Ottawa tells coal generators to power down

By Globe and Mail


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Environment Minister Jim Prentice has told Canadas major electricity producers that theyll have to gradually retire their coalfired plants and replace them with cleaner sources of power — a plan that would be a boon to natural gas producers.

As the U.S. Senate struggles to deal with climate legislation, Mr. Prentice met with power company chief executives in Ottawa and made it clear the government intends to highlight Canadas relative advantage in clean electricity compared to U.S. reliance on coal.

Under Ottawas proposal, power companies would have to close their coalfired facilities as they reach the end of their commercial life, largely over the next 10 to 15 years. The companies would not be allowed to refurbish the plants to extend their usefulness or replace them with new coal units, unless they include technology to capture the carbon dioxide and sequester it underground.

The government has announced a target to increase Canadas reliance on nonemitting sources of power to 90 per cent by 2020, from the current level of 75 per cent.

But the environment minister is quietly shifting that goal to low emitting sources, which would include natural gas as well as nuclear, hydroelectric and renewables such as wind and solar. Natural gas power plants emit roughly half the carbon dioxide as coalburning ones, and the fuel is expected to be abundant for the next several decades as the industry develops massive shale gas deposits.

Mr. Prentice also assured the executives that the government intends to set flexible rules that would not force them to close down the plants at an arbitrary date, sources said. The government believes most of Canadas 21 coalburning power plants would reach the end of their commercial life between 2015 and 2025, though industry officials say companies would find ways to keep them running longer if they are prevented from investing in more costefficient overhauls or new coal plants. The government plans to move fairly quickly because power companies are already starting to plan how they will meet electricity demand later this decade.

The power industry has been concerned about Mr. Prentices 2020 emission target, arguing that the prohibition on refurbishments could hurt shareholder value and drive up costs to energy consumers. It was unclear how some provinces would fill the gap, particularly Alberta and Saskatchewan, which rely on coal for more than half their power supply.

Among the companies attending the meeting were executives from TransAlta Corp., Capital Power Corp, SaskPower, Ontario Power Generation, New Brunswick Power and Nova Scotia Power. Ontario has already committed to closing its coalfired plants by 2014, but Alberta and Saskatchewan would find it more difficult to replace their power production due to their dependence on coalfired plants.

Ottawa plans to regulate greenhouse gas emissions in lockstep with the U.S. because of the integrated nature of the two economies.

But Mr. Prentice has said the electricity sectors are vastly different and that, therefore, Canada can move unilaterally to showcase Canadians leadership in clean power, a strategy aimed in part at deflecting the strident criticism targeting the rapidly growing emissions in the expanding oil sands sector.

Canada has 21 operating coal plants with Ontario planning to close its four by 2014 while the U.S. has some 650 coalburning plants that provide more than half the countrys electricity.

A nonpartisan group of senators led by Democrat John Kerry and Republican Lindsay Graham had been expected to introduce longanticipated legislation to meet the U.S. commitment to reduce emissions by 17 per cent from 2005 levels by 2020. But intraparty wrangling has threatened to delay the bill.

Despite the delays in the U.S., power producers believe the government will move far more quickly to impose new rules on them, though Mr. Prentice has not indicated a timeline.

Don Wharton, TransAltas vicepresident of sustainable development, said the companies would prefer a regulatory approach that set clear and achievable emissionreduction standards for them individually, rather than a vague industrywide approach aimed at a nonemitting goal.

We struggle to understand what the goal 90 per cent nonemitting, what problems does that actually get at, Mr. Wharton said. It is a very prescription goal whose endpoint isnt clear to us.

Publicly traded TransAlta recently shut down a coalfired plant at Wabamun, Alta., but is partnering with Edmontonbased Capital Power on the new 450megawatt Keephills 3 unit. The two Alberta companies have also received federal and provincial funding to construct a carboncapture pilot project at the site.

In Saskatchewan, three coalfired stations account for more than 55 per cent of the provinces power generation, and SaskPower has refurbished them all over the past 15 years.

There are no plans to decommission any of our coal fired plants before 2020, said SaskPower spokesman James Parker.

Rick Smith, president of Environmental Defence, said the governments efforts to reduce emissions in the power sector which account for 17 per cent of emissions will be overwhelmed by growing CO2 emissions as oil companies boost production from the oil sands.

