According to the Texas Energy Report and the Dallas Morning News, Lt. Gov. David Dewhurst told reporters last week he's considering incentives to get power companies to either upgrade or replace old coal plants with natural gas. This was reported in an earlier posting.
Thirteen coal-fired power plants in Texas were built before 1980. Shut those down without immediately replacing the full capacity, and the lights go out.
The Electric Reliability Council of Texas, which operates the state grid, expects Texas will need 65,206 megawatts of electric generating capacity this summer to meet peak demand. ERCOT predicts we will have 73,656 megawatts, giving the grid a fat, 16 percent cushion of excess capacity. But if you remove those 13 plants, or 8,288 megawatts of capacity, you get a razor-thin reserve margin of only 0.2 percent.
The question is. How real and severe would the impact of this action be on our electricity prices in the future. COMMENTS INVITED....
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