If the oil market is reasonably efficient, then the price of a barrel of oil should reflect something like the cost of production of the highest-cost barrel of oil needed to just satisfy demand. In other words, the market price of oil should reflect the marginal cost of production. The price of oil on the world …
How Can the Market Price of Oil Fall So Far So Fast? Read More »
I suspect the simplest answer to the title question is “always.” Maybe the answer depends on your definition of “distort,” but both the intended and generally expected consequences of state utility rate regulation has always been to push costs to be something other than what would naturally emerge in the absence of rate regulation. More …
When Does State Utility Regulation Distort Costs? Read More »
Yes, solar power systems are getting cheaper and battery storage is improving. The combination has many folks worried (or elated) about the future prospects of grid-based electric utilities when consumers can get the power they want at home. (See Lynne’s post from last summer for background.) An analysis by Moody’s concludes that battery storage remains an …
Moody’s Concludes: Mass Grid Defection Not Yet on the Horizon Read More »
I recently argued that the regulated utility is not likely to enter a “death spiral”, but that the regulated utility business model is indeed under pressure, and the conversation about the future of that business model is a valuable one. One area of pressure on the regulated utility business model is the market for residential …
Should Regulated Utilities Participate in the Residential Solar Market? Read More »
For the past three years, I’ve team-taught a class that’s part of our Institute for Energy and Sustainability at Northwestern (ISEN) curriculum. It’s an introductory class, primarily focused on ethics and philosophy. One of my earth science colleagues kicks us off with the carbon cycle, the evidence for anthropogenic global warming, and interpretations of that …
The conversations about the “utility death spiral” to which I alluded in my recent post have included discussion of the potential for “grid defection”. Grid defection is an important phenomenon in any network industry — what if you use scarce resources to build a network that provides value for consumers, and then over time, with …
“Grid Defection” and the Regulated Utility Business Model Read More »
The Wall Street Journal recently opined against President Obama’s nominee for Federal Energy Regulatory Commission chairman, Norman Bay, and in the process took a modest swipe at subsidies for wind energy. The context here is Bay’s action while leading FERC’s enforcement division, and in particular his prosecution of electric power market participants who manage to run afoul …
The Spin on Wind, Or, an Example of Bullshit in the Field of Energy Policy Read More »
Jay Zarnikau, C.K. Woo, and Ross Baldick have examined whether the shift from a zonal to nodal market design in the ERCOT power market had a noticeable effect on electric energy prices. The resulting article, published in the Journal of Regulatory Economics, and this post may be a bit geekier than we usually get around here. …
Did Ercot’s Shift from Zonal to Nodal Market Design Reduce Electric Power Prices? Read More »
Jeremy Jacobs and Hannah Northey at Greenwire report “Appeals court throws out FERC’s demand-response order“: A federal appeals court today threw out a high-profile Federal Energy Regulatory Commission order that provided incentives for electricity users to consume less power, a practice dubbed demand response. In a divided ruling, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the …
Simona Benedettini and Carlo Stagnaro make the case for allowing negative prices in electric power markets in Europe. A few of the larger power markets in Europe allow prices to go negative, but others retain a zero price lower limit. Benedettini and Stagnaro explain both why it is reasonable, economically speaking, to allow electricity prices …
The Case for Allowing Negative Electricity Prices – Benedettini and Stagnaro Read More »
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