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The Haves and Have-Nots of Electricity in California

California Public Safety Power Shutoffs highlight wildfire prevention as PG&E outages disrupt schools, businesses, and rural communities, driving generator use, economic hardship, and emergency preparedness across Northern California during high-wind events.

 

Key Points

Utility outages to reduce wildfire risk during extreme winds, impacting homes and businesses in high-risk California.

✅ PG&E cuts power during high winds to prevent wildfires

✅ Costs rise for generators, fuel, batteries, and spoiled food

✅ Rural, low-income communities face greater economic losses

 

The intentional blackout by California’s largest utility this week put Forest Jones out of work and his son out of school. On Friday morning Mr. Jones, a handyman and single father, sat in his apartment above a tattoo parlor waiting for the power to come back on and for school to reopen.

“I’ll probably lose $400 or $500 dollars because of this,” said Mr. Jones, who lives in the town of Paradise, which was razed by fire last year and is slowly rebuilding. “Things have been really tough up here.”

Millions of people were affected by the blackout, which spanned the outskirts of Silicon Valley to the forests of Humboldt County near the Oregon border. But the outage, which the power company said was necessary to reduce wildfire risk across the region, also drew a line between those who were merely inconvenienced and those who faced a major financial hardship.

To have the lights on, the television running and kitchen appliances humming is often taken for granted in America, even as U.S. grid during coronavirus questions persisted. During California’s blackout it became an economic privilege.

The economic impacts of the shut-off were especially acute in rural, northern towns like Paradise, where incomes are a fraction of those in the San Francisco Bay Area.

Both wealthy and poorer areas were affected by the blackout but interviews across the state suggested that being forced off the grid disproportionately hurt the less affluent. One family in Humboldt County said they had spent $150 on batteries and water alone during the shutdown.

“To be prepared costs money,” Sue Warhaftig, a massage therapist who lives in Mill Valley, a wealthy suburb across the Golden Gate Bridge from San Francisco. Ms. Warhaftig spent around two days without electricity but said she had been spared from significant sacrifices during the blackout.

She invested in a generator to keep the refrigerator running and to provide some light. She cooked in the family’s Volkswagen camper van in her driveway. At night she watched Netflix on her phone, which she was able to charge with the generator. Her husband, a businessman, is in London on a work trip. Her two sons, both grown, live in Southern California and Seattle.

“We were inconvenienced but life wasn’t interrupted,” Ms. Warhaftig said. “But so many people’s lives were.

Pacific Gas & Electric restored power to large sections of Northern California on Friday, including Paradise, where the electricity came back on in the afternoon. But hundreds of thousands of people in other areas remained in the dark. The carcasses of burned cars still littered the landscape around Paradise, where 86 people died in the Camp Fire last year, some of them while trying to escape.

Officials at power company said that by Saturday they hoped to have restored power to 98 percent of the customers who were affected.

The same dangerous winds that spurred the shut-off in Northern California have put firefighters to work in the south. The authorities in Los Angeles County ordered the evacuation of nearly 100,000 people on Friday as the Saddleridge Fire burned nearly 5,000 acres and destroyed 25 structures. The Sandalwood Fire, which ignited Thursday in Riverside County, had spread to more than 800 acres and destroyed 74 structures by Friday afternoon.

While this week’s outage was the first time many customers in Northern California experienced a deliberate power shut-off, residents in and around Paradise have had their power cut four times in recent months, residents say.

Many use a generator, but running one has become increasingly expensive with gasoline now at more than $4 a gallon in California.

On Friday, Dennis and Viola Timmer drove up the hill to their home in Magalia, a town adjacent to Paradise, loaded with $102 dollars of gasoline for their generators. It was their second gasoline run since the power went out Tuesday night.

The couple, retired and on a fixed income after Mr. Timmer’s time in the Navy and in construction, said the power outage had severely limited their ability to do essential tasks like cooking, or to leave the house.

“You know what it feels like? You’re in jail,” said Ms. Timmer, 72. “You can’t go anywhere with the generators running.”

Since the generators are not powerful enough to run heat or air conditioning, the couple slept in their den with an electric space heater.

“It’s really difficult because you don’t have a normal life,” Ms. Timmer said. “You’re trying to survive.”

