American energy providers are planning to invest hundreds of billions of dollars in green energy, even as such projects lead to skyrocketing costs for consumers.
Energy companies are projected to spend $140 billion in both 2022 and 2023, upgrading grid infrastructure, building renewable energy projects, and preparing for electric-vehicle-fueled demand, the Edison Electric Institute told The Wall Street Journal, marking the largest yearly totals since the industry group began tracking the figure more than two decades ago. [bold, links added]
Overall, energy bills are expected to increase by up to 3% on an annual basis, according to the research firm Sector & Sovereign Research, the WSJ reported.
Energy bills have stayed relatively flat over the last several decades, Bureau of Labor Statistics data showed.
“You’re forcing more and more demand for electricity because the environmentalists want everything to be electric,” Dan Kish, a senior fellow at the Institute for Energy Research, told the Daily Caller News Foundation in an interview. “Yet, the sources you’re allowing to be used to make the electricity are getting more expensive.”
Kish noted government data showing that residential customers’ energy bills increased 4.3% in 2021, the largest annual increase since 2008.
National Grid — a major energy supplier in New York, Massachusetts, New Hampshire, and Rhode Island — became the latest company to unveil extensive plans for “achieving a net-zero future” on Tuesday, promising to boost investments in wind, solar, hydropower, and renewable natural gas.
The California-based Pacific Gas & Electric (PG&E), the largest energy utility in the U.S. has issued its own net-zero plan that includes support for policies that will lead to nationwide carbon neutrality by 2050 or sooner.
“We have a critical responsibility to lead the clean energy transition for our customers and communities,” John Pettigrew, the CEO of National Grid, said in a statement.
However, the transition to renewables will lead to higher costs for utilities, which will then be passed onto consumers in the form of price hikes, the WSJ reported.
Pedro Pizarro, the CEO of California utility company Edison International, said recent natural gas prices have surged and energy costs will remain elevated in the future as providers build out renewable infrastructure and electricity demand skyrockets.
“We’re obviously very focused on trying to manage electric costs as much as we can, but let’s also recognize that there will be more pressure on electric costs,” Pizarro told the WSJ.
California consumers’ energy bills have dwarfed those of consumers in other states in 2021 and are projected to continue increasing. The state has implemented some of the most aggressive climate plans in the country.
‘Horrific, truly horrific’
President Joe Biden has laid out plans to cut U.S. emissions by 50% by 2030 and achieve a 100% carbon-free electricity grid by 2035. His administration has also worked to limit new oil and gas drilling on federal lands and waters.
Similar to Biden, the U.K. and Europe have issued ambitious climate plans, but, unlike the U.S., have made significant progress on expanding their renewable energy systems.
In the U.K., renewables accounted for 43% of domestic energy production and in the European Union (EU), renewables produced 22% of domestic energy generation.
However, energy bills have surged in the region as nations have looked to Russia and other major fossil fuel producers for oil and natural gas supply.
In the U.K. and EU, oil and gas drilling has sharply plummeted in recent years as the region has largely turned away from fossil fuels.
“The reason why gas prices have gone up so significantly — they’re about 10 times higher than they are in the U.S. — is because most European countries have phased out coal, have phased down nuclear, and have gone almost exclusively to renewable energy,” Benny Peiser, the director of the U.K.-based Global Warming Policy Foundation, told the DCNF.
Millions of British households are expected to see energy bills increase by $1,000 per year, CNBC reported.
The projected utility price increases will lead to a doubling of U.K. households in “fuel poverty” while the poorest British residents will be forced to spend 10% of their budget on energy.
“The situation has changed significantly for the worse,” Simon Rossi, the CEO of U.K. utility company EDF, recently said, according to Reuters.
Another British utility executive, Keith Anderson of Scottish Power, said price increases could be “horrific, truly horrific” by October.
Natural gas prices in the U.K. have surged nearly 300% year over year while prices in the EU have increased a whopping 436% year over year.
Read rest at Daily Caller
More Wind Turbines and Solar Panels to endanger the Birds especialy the Larger Birds like Eagles,Condors,Hawks,Owls Etc and the Eco-Freaks could’nt Care Less unless their in a Offshore Oil Spill for the Sea and Shorebirds
And above all, the main non-transport energy demand now is heat; easy with the Sun, just put your windows South and heat a water tank. But to make transport electric, implies a power demand 2-3 times today’s level; and no supply system is available or even in sight.
Those who want nonC energy, will get it; if and when available. At high price; and if very little continuous energy is available, prices WILL be high. Which is why gas must be kept in the ground. Low prices for nonC are unacceptable, being unable to pay for the 6 hour day of short life panels and windmills. If nuclear and gas save the day, all others will be stranded assets when their running, maintenence, removal and replacement costs show up. What do the Chinese do when it rains? They let it rain. But we are so wise…
OK, so it is not like there is any great mystery or intrigue here. All you have to do is look at the current situation in the UK, EU, S. Australia & California for a “sneak peak” on skyrocketing electricity prices & reliability issues. Not satisfied with the evidence? Then, take a look at Ontario’s disastrous renewables campaign between 2008-2018. PLENTY of available data to prove a point…This “Green Dream” is mischaracterized. It’s a PIPE DREAM! So, let me get this straight. More specifically, the U.S will want to be more like Germany, right? So residential rates 2X and industrial rates 3X per KWH above average U.S electricity prices is terrific? Wonder why the Germans have been so “soft” on the Russian economic sanctions & lagging most NATO allies on armament shipments to Ukraine. Wild guess…because if the Russians cut off the natural gas supply on Nordstream 1 pipeline then Germany can’t keep their lights on? You don’t have to be “psychic” to get the picture (here). You just have to be realistic and understand energy imperatives. Aspirations are great in the social sciences but unfortunately, have little applicability in the brutish world of physics & basic math…
…but fewer and fewer of us are aware of “the brutish world of physics and math”. The rest seem to think they live in “La La Land”.
Doug Ford is leading in the polls for the upcoming election. Shouldn’t have to kwowtow to the Green movement.
An environment free of CO2 is a dead planet. Life on earth is composed ENTIRELY of little carbon sacks of water called cells. That carbon comes entirely from CO2. And CO2 has been dangerously and inexorably declining from life luxuriant concentrations more than twenty times today’s at life’s birth. I’m a farmer with a biology degree. And I’m sick to death of policies that are destroying our way of life, our living standards, and our security from the misguided notion that more CO2 isn’t the best thing to happen to the environment human beings have ever done. More CO2 makes the environment greener, more drought-tolerant, and more abundant. Because all life is made from the stuff. And we live in starvation level lows. Every joker with a picket sign is NOT an “environmentalist”. Far too many of them are destroying the best fed, longest-living, most prosperous conditions human beings have ever enjoyed. And are entirely IGNORANT THAT FOSSIL FUELS ARE THE ONLY GREEN ENERGY BECAUSE USING THEM REPLENISHES THE DANGEROUSLY LOW LEVELS OF CO2 FOR LIFE ON THIS PLANET. That is the science. Why are we catering to the wishes of the ignorant and ill-informed?
Of course you are 100% correct Barry, but with today’s appalling standards of education few people understand that. You only have to see the crowds of uneducated young teenagers at every “Global Warming” rally to see how our educationalists have failed the young. With some help from people such as Greta’s parents!
BARRY BATEMAN for PRESIDENT !!!!