Dissruptive Challenge
ChrisOlson
Banned Posts: 1,807 ✭✭
Edison Electric Institute put out a report in January that basically says people like my wife and I are considered a "disruptive challenge". By choosing to use renewable energy sources to power our home, and living off-grid, we are ruining their business model.
http://www.eei.org/ourissues/finance/Documents/disruptivechallenges.pdf
I like this, particularly:
The electric utility sector has not previously experienced a viable disruptive threat to its service offering due customer reliance and the solid economic value of its product. However, a combination of technological innovation, public/regulatory policy, and changes in consumer objectives and preferences has resulted in distributed generation and other DER (Distributed Energy Resources) being on a path to becoming a viable alternative to the electric utility model.
I can't say that I feel bad about any of this. In fact, I'm rather proud to be living today what I preached for years as to how I thought the whole thing should be set up. I have never agreed with the concept of the "grid", even though many people today can't fathom how it could be done any differently. All you have to do is go back to 1940. Cities had electricity. Many, many of them had hydro plants on a river. Most of those small hydro plants got shut down once the "grid" got signed into law in 1936.
But the rural areas also had power. Rural folks had 32V DC appliances - lights, radios, fans, washing machines, and even electric irons for clothes. Many even had backup 32V Delco Light Plants - standby DC generators. Virtually everybody in the rural areas lived off-grid. And solar PV didn't even exist back then - it was all powered by thousands of Jacobs and WinCharger wind turbines. LaVerne Noyes invented and sold the first Aermotor water pumping windmill in 1888 and by 1940 there was an estimated 1.3 million of them in the US and Canada - and some of them, including the 8 foot diameter one on our place here, are still working today.
That all changed with the Rural Electrification Act of 1936. And not for the better because rural folks were not that bad off. It was just an example of a business model being able to shape the laws to fit it, because all of the federal funding for the REA was channeled thru electric power companies, most of which still exist today - and have made billions of dollars for their investors and shareholders. And now their business model is starting to fall apart. And they're worried. Real worried. And they're not going to go down without making a lot of noise.
--
Chris
http://www.eei.org/ourissues/finance/Documents/disruptivechallenges.pdf
I like this, particularly:
The electric utility sector has not previously experienced a viable disruptive threat to its service offering due customer reliance and the solid economic value of its product. However, a combination of technological innovation, public/regulatory policy, and changes in consumer objectives and preferences has resulted in distributed generation and other DER (Distributed Energy Resources) being on a path to becoming a viable alternative to the electric utility model.
I can't say that I feel bad about any of this. In fact, I'm rather proud to be living today what I preached for years as to how I thought the whole thing should be set up. I have never agreed with the concept of the "grid", even though many people today can't fathom how it could be done any differently. All you have to do is go back to 1940. Cities had electricity. Many, many of them had hydro plants on a river. Most of those small hydro plants got shut down once the "grid" got signed into law in 1936.
But the rural areas also had power. Rural folks had 32V DC appliances - lights, radios, fans, washing machines, and even electric irons for clothes. Many even had backup 32V Delco Light Plants - standby DC generators. Virtually everybody in the rural areas lived off-grid. And solar PV didn't even exist back then - it was all powered by thousands of Jacobs and WinCharger wind turbines. LaVerne Noyes invented and sold the first Aermotor water pumping windmill in 1888 and by 1940 there was an estimated 1.3 million of them in the US and Canada - and some of them, including the 8 foot diameter one on our place here, are still working today.
That all changed with the Rural Electrification Act of 1936. And not for the better because rural folks were not that bad off. It was just an example of a business model being able to shape the laws to fit it, because all of the federal funding for the REA was channeled thru electric power companies, most of which still exist today - and have made billions of dollars for their investors and shareholders. And now their business model is starting to fall apart. And they're worried. Real worried. And they're not going to go down without making a lot of noise.
--
Chris
Comments
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Re: Dissruptive Challenge
Chris you anarchist you!
This is what we're seeing from many electric companies it seems: they want the right to charge people for not using their power as well as for using it.
Wish I could charge people for my not doing anything for them. Why, I'd only have to charge a penny each for all 7 billion .... -
Re: Dissruptive Challenge
One other comment I'd like to add is that the electric utilities are strongly opposed to any sort of subsidies for renewable energy projects because they feel it makes it hard for them to compete. But the fact is, every single electric utility that exists today was built on federal subsidies thru the REA.