To be sure, the shutdown has affected many people regardless of economic status, and similar disruptions abroad, like a London power outage that disrupted routines, show how widespread such challenges can be. The areas without power were as diverse as the wealthy suburbs of Silicon Valley, the old Gold Rush towns of the Sierra Nevada, the East Bay of San Francisco and the seaside city of Arcata.

Ms. Cahn’s cellphone ran out of power during the blackout and even when she managed to recharge it in her car cell service was spotty, as it was in many areas hit by the blackout.

Accustomed to staying warm at night with an electric blanket, Ms. Cahn slept under a stack of four blankets.

“I’m doing what I have to do which is not doing very much,” she said.

Further south in Marin City, Chanay Jackson stood surrounded by fumes from generators still powering parts of the city.

She said that food stamps were issued on the first of the month and that many residents who had to throw away food were out of luck.

“They’re not going to issue more food stamps just because the power went out,” Ms. Jackson said. “So they’re just screwed until next month.”

Strong winds have many times in the past caused power lines to come in contact with vegetation, igniting fires that are then propelled by the gusts, and hurricanes elsewhere have crippled infrastructure with Louisiana grid rebuild after Laura according to state officials. This was the case with the Camp Fire.

Since higher elevations had more extreme winds many of the neighborhoods where power was turned off this week were in hills and canyons, including in the Sierra Nevada.

The shut-off, which by one estimate affected a total of 2.5 million people, has come under strong criticism by residents and politicians, and warnings from Cal ISO about rolling blackouts as the power grid strained. The company’s website crashed just as customers sought information about the outage. Gov. Gavin Newsom called it unacceptable. But his comments were nuanced, criticizing the way the shut-off was handled, not the rationale for it. Mr. Newsom and others said the ravages of the Camp Fire demanded preventive action to prevent a reoccurrence.

Yet the calculus of trying to avoid deadly fires by shutting off power will continue to be debated as California enters its peak wildfire season, even as electricity reliability during COVID-19 was generally maintained for most consumers.

In the city of Grass Valley, Matthew Gottschalk said he and his wife realized that a generator was essential when they calculated that they had around $500 worth of food in their fridge.

“I don’t know what we would have done,” said Mr. Gottschalk, whose power went out Tuesday night.

His neighbors are filling coolers with ice. Everyone is hoping the power will come back on soon.

“Ice is going to run out and gas is going to run out,” he said.

 

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Hydro One will keep running its U.S. coal plant indefinitely, it tells American regulators

Hydro One-Avista Merger outlines a utility acquisition shaped by Washington regulators, Colstrip coal plant depreciation, and plans for renewables, clean energy, and emissions cuts, while Montana reviews implications for jobs, ratepayers, and a 2027 closure.

 

Key Points

A utility deal setting Colstrip depreciation and renewables, without committing to an early coal plant closure.

✅ Washington sets 2027 depreciation for Colstrip units

✅ Montana reviews jobs, ratepayer impacts, community fund

✅ Avista seeks renewables; no binding shutdown commitment

 

The Washington power company Hydro One is buying will be ready to close its huge coal-fired generating station ahead of schedule, thanks to conditions put on the corporate merger by state regulators there.

Not that we actually plan to do that, the company is telling other regulators in Montana, where coal unit retirements are under debate, the huge coal-fired generating station in question employs hundreds of people. We’ll be in the coal business for a good long time yet.

Hydro One, in which the Ontario government now owns a big minority stake, is still working on its purchase of Avista, a private power utility based in Spokane. The $6.7-billion deal, which Hydro One announced in July, includes a 15 per cent share in two of the four generating units in a coal plant in Colstrip, Montana, one of the biggest in the western United States. Avista gets most of its electricity from hydro dams and gas but uses the Colstrip plant when demand for power is high and water levels at its dams are low.

#google#

Colstrip’s a town of fewer than 2,500 people whose industries are the power plant and the open-pit mines that feed it about 10 million tonnes of coal a year. Two of Colstrip’s generators, older ones Avista doesn’t have any stake in, are closing in 2022. The other two will be all that keep the town in business.

In Washington, they don’t like the coal plant and its pollution. In Montana, the future of Colstrip is a much bigger concern. The companies have to satisfy regulators in both places that letting Hydro One buy Avista is in the public interest.

