Shut down New Mexico's last remaining coal plant (Four Corners Generating Station), environmentalists say, and replace it with renewable energy. But coal is a practical fuel, affordable and dependable. Being generically against coal is no more useful than being generically against electricity. Electricity demand is rapidly rising. Electric vehicles, new AI data centers, and a growing economy simply mean we need more power. And we need reliable power.
While new additions of electricity generation remain dominated by intermittent wind and solar power, keeping what we already have on the grid will be critically important to meeting our energy needs and doing so affordably. Across the country, electricity prices have risen faster than the pace of inflation over the past few years. If we tear down our existing sources of reliable power at the very moment electricity demand begins to soar, even higher prices will be an inevitability.
With everyone I've encountered who is really immersed in energy issues, the common view is that we need every available energy source, ranging from renewables and nuclear power to coal, just to keep the lights on. Frankly, we all tend to take the on-demand delivery of electricity for granted. We shouldn’t. In just the past month, power demand eclipsed available supply in Louisiana, forcing the grid operator there to institute rolling blackouts (“load shed”) for 100,000 customers on a 90-degree day.
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