The old saying where I come from; "what's good for the goose is good for the gander".Cariboocoot wrote: »This is what we're seeing from many electric companies it seems: they want the right to charge people for not using their power as well as for using it.
Yes, and you see, the thing is - the electric companies are regulated monopolies. They have a designed-in profit margin. And it's all based on sales. If their sales drop they panic because the shareholders and investors who have the money in it don't get an "acceptable" ROI. So they apply for a rate increase and they get it.
These people, being monopolies, have never had to deal with competition. But renewable energy sources like solar are not going to go away, they're not going to legislated out of existence. So doing the right thing now becomes a "disruptive challenge" - a threat. I predict that in the next 10 years the price of grid electricity will get higher as more people start generating their own, and that the people who don't have renewable generation will find it a major burden to pay the bill - much worse than it is today.
But that's how major technology changes are made. The grid, the way it is designed, is an unsustainable system that is going to become incredibly expensive to maintain and operate with time. The technology exists today to break it up into smaller more manageable pieces and get better reliability and redundancy - and drastically reduce the operating costs of it. But the problem is that we have these huge conglomerates that control it, and to do that they have to be dissolved. That change is not going to come easy.
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Chris -
Re: Dissruptive Challenge
I think they're worried more about people with big grid-tied arrays. Most of their revenue is from energy generation.
Competition is always good. However, since both sides (electric companies and grid-tie installations) are subsidized, it is substabtially skewed. -
Re: Dissruptive Challenge
I think they're worried about anything that reduces their sales. They can force a grid-tie setup to use more power than it produces like they have already done here. They just give you a credit on the bill and you got 12 months to use the credit or they get the power for free.
The only way they can force somebody who's off-grid to use any of their power is to bribe the right politician to pass some law that makes off-grid homes illegal. They recently did it here - got an ordinance passed that requires all new construction to have minimum 100 amp service - no new off-grid construction allowed in this county.
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Chris -
Re: Dissruptive ChallengeChrisOlson wrote: »They recently did it here - got an ordinance passed that requires all new construction to have minimum 100 amp service - no new off-grid construction allowed in this county.
Does the ordinance explicitly ban off-grid construction? It is possible (you have done it) to have 100 amp service off grid. --vtMaps4 X 235watt Samsung, Midnite ePanel, Outback VFX3524 FM60 & mate, 4 Interstate L16, trimetric, Honda eu2000i -
Re: Dissruptive Challenge
Do they expect a person to pay millions of dollars to run the grid to their hunt camp in the boonies? Wait until one of those politicos want to build a cottage or hunt camp and gets that bite in the a$$.
Ralph -
Re: Dissruptive Challenge
WOW! This $h1t is truly scary!!! Nova Scotia Power already came and changed my meter because it was recording almost no usage. The new meter isn't doing any better for them. Next step? Possibly start charging me $1000/year for the connection, and a $20,000 fee to disconnect? I believe they'd try anything they can think of. They'd start small and work it up. -
Re: Dissruptive Challenge
Or they could get their foot in the door by getting a tariff to charge for their fixed cost to be covered no matter what. What! They already have!lost fixed cost recovery (lfcr)
In May 2012, the Arizona Corporation Commission (ACC) approved new rates for APS. Because more customers are installing renewable energy systems such as solar and wind, and energy efficiency measures such as compact fluorescent light bulbs and refrigerator recycling, APS is selling less electricity, but fixed costs remain. APS is allowed to implement a new charge to recover a portion of the fixed costs.
what are fixed costs?
Fixed costs are for items that are needed regardless of how much electricity is sold, such as power poles, wires and other delivery infrastructure.
who is affected by this change?
All residential and small business customers are now subject to lost fixed cost recovery. Large commercial and industrial customers have current rate structures which already include the recovery of fixed costs.
what is the new charge?
A new charge will begin appearing on affected customers’ bills in March 2013 in one of two forms: a flat addition to the existing customer charge (Flat Charge Option) or a new Lost Fixed Cost Recovery (LFCR) percentage of bill charge.
While it is a small fee added to the bill it is "adjustable"! So last month my charge as a percentage of the bill was only $0.05 and I had no service delivery charges as my solar production YTD is more than my consumption in total. But the tell is in the fine print:The LFCR is calculated annually based on lost sales from measured and approved ACC programs for energy efficiency and customer-sited, non-APS owned renewable energy systems. APS will file results with the ACC each January; the ACC then sets the LFCR amount for the 12-month period (March-February). It is calculated as a percentage of your bill.