Ontario proudly closed the last of our coal plants in 2014 and outlawed new ones as environmental menaces, and Alberta's coal phase-out is now slated to finish by 2023. When Hydro One said it was buying Avista, which makes about $100 million in profit a year, Premier Kathleen Wynne said she hoped Ontario’s “value system” would spread to Avista’s operations.

The settlement is “an important step towards bringing together two historic companies,” Hydro One’s chief executive Mayo Schmidt said in announcing it.

The deal has approval from the Washington Utilities and Transportation Commission staff but is subject to a vote by the group’s three commissioners. It doesn’t commit Avista to closing anything at Colstrip or selling its share. But Avista and Hydro One will budget as if the Colstrip coal burners will close in 2027, instead of running into the 2040s as their owners had once planned, a timeline that echoes debates over the San Juan Generating Station in New Mexico.

In accounting terms, they’ll depreciate the value of their share of the plant to zero over the next nine years, reflecting what they say is the end of the plant’s “useful life.” Another of Colstrip’s owners, Puget Sound Energy, has previously agreed with Washington regulators that it’ll budget for a Colstrip closure in 2027 as well.

Avista and Hydro One will look for sources of 50 megawatts of renewable electricity, including independent power projects where feasible, in the next four years and another 90 megawatts to supplement Avista’s supply once the Colstrip plant eventually closes, they promise in Washington. They’ll put $3 million into a “community transition fund” for Colstrip.

The money will come from the companies’ profits and cash, the agreement says. “Hydro One will not seek cost recovery for such funds from ratepayers in Ontario,” it says specifically.

“Ontario has always been a global leader in the transition away from dirty coal power and towards clean energy,” said Doug Howell, an anti-coal campaigner with the Sierra Club, which is a party to the agreement. “This settlement continues that tradition, paving the way for the closure of the largest single source of climate pollution in the American West by 2027, if not earlier.”

Montanans aren’t as thrilled. That state has its own public services commission, doing its own examination of the corporate merger, which has asked Hydro One and Avista to explain in detail why they want to write off the value of the Colstrip burners early. The City of Colstrip has filed a petition saying it wants in on Montana hearings because “the potential closure of (Avista’s units) would be devastating to our community.”

Don’t get too worked up, an Avista vice-president urged the Montana commission just before Easter.

“Just because an asset is depreciated does not mean that one would otherwise remove that asset from service if the asset is still performing as intended,” Jason Thackston testified in a session that dealt only with what the deal with Washington state would mean to Colstrip. We’re talking strictly about an accounting manoeuvre, not an operational commitment.

Six joint owners will have to agree to close the Colstrip generators and there’s “no other tacit understanding or unstated agreement” to do that, he said.

Besides Washington and Montana, state regulators in Idaho, including those overseeing the Idaho Power settlement process, Alaska and Oregon and multiple federal authorities have to sign off on the deal before it can happen. Hydro One hopes it’ll be done in the second half of this year.

 

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$453M Manitoba Hydro line to Minnesota could face delay after energy board recommendation

Manitoba-Minnesota Transmission Project faces NEB certificate review, with public hearings, Indigenous consultation, and cross-border approval weighing permit vs certificate timelines, potential land expropriation, and Hydro's 2020 in-service date for the 308-MW intertie.

 

Key Points

A cross-border hydro line linking Manitoba and Minnesota, now under NEB review through a permit or certificate process.

✅ NEB recommends certificate with public hearings and cabinet approval

✅ Stakeholders cite land, health, and economic impacts along route

✅ Hydro targets May-June 2020 in-service despite review

 

A recommendation from the National Energy Board could push back the construction start date of a $453-million hydroelectric transmission line from Manitoba to Minnesota.

In a letter to federal Natural Resources Minister Jim Carr, the regulatory agency recommends using a "certificate" approval process, which could take more time than the simpler "permit" process Manitoba Hydro favours.

The certificate process involves public hearings, reflecting First Nations intervention seen in other power-line debates, to weigh the merits of the project, which would then go to the federal cabinet for approval.

The NEB says this process would allow for more procedural flexibility and "address Aboriginal concerns that may arise in the circumstances of this process."

The Manitoba-Minnesota Transmission Project would provide the final link in a chain that brings hydroelectricity from generating stations in northern Manitoba, through the Bipole III transmission line and, like the New England Clean Power Link project, across the U.S. border as part of a 308-megawatt deal with the Green Bay-based Wisconsin Public Service.

