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Edf on Grid Modernization

Last week the Environmental Defense Fund released a new report on grid modernization, Grid Modernization: The Foundation for Climate Change Progress (pdf). This short report provides a clear overview of how grid modernization enables a cleaner energy future, examining six areas where investment and regulatory policy should focus to make that happen. The focus of this …

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Complexity, Permissionless Innovation, and the English Dance

Recently on EconTalk Russ Roberts talked with Duke University’s Mike Munger about permissionless innovation. The discussion focused on Mike’s recent essay on permissionless innovation, in which he claimed that “permissionless innovation, a strong presumption in favor of allowing experimentation with new technologies and with new business platforms that use those technologies” is the most important, …

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Giberson Makes His Mark on Wall Street and Other Notes on Price Gouging Commentary

I get a mention in the September 12, 2017, Deal Book column in the New York Times: “Price caps discourage extraordinary supply efforts that would help bring goods in high demand into the affected area,” Michael Giberson, an instructor with the Center for Energy Commerce in the Rawls College of Business at Texas Tech University, …

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How Cool is This Liquid Battery?

Many of the prospects for a cleaner and prosperous future — autonomous vehicles, economical renewable energy, more efficient electronics — are made more likely and/or more affordable with improvements in energy storage. Tesla’s advances in the technology, form factor, and scale of production of lithium ion batteries are well known (and in fact I think …

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Nancy Maclean’s Generalized Rewriting of James Buchanan’s Views on Democracy

I have only read a small bit of Nancy MacLean’s book on James M. Buchanan, public choice, and politics. I’m reluctant to buy a copy, but I wanted to see if it was as bad as some critics have said. (Now you know something of my limited knowledge of and pre-existing bias against the book. …

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Lobbyists for Wind and Solar Energy Ready to Fight Doe Grid Policy Study

Soon after Energy Secretary Rick Perry requested DOE staff to prepare a report on how public policies affected the electric power grid, lobbyists for the wind energy and solar energy industries struck back. In an op-ed appearing in The Hill, Megan Hansen and I identify why we think the renewable power industries are so sensitive …

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Planet Money Buys Oil, Loses About $800 on the Deal, and Makes Some Great Podcast Journalism

The NPR economics podcast Planet Money offers a great five-part introduction to the oil business and the place it plays in our economy. Along the way they offer insights into prices and market processes, innovation and industry change, and the many uses of fossil energy. The five part series does not go deep, but the reporters do cover the …

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Gaming the Rankings on the Texas Power to Choose Website: Tpuc’s Simple Solution

The Texas Public Utility Commission has implemented a fix to the “gaming the rankings” problem. The fix itself can be gamed a bit – is already being gamed a bit – but the offers gaming the fix are less misleading than before. It is an improvement. Here is what is going on: Creative retail electric …

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