If they don't make enough to cover, they adjust, I assume always upward and onward. -
Re: Dissruptive Challenge
It costs $300 a year here and likely to go up!waynefromnscanada wrote: »WOW! .... Next step? Possibly start charging me $1000/year for the connection.....
Hey, don't give them any ideas!waynefromnscanada wrote: »...and a $20,000 fee to disconnect? ..... Home system 4000 watt (Evergreen) array standing, with 2 Midnite Classic Lites, Midnite E-panel, Magnum MS4024, Prosine 1800(now backup) and Exeltech 1100(former backup...lol), 660 ah 24v Forklift battery(now 10 years old). Off grid for 20 years (if I include 8 months on a bicycle).
- Assorted other systems, pieces and to many panels in the closet to not do more projects. -
Re: Dissruptive ChallengeIt costs $300 a year here and likely to go up!
Hey, don't give them any ideas!
Yep here about 20.50 a month with the taxes.
Customer account charge $7.62
Delivery service charge $0.00 <-- that one cause we are on the good side of the YTD delivery. That will change here in a month or so.
Environmental benefits surcharge $0.00
System benefits charge $0.00
Power supply adjustment* $0.00
Metering* $5.95
Meter reading* $1.98
Billing* $2.24
Taxes:
Regulatory assessment $0.05
State sales tax $1.55
County sales tax $0.16
City sales tax $0.68
Franchise fee $0.46
Then the cost of power:
Generation of electricity on-peak* $0.00
Generation of electricity off-peak* $5.09 <-- for generation of 249 kWh
Federal transmission and ancillary services* $0.00
Federal transmission cost adjustment* $0.00 -
Re: Dissruptive Challenge
Over the years, rural grid power surges did a pretty good number on many of my neighbors wells and appliances.
No thanks.Ranch Off Grid System & Custom Home: 2 x pair stacked Schneider XW 5548+ Plus inverters (4), 2 x Schneider MPPT 80-600 Charge Controllers, 2 Xanbus AGS Generator Start and Air Extraction System Controllers, 64 Trojan L16 REB 6v 375 AH Flooded Cel Batteries w/Water Miser Caps, 44 x 185 Sharp Solar Panels, Cummins Onan RS20 KW Propane Water Cooled Genset, ICF Custom House Construction, all appliances, Central A/C, 2 x High Efficiency Variable Speed three ton Central A/C 220v compressors, 2 x Propane furnaces, 2 x Variable Speed Air Handlers, 2 x HD WiFi HVAC Zoned System Controllers -
Re: Dissruptive ChallengeDoes the ordinance explicitly ban off-grid construction? It is possible (you have done it) to have 100 amp service off grid. --vtMaps
The ordinance requires a 100-amp utility service, minimum, for any new residential structure built after 2011. They can't force you to use it, however. The ordinance was drafted because the electric cooperative ran lines to a big lake home that a retired doctor built. Several other cottages and homes were built on that same lake on lots that were sold, and many of them are off-grid even though the electric service was available right next door at the doctor's place. They had a big uproar at County Zoning Commission meeting over it, with the electric coop complaining to high heaven that they ran the lines there expecting to get service to all these lake cottages and homes. So they got the ordinance passed.
Like any ordinance you have to apply for a variance for new off-grid construction now. And the only way you'll get it is if you're like us where lines would have to be run for one residence and the cost would be prohibitive. If electric service is available the ordinance requires you to hook up to it. The bad part (for the consumer) is that this area is totally rural. The largest city has a population of 2,700. So they charge almost $60 just for the monthly "fixed charge" because they have to maintain lots of infrastructure with not very many customers to cover the costs of it. And if you grid-tie they charge an additional $47.50/month net-metering fee putting your total fixed charge at over $100/month JUST to have electric service with a grid-tied wind or solar RE system.
The BoD at the electric coop all make six figure incomes - well, guess where that money comes from to pay their salaries? And they have gone to great lengths to protect and insure that their nest eggs don't evaporate.
--
Chris -
Re: Dissruptive Challenge
I say, if utilities want to charge based on their actual costs then fine. Let them charge me for use of the grid, maybe even reduce the net metering credit we get for excess production. But - then they should be charged for all the pollution and risk produced from burning coal, uranium, etc. They should be happy to let us early adopters have a bit of an advantage in exchange for continuing in their old ways. If energy was a true, level playing field, and utilities had to pay for all their economic and environmental costs, rates would go way up and solar would look more attractive than ever. -
Re: Dissruptive ChallengeI say, if utilities want to charge based on their actual costs then fine.