When Hydro filed its application in December 2016, it had expected to have approval by the end of August 2017 and to begin construction on the line in mid-December, in order to have the line in operation by May or June 2020.  

Groups representing stakeholders along the proposed route of the transmission line had mixed reactions to the energy board's recommendation.

A lawyer representing a coalition of more than 120 landowners in the Rural Municipality of Taché and around La Broquerie, Man., welcomed the opportunity to have a more "fulsome" discussion about the project.

"I think it's a positive step. As people become more familiar with the project, the deficiencies with it become more obvious," said Kevin Toyne, who represents the Southeast Stakeholders Coalition.

Toyne said some coalition members are worried that Hydro will forcibly expropriate land in order to build the line, while others are worried about potential economic and health impacts of having the line so close to their homes. They have proposed moving the line farther east.

When the Clean Environment Commission — an arm's-length provincial government agency — held public hearings on the proposed route earlier this year, the coalition brought their concerns forward, echoing Site C opposition voiced by northerners, but Toyne says both the commission and Hydro ignored them.

Hydro still aiming for 2020 in-service date

The Manitoba Métis Federation also participated in those public hearings. MMF president David Chartrand worries about the impact a possible delay, as seen with the Site C work halt tied to treaty rights, could have on revenue from sales of hydroelectric power to the U.S.

"I know that a lot of money, billions have been invested on this line. And if the connection line is not done, then of course this will be sitting here, not gaining any revenue, which will affect every Métis in this province, given our Hydro bill's going to go up," Chartrand said.The NEB letter to Minister Carr requests that he "determine this matter in an expedited manner."

Manitoba Hydro spokesperson Bruce Owen said in an email that the Crown corporation will participate in whatever process, permit or certificate, the NEB takes.

"Manitoba Hydro does not have any information at this point in time that would change the estimated in-service date (May-June 2020) for the Manitoba-Minnesota Transmission Project," he said.

The federal government "is currently reviewing the NEB's recommendation to designate the project as subject to a certificate, which would result in public hearings," said Alexandre Deslongchamps, a spokesperson for Carr.

"Under the National Energy Board Act, an international power line requires either the approval by the NEB through a permit or approval by the Government of Canada by a certificate. Both must be issued by the NEB," he wrote in an email to CBC News.

By law, the certificate process is not to take longer than 15 months.

 

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Michigan utilities propose more than $20M in EV charging programs

Michigan EV time-of-use charging helps DTE Energy and Consumers Energy manage off-peak demand, expand smart charger rebates, and build DC fast charging infrastructure, lowering grid costs, emissions, and peak load impacts across Michigan's distribution networks.

 

Key Points

Michigan utility programs using time-based EV rates to shift charging off-peak and ease grid load via charger rebates.

✅ Off-peak rates cut peak load and distribution transformer stress.

✅ Rebates support home smart chargers and DC fast charging sites.

✅ DTE Energy and Consumers Energy invest to expand EV infrastructure.

 

The two largest utilities in the state of Michigan, DTE Energy and Consumers Energy, are looking at time-of-use charging rates in two proposed electric vehicle (EV) charging programs, aligned with broader EV charging infrastructure trends among utilities, worth a combined $20.5 million of investments.

DTE Energy last month proposed a $13 million electric vehicle (EV) charging program, which would include transformer upgrades/additions, service drops, labor and contractor costs, materials, hardware and new meters to provide time-of-use charging rates amid evolving charging control dynamics in the market. The Charging Forward program aims to address customer education and outreach, residential smart charger support and charging infrastructure enablement, DTE told regulators in its 1,100-page filing. The utility requested that rebates provided through the program be deferred as a regulatory asset.

Consumers Energy in 2017 withdrew a proposal to install 800 electric vehicle charging ports in its Michigan service territory after questions were raised over how to pay for the $15 million plan. According to Energy News Network, the utility has filed a modified proposal building on the former plan and conversations over the last year that calls for approximately half of the original investment.

Utilities across the country are viewing new demand from EVs as a potential boon to their systems, a shift accelerated by the Model 3's impact on utility planning, potentially allowing greater utilization and lower costs. But that will require the vehicles to be plugged in when other demand is low, to avoid the need for extensive upgrades and more expensive power purchases. Michigan utilities' proposal focuses on off-peak EV charging, as well as on developing new EV infrastructure.

