electric power surplus

["John S. Denker" <jsd@MONMOUTH.COM>]

Remember when Enron, et al were running the energy markets and
there were electric power shortages as far as the eye could
see?  And that because of needless environmental regulation
and insufficient investment in electric power production.

That was only a year and a half ago.



> ANALYST: MORE PLANT CLOSURES AHEAD
>
> By CBS.MarketWatch.com     4:27 PM ET Sep 12, 2002
>
> NEW YORK (CBS.MW) -- The power industry can expect further plant
> closings following American Electric Power's announcement to
> mothball as many as 16 gas-fired plants in Texas, Williams
> Capital Group said Thursday.
>
> On Wednesday, American Electric Power  said it would close down
> certain power plants that aren't deemed necessary by the Electric
> Reliability Council of Texas to support system reliability. The
> company would close the plants by the end of the year.
>
> "It's reached a point where we are buying power for a price below
> the production costs of 16 of our gas-fired plants," Eric van der
> Walde, an AEP executive vice president, said in a statement, adding
> that the plants have been idle for much of the year. He emphasized
> that the closures would improve AEP's financial performance.
>
> Williams Capital's Christopher Ellinghaus said in a note to clients
> that AEP's announcement is the first of what he expects will be a
> "sizable economic displacement of incumbent utility generation."
>
> As a result, he expects "tens of thousands of megawatts to be
> mothballed nationwide as low electricity prices and over-capacity
> in most regions squeeze the profit margins on inefficient,
> high-heat-rate power-generation assets."

======================

And the prize for figuring it out early goes to:
Mark Shapiro -- Sat, 31 Mar 2001 10:10:42 -0800

>  Much (but not all) of the California energy problem was the
>  result of a badly flawed deregulation scheme foisted on a naive legislature
>  (oh the joys of term limits) by lobbyists for the out-of-state energy
>  suppliers (Enron sent in an army of lawyers to help write the bill).  You
>  can read about it in my article "Power to the People!":