That's all fine and good. But these electric coops out here aren't regulated. They buy all their power from Dairyland Power and the wholesale rates that Dairyland Power can charge are regulated by the PSC. But once it gets to the electric coop that serves a region the sky is the limit. The coop is supposed to be member owned, which it might be, and each member gets a "vote" to make decisions. But that "vote" is about like voting for the President of the United States - it don't count anyway because the Electoral College actually selects the president. So they got a big BoD that draws down big incomes just because they can. They don't replace poles leaning at a 45 degree angle and being held up by the wires because the power is still on and don't replace it until it goes out.
They're a not-for-profit coop, but that don't mean there's not a group of people making big money off it.
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Chris -
Re: Dissruptive Challenge
Such is life in America, the Land of the Free.ChrisOlson wrote: »That's all fine and good. But these electric coops out here aren't regulated. They buy all their power from Dairyland Power and the wholesale rates that Dairyland Power can charge are regulated by the PSC. But once it gets to the electric coop that serves a region the sky is the limit. The coop is supposed to be member owned, which it might be, and each member gets a "vote" to make decisions. But that "vote" is about like voting for the President of the United States - it don't count anyway because the Electoral College actually selects the president. So they got a big BoD that draws down big incomes just because they can. They don't replace poles leaning at a 45 degree angle and being held up by the wires because the power is still on and don't replace it until it goes out.
They're a not-for-profit coop, but that don't mean there's not a group of people making big money off it.
--
Chris -
Re: Dissruptive Challenge
That's my point exactly. Any talk from the utilities about actual costs is just B.S. I maintain this country (Canada included) is headed for a train wreck. -
Re: Dissruptive ChallengeSuch is life in America, the Land of the Free.
Oh yeah. Freedom is all about money. I predict that the expense of maintaining an unsustainable system will eventually kill it. Something major will happen to it that makes people realize that it was a mistake and that there's a better way to do it. Just about everybody here on this forum is on the forefront of that better way. All of us who have invested in small scale solar power for our homes have proved to the rest that it works. When companies like EEI start putting out reports noting that these "distruptive challenges" are starting to erode their business model, that's serious proof that it works.
As long as the freedom exists to allow people to continue the transition to the better way, all will be fine. The big utilities - most of which were conceived by government funding after 1936 - are not going to let it go without a fight. If they were true "public services" it shouldn't matter. But they're not - there's groups of people making BIG money off the existing system. And the almighty dollar will eventually determine what happens - freedom has nothing to do with it.
--
Chris
Edit:
And the almighty dollar will eventually determine what happens - freedom has nothing to do with it.
What I mean by this is that you and I and everybody else here invests in equipment that never has to be refueled. We spend money on solar panels or wind turbines that, once we have them, generate power from sources of energy that are free. There is virtually no additional expense involved once we have the equipment.
The utility system, on the other hand, has largely invested in sources of power that are not free. Mostly fossil fuels.
One is a sustainable system - the other is not. The sustainable system, by design, uses distributed generation - generate the power at the point of use and eliminate the infrastructure to transmit it all over the place. I preached against the "grid" system for years and I am so happy that distributed generation sources have finally become viable enough so that the big "grid" system is in danger due to its economic impracticality. -
Re: Dissruptive Challenge
If their "business model" was more about providing the essential service of electricity and less about providing massive profits for people who already have plenty of money then it would inevitably be a sustainable model, not a house of cards.
Unfortunately there are many examples in industry of profit-first business models. Stockholders demanding not only quarterly profits, but greater profits each quarter. And if the profit isn't as large this quarter as expected (never mind larger than last quarter's) then the stock value takes a hit.
None of the methodology being used to run businesses these days has anything to do with engineering except in a secondary or even tertiary form. Eventually they will have neglected maintenance and R&D to the point where income is generated only by the skewed mathematics of accounting; selling off assets and laying off workers to continue showing positive financial returns until there's nothing left to sell or cut.
As I said, not engineering at all. A sane power company would realize the value of investing in solar power instead of fearing it because it doesn't fit with their known skill set. On a large scale, a controlled PV generation scheme would be more profitable for them than another coal-burning plant and have the added (albeit intangible) benefit of good PR. -
Re: Dissruptive Challenge
In California (for example), the state PUC has rules that pretty much say the utility owns its customers. If a customer wants to "leave the service" they have to pay the utility for the privileged (basically, the utility/PUC have long term bonds/investments that need to be payed off if you take your revenue and leave the game).