While adoption has remained relatively low nationally, last year the Edison Electric Institute and the Institute for Electric Innovation forecast 7 million EVs on United States' roads by the end of 2025. But unless those EVs can be coordinated, state power grids could face increased stress, the National Renewable Energy Laboratory has said distribution transformers may need to be replaced more frequently and peak load could push system limits — even with just one or two EVs on a neighborhood circuit. 

In its application, DTE told regulators that electrification of transportation offers a range of benefits including "reduced operating costs for EV drivers and affordability benefits for utility customers."

"Most EV charging takes place overnight at home, effectively utilizing distribution and generation capacity in the system during a low load period," the utility said. "Therefore, increased EV adoption puts downward pressure on rates by spreading fixed costs over a greater volume of electric sales."

DTE added that other benefits include reduced carbon emissions, improved air quality, increased expenditures in local economies and reduced dependency on foreign oil for the public at large.

A previous proposal from Consumers Energy included 60 fast charging DC stations along major highways in the Lower Peninsula and 750 240-volt AC stations in metropolitan areas. Consumers' new plan will offer rebates for charger installation, as U.S. charging networks jostle for position amid federal electrification efforts, including residential and DC fast-charging stations.

 

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Military Is Ramping Up Preparation For Major U.S. Power Grid Hack

DARPA RADICS Power Grid Security targets DoD resilience to cyber attacks, delivering early warning, detection, isolation, and characterization tools, plus a secure emergency network to protect critical infrastructure and speed grid restoration and communications.

 

Key Points

A DoD/DARPA initiative to detect, contain, and rapidly recover the U.S. grid from sophisticated cyber attacks.

✅ Early warning separates attacks from routine outages

✅ Pinpoints intrusion points and malware used

✅ Builds secure emergency network for rapid restoration

 

The U.S. Department of Defense is growing increasingly concerned about hackers taking down our power grid and crippling the nation, reflecting a renewed focus on grid protection across agencies, which is why the Pentagon has created a $77-million security plan that it hopes will be up and running by 2020.

The U.S. power grid is threatened every few days. While these physical and cyber attacks have never led to wide-scale outages, attacks are getting more sophisticated. According to a 494-page report released by the Department of Energy in January and a new grid report card, the nation’s grid “faces imminent danger from cyber attacks.” Such a major, sweeping attack could threaten “U.S. lifeline networks, critical defense infrastructure, and much of the economy; it could also endanger the health and safety of millions of citizens.” If it were to happen today, America could be powered-down and vulnerable for weeks.

#google#

The DoD is working on an automated system to speed up recovery time to a week or less — what it calls the Rapid Attack Detection, Isolation, and Characterization (RADICS) program. DARPA, the Pentagon’s research arm, originally solicited proposals in late 2015, asking for technology that did three things. Primarily, it had to detect early warning signs and distinguish between attacks and normal outages, especially after intrusions at U.S. electric utilities underscored the risk, but it also had to pinpoint the access point of the attack and determine what malicious software was used. Finally, it must include an emergency system that can rapidly connect various power-supply centers, without any human coordination. This would allow emergency and military responders to have an ad hoc communication system in place moments after an attack.

“If a well-coordinated cyberattack on the nation’s power grid were to occur today, the time it would take to restore power would pose daunting national security challenges,” said DARPA program manager John Everett, in a statement, at the time. “Beyond the severe domestic impacts, including economic and human costs, prolonged disruption of the grid would hamper military mobilization and logistics, impairing the government’s ability to project force or pursue solutions to international crises.”

DARPA plans to spend $77 million on RADICS, while DOE funding to improve the grid complements these initiatives. Last November, SRI International announced it had received $7.3 million from the program. In December, Raython was granted $9 million. The latest addition is BAE Systems, which received $8.6 million last month to develop technology that detects and contains power-grid threats, and creates a secure emergency provisional system that restores some power and communication in the wake of an attack — what is being called a secure emergency network.

According to the military news site Defense Systems, BAE’s SEN would rely on radio, satellite, or wireless internet — particularly as ransomware attacks continue to rise — whatever is available that allows the grid to continue working. The SEN would serve as a wireless connection between separate power grid stations.

While the ultimate goal of the RADICS program will be the restoration of civilian power and communications, the SEN will prioritize communication networks that would be used for defense or combat, so the U.S. government can still wage war while the rest of us are in the dark.

