Being Green Pays

The energy crisis in California between the years of 2000-2001 left many state citizens angered at their utility providers, and rightfully so. Thanks to the corporate greed of companies such as Enron, the entire economy of the state was affected in an adverse way. However, there were good things that came from these trying years, in the form of new ideas. Since the energy crisis there have been no serious rolling blackouts, and the power grid of California has been able to cope to increased usage due to an ever growing population.  This is good news, now has does this partake in the Green News debate?  Green news is what’s keeping this story alive.

The rest of the U.S. took notice of California’s’ problem, and took matters into their own hands. Except that instead of having consumers pay their utility company for electricity and gas, it is now the utility companies that are beginning to pay the consumer. In several Atlantic states, the abundance of energy has caused prices of electricity to drop into the negative. This means that the utility company actually pays their consumers to use their product.

This is thanks due in part to a lack of serious technological breakthrough, and the advent of renewable energy, green energy. There has not yet been a device which can correctly store electricity in large amounts, besides batteries which are expensive to maintain and eventually harmful to the environment. Due to this, there is no way to store excess energy that is created by power plants. Usually there is a downtime in electrical use, mainly during the night hours. However, several green power sources such as wind power and those that utilize power from the movement of water continue to function during those hours. Thus, while there is less demand there is still a considerable amount of energy being generated which is not used, and is consequently sold in the negative.

In states without large populations, this has certainly been a gift to those who use utilities. For the especially tech-savvy, they can plug in their electric cars during the time when the power is paid for by their utility provider and not pay a dime to get around the next day.

In states like California, with its ever increasing population and changing demographics, this would be a blessing and certainly create a flourish of activity in the electric motor marketplace. The addition of solar/wind/water power to the California grid would create considerably less strain on the grid, as well as greatly reduce carbon emissions due to the burning of oil and coal at power stations.