I have always wondered if you did not pay your bill and the utility cuts off the service--If you then never reconnect (after paying up the several months of billing)--would they still come after you.
Probably more of a large customer issue (proccessing plant that uses "waste" to power boilers for local energy usage)--But it is getting close to where the balance could sift to off grid power...
But then we have the whole who owns the rights to the sun and shading from a neighbor's property (or city trees)... There have been some big/ugly legal battles already over those issues in the suburbs in our area in the last decade or so (GT solar power).
It is going to get uglier before it gets better.
-BillNear San Francisco California: 3.5kWatt Grid Tied Solar power system+small backup genset -
Re: Dissruptive Challenge
Bill;
During the great depression thousands of people left the devastated mid-west and made their way to California to seek a better life. They abandoned their homes to the banks and the elements and took what they could carry and moved on.
It sounds as though there could soon be another mass exodus, only this time in the opposite direction. I wouldn't blame them a bit. Let the politicians see how valuable the place is when no one wants to live there anymore.
My wife and I left the lower mainland of British Columbia for much the same reasons; it was too expensive to live there anymore. Now our property taxes are 1/3 of what they were and we are out from under the thumb of the GVRD and Translink taxation agencies. Even the gasoline is less expensive (although still expensive).
Everyone should examine their life from time to time and consider what's good and bad about it, and entertain the possibility of a large-scale change for the better. -
Re: Dissruptive Challenge
My personal vision of how it should've been done is maybe something most won't agree with.
But I envision utility companies that don't maintain and operate huge high voltage transmission lines and power plants. Instead use distributed generation. Most homeowners, for instance, can't install their own solar. But the utility company is the one that comes in and installs it. The utility owns the solar panels and the customer pays a monthly fee to have them. There is no cost for the power that comes from them because nobody has to mine or refine sunshine. It "just works".
There are "blocks" that are interconnected by wires and each "block" has a standby generator that runs on fossil fuel (for now) to provide peak load power and backup for when the sun doesn't shine. Someday a new battery technology will come along that makes it feasible to store solar power for at night for the "blocks". This is, in fact, already being done in Alaska.
I can envision a system where high voltage overhead lines are no longer needed. Big central powerplants are no longer needed. Most of the infrastructure is there today to make it work - just needs to be broken down into smaller parts, and the overhead infrastructure replaced with underground eventually.
--
Chris -
Re: Dissruptive ChallengeChrisOlson wrote: »My personal vision of how it should've been done is maybe something most won't agree with.
I think the government needs to get out of regulating electricity. It may be a short time shock, but in the long run there will be a movement towards more economical decisions, greater diversity and viability. Some people will form mini networks, some will use centralized grid, some will go completely off-grid. The system will be very resilient and reliable.
Right now, electric systems are built and maintained not to improve economics, but to meet ever-changing and controversial government regulations, which creates very inefficient and unreliable structures requiring external subsidies and getting worse with time. -
Re: Dissruptive Challenge
Curiously enough, electrical power systems began as small, regional generation. I remember the remains of our local plant: coal fired steam generators - the steam whistle was used as the village fire alarm for years after the generation shut down. Edison put up many DC plants around NYC and environs.
Then in came the big civic projects to combat the depression: TVA, REP, ETC. (:p) Niagara's generators would feed the whole East coast. Hoover dam, the Grand Coulee, flooding the vallies for power. Wires run everywhere, crisscrossing the continent. No more outages was the promise, because power could be brought from anywhere to anywhere!
Okay, they didn't mention the 50% transmission losses. They didn't mention the cascade failures that could take out one whole section (I think there are four total) if someone plugged in a hairdryer at the wrong time. They didn't mention the lack of upgrading of infrastructure as more and more demand was made on the grid. They didn't mention thousands of private and public companies all trying to interact on power management across state lines with different rules and regulations and incentives.
But the real down side is there's no national will (in either country) to correct the obvious flaws despite the known dangers of not fixing them. There's not one single EE in the world who would look at the NA power grid and say it's fine. But in the eyes of the people who are in charge of it, nothing is wrong.
Like driving down the road with a leaking fuel line; so long as you're still going you'll get there. Until you stop. -
Re: Dissruptive ChallengeCariboocoot wrote: »Okay, they didn't mention the 50% transmission losses. They didn't mention the cascade failures that could take out one whole section (I think there are four total) if someone plugged in a hairdryer at the wrong time. They didn't mention the lack of upgrading of infrastructure as more and more demand was made on the grid. They didn't mention thousands of private and public companies all trying to interact on power management across state lines with different rules and regulations and incentives.