 

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Nigeria's Electricity Crisis

Nigeria Electricity Crisis undermines energy access as aging grid, limited generation, and transmission losses cause power outages, raising costs for businesses and public services; renewables, microgrids, and investment offer resilient, inclusive solutions.

 

Key Points

A nationwide power gap from weak infrastructure, low generation, and grid losses that disrupt services and growth.

✅ Aging grid and underinvestment drive frequent power outages

✅ Businesses face higher costs, lost productivity, weak competitiveness

✅ Renewables, microgrids, and regulatory reform can expand access

 

In Nigeria, millions of residents face persistent challenges with access to reliable electricity, a crisis that has profound implications for businesses, public services, and overall socio-economic development. This article explores the root causes of Nigeria's electricity deficit, drawing on 2021 electricity lessons to inform analysis, its impact on various sectors, and potential solutions to alleviate this pressing issue.

Challenges with Electricity Access

The issue of inadequate electricity access in Nigeria is multifaceted. The country's electricity generation capacity falls short of demand due to aging infrastructure, inadequate maintenance, and insufficient investment in power generation and distribution, a dynamic echoed when green energy supply constraints emerge elsewhere as well. As a result, many Nigerians, particularly in rural and underserved urban areas, experience frequent power outages or have limited access to electricity altogether.

Impact on Businesses

The unreliable electricity supply poses significant challenges to businesses across Nigeria. Manufacturing industries, small enterprises, and commercial establishments rely heavily on electricity to operate machinery, maintain refrigeration for perishable goods, and power essential services. Persistent power outages disrupt production schedules, increase operational costs, and, as grids prepare for new loads from electric vehicle adoption worldwide, hinder business growth and competitiveness in both domestic and international markets.

Public Services Strain

Public services, including healthcare facilities, schools, and government offices, also grapple with the consequences of Nigeria's electricity crisis. Hospitals rely on electricity to power life-saving medical equipment, maintain proper sanitation, and ensure patient comfort. Educational institutions require electricity for lighting, technological resources, and administrative functions. Without reliable power, the delivery of essential public services is compromised, impacting the quality of education, healthcare outcomes, and overall public welfare.

Socio-economic Impact

The electricity deficit in Nigeria exacerbates socio-economic disparities and hampers poverty alleviation efforts, even as debates continue over whether access alone reduces poverty in every context. Lack of access to electricity limits economic opportunities, stifles entrepreneurship, and perpetuates income inequality. Rural communities, where access to electricity is particularly limited, face greater challenges in accessing educational resources, healthcare services, and economic opportunities compared to urban counterparts.

Government Initiatives and Challenges

The Nigerian government has implemented various initiatives to address the electricity crisis, including privatization of the power sector, investment in renewable energy projects, and regulatory reforms aimed at improving efficiency and accountability, while examples like India's village electrification illustrate rapid expansion potential too. However, progress has been slow, and challenges such as corruption, bureaucratic inefficiencies, and inadequate funding continue to impede efforts to expand electricity access nationwide.

Community Resilience and Adaptation

Despite these challenges, communities and businesses in Nigeria demonstrate resilience and adaptability in navigating the electricity crisis. Some businesses invest in alternative power sources such as generators, solar panels, or hybrid systems to mitigate the impact of power outages, while utilities weigh shifts signaled by EVs' impact on utilities for future planning. Community-led initiatives, including local cooperatives and microgrids, provide decentralized electricity solutions in underserved areas, promoting self-sufficiency and resilience.

Path Forward

Addressing Nigeria's electricity crisis requires a concerted effort from government, private sector stakeholders, and international partners, informed by UK grid transformation experience as well. Key priorities include increasing investment in power infrastructure, enhancing regulatory frameworks to attract private sector participation, and promoting renewable energy deployment. Improving energy efficiency, reducing transmission losses, and expanding electricity access to underserved communities are critical steps towards achieving sustainable development goals and improving quality of life for all Nigerians.

Conclusion

The electricity crisis in Nigeria poses significant challenges to businesses, public services, and socio-economic development. Addressing these challenges requires comprehensive strategies that prioritize infrastructure investment, regulatory reform, and community empowerment. By working together to expand electricity access and promote sustainable energy solutions, Nigeria can unlock its full economic potential, improve living standards, and create opportunities for prosperity and growth across the country.

 

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