California power
Posted: Fri Aug 31, 2001 11:17 am
Well, I talked with several Southern California residents in person about the problems out there with power. One of them was a member of the Stanford Linear Accelerator staff. The ocassion was a Teslathon in the north which I always attend about a month before mine.
It seems that the California "powers that be" are now urging folks to use power!!! A double message is being transmitted. It seems revenues are dropping percipitously as real conservation by users is working to a degree. They are actually experiencing huge surpluses of power in some areas! Some marginal businesses have gone under in certain areas due to increased costs of their power during the surcharge crisis. Others have relocated. Jobs are lost or shifting about. Sounds like being on a consumers tilt-a-whirl!
All of the folks I talked with from that area have to laugh over the debacle while paying about three to four times the kilowatt hour rate I pay. It is a muffled laugh which replaces a good cry, though, for what are they to do? Just suck it up, I guess.
They noted that no real major traditional power plant has come on line in many years there. The SLAC guy noted that if anything is proposed, small groups of extremely vocal activists queue up for a shot at knocking down further consideration of a new facility. All of these groups, according to the folk I talked with, have political clout far beyond their numbers. (th' squeeky wheel gets th' grease)
I asked about nuclear possibilities and all gasped at the mere suggestion, and beamed broadly following the shock of the suggestion. All noted that no living CA politico would even attach his or her name to the merest whisper of such a thing as it would be equal to a self-inflicted bullet in the brain pan, politically.
So, I guess the California power issue is a non-issue as the thing inch worms in knee jerk steps of feast and famine.
You can bet it isn't an easy to understand issue with this or that special interest group issuing demands and denouncing the other.
Fusion is not even thought of out there anymore. It's nuclear, ain't it?
Richrd Hull
It seems that the California "powers that be" are now urging folks to use power!!! A double message is being transmitted. It seems revenues are dropping percipitously as real conservation by users is working to a degree. They are actually experiencing huge surpluses of power in some areas! Some marginal businesses have gone under in certain areas due to increased costs of their power during the surcharge crisis. Others have relocated. Jobs are lost or shifting about. Sounds like being on a consumers tilt-a-whirl!
All of the folks I talked with from that area have to laugh over the debacle while paying about three to four times the kilowatt hour rate I pay. It is a muffled laugh which replaces a good cry, though, for what are they to do? Just suck it up, I guess.
They noted that no real major traditional power plant has come on line in many years there. The SLAC guy noted that if anything is proposed, small groups of extremely vocal activists queue up for a shot at knocking down further consideration of a new facility. All of these groups, according to the folk I talked with, have political clout far beyond their numbers. (th' squeeky wheel gets th' grease)
I asked about nuclear possibilities and all gasped at the mere suggestion, and beamed broadly following the shock of the suggestion. All noted that no living CA politico would even attach his or her name to the merest whisper of such a thing as it would be equal to a self-inflicted bullet in the brain pan, politically.
So, I guess the California power issue is a non-issue as the thing inch worms in knee jerk steps of feast and famine.
You can bet it isn't an easy to understand issue with this or that special interest group issuing demands and denouncing the other.
Fusion is not even thought of out there anymore. It's nuclear, ain't it?
Richrd Hull