Also hackers who can break in from anywhere in the world and put the whole grid down for a long time. It's surprising this hasn't happened yet. -
Re: Dissruptive Challenge
My thinking is that the bottom line isn't money. Its Control. Centralized power by the "leaders", distributed to the "followers" - GOOD. Distributed generation by independent individuals - BAD. Centralized government, Centralized banking, Centralized education, Centralized foreign policy, etc, etc. I'm sure they are working on centralizing the internet. -
Re: Dissruptive ChallengeAlso hackers who can break in from anywhere in the world and put the whole grid down for a long time. It's surprising this hasn't happened yet.
It doesn't need to: the grid falls apart on its own regularly enough.
I wouldn't say it's a matter of needing less or more regulation of power companies but rather the right regulation. That's where it all gets difficult. -
Re: Dissruptive ChallengeEdison Electric Institute put out a report in January that basically says people like my wife and I are considered a "disruptive challenge". By choosing to use renewable energy sources to power our home, and living off-grid, we are ruining their business model.
Micro-fusion or LENR -> disruptive challenges that makes the disruptive challenge of solar seem microscopic. To bad fusion is still far away and modern LENR schemes such as the E-Cat are looking more fraudulent than not. Solar is really second-hand fusion - the sun is fusion power. -
Re: Dissruptive ChallengeCariboocoot wrote: »Curiously enough, electrical power systems began as small, regional generation. I remember the remains of our local plant: coal fired steam generators - the steam whistle was used as the village fire alarm for years after the generation shut down. Edison put up many DC plants around NYC and environs.
Then in came the big civic projects to combat the depression: TVA, REP, ETC. (:p) Niagara's generators would feed the whole East coast. Hoover dam, the Grand Coulee, flooding the vallies for power. Wires run everywhere, crisscrossing the continent. No more outages was the promise, because power could be brought from anywhere to anywhere!
Okay, they didn't mention the 50% transmission losses. They didn't mention the cascade failures that could take out one whole section (I think there are four total) if someone plugged in a hairdryer at the wrong time. They didn't mention the lack of upgrading of infrastructure as more and more demand was made on the grid. They didn't mention thousands of private and public companies all trying to interact on power management across state lines with different rules and regulations and incentives.
But the real down side is there's no national will (in either country) to correct the obvious flaws despite the known dangers of not fixing them. There's not one single EE in the world who would look at the NA power grid and say it's fine. But in the eyes of the people who are in charge of it, nothing is wrong.
Like driving down the road with a leaking fuel line; so long as you're still going you'll get there. Until you stop.
Just like Rome, it took hundreds of years to completely collapse. America will probably be similar. Taking decades to collapse. It will probably be conquored by enemies or from within (or both) before it collapses completely though. Between now and then - 3rd world banana republic. -
Re: Dissruptive ChallengeCariboocoot wrote: »I wouldn't say it's a matter of needing less or more regulation of power companies but rather the right regulation.
There's no such thing. Since the ones who regulate do not have a knowlegde of the subject, nor any vested interest in the outcome, right regulation may come up only by coincidence and for a short period of time.
In contrast, free market regulation is done by lots of people persuing their own interests. It is far from perfect, but in the end it usually leads to better results. -
Re: Dissruptive ChallengeChrisOlson wrote: »My personal vision of how it should've been done is maybe something most won't agree with.
But I envision utility companies that don't maintain and operate huge high voltage transmission lines and power plants. Instead use distributed generation. Most homeowners, for instance, can't install their own solar. But the utility company is the one that comes in and installs it. The utility owns the solar panels and the customer pays a monthly fee to have them. There is no cost for the power that comes from them because nobody has to mine or refine sunshine. It "just works".
There are "blocks" that are interconnected by wires and each "block" has a standby generator that runs on fossil fuel (for now) to provide peak load power and backup for when the sun doesn't shine. Someday a new battery technology will come along that makes it feasible to store solar power for at night for the "blocks". This is, in fact, already being done in Alaska.
I can envision a system where high voltage overhead lines are no longer needed. Big central powerplants are no longer needed. Most of the infrastructure is there today to make it work - just needs to be broken down into smaller parts, and the overhead infrastructure replaced with underground eventually.
--
Chris
One guy envisioned Solar -> NIMH {or some other non-toxic battery technology} (short-term storage) -> Hydrogen production (long-term storage, fuel cell with closed-loop hydrogen) -> Hydrogen fuel cell
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