016
• 820 megawatts to come online in late 2018
• will retire two coal-fired units at the Crystal River complex when new NG facilities come online
• will also decommission a Crystal River nuclear power plant due to structural problems

One can talk about wind and solar energy until the cows come home, but in the big scheme of things, it's all about natural gas these days. I sure hope those estimates of all that natural gas are accurate. Seriously, this really takes fracking off the table as something that needs to be banned: if the activists convince the government to ban fracking, there's really nothing left. I'm impressed how quickly the private sector can respond.