Rich Powell writes in RealClearEnergy about potential blackouts this summer.
- The North American Electric Reliability Corporation (NERC) has warned that two-thirds of the U.S. could experience blackouts this summer.
- We can avoid potential blackouts by reducing regulations for all energy sources and especially baseload sources like nuclear, geothermal, hydropower, and natural gas.
- Furthermore, policymakers must streamline the permitting process to accelerate the buildout of key transmission infrastructure.
“A third thing that could have immediate and long term impact on stabilizing the American grid is to modernize permitting. Developers can only build more energy infrastructure as fast as they can permit the projects. Baseload renewable sources like hydropower and geothermal could see a larger share of the grid if we modernize how we permit energy projects. Right now, it takes 10 years to permit an off-shore wind farm, five years to certify a new nuclear reactor design, or six years to issue a permit necessary to store billions of tons of captured CO2.”
Read the full article here.
The views and opinions expressed are those of the author’s and do not necessarily reflect the official policy or position of C3.
