I suggest going to the MSNBC site to view the rest of the article. I have only put part of it here. Lots of charts and information.

http://www.msnbc.com/news/427562.asp Pain goes beyond the gas pump Detroit got a taste of blackouts in mid-June when traffic lights, offices, elevators and even the city's elevated rail system lost power due to stressed-out transmission lines.

Officials monitoring the nation's power grid are warning of blackouts this summer, NBC's George Lewis explains in this Nightly News report from June 14 MSNBC June 30  As holiday travelers face sticker shock at gas pumps, the worlds most prosperous nation faces a humbling fact: It is no longer able to provide cheap, stable energy. Beyond the high price of gasoline, the United States faces a near future of power blackouts and higher heating costs come fall.

Suddenly energy policy has become an issue.  WILLIAM AMURGIS Energy.com content director ITS NOT the kind of crisis like the 1970s oil crunch, when OPEC drove prices up. Instead, its a more gradual, and perhaps longer-lasting, phenomenon. OPEC supply is still a factor, but other variables have emerged since the 70s, chief among them competition among power companies and the high-tech economys thirst for ever more juice. At the heart of the problem, and possibly the solution, is deregulation of utilities  an industry worth $220 billion a year.

The industry had been a regulated monopoly for 70 years, almost as long as electricity has been available. But in the last decade or so, theres been a move to let companies compete for customers. Maryland, for one, is deregulating its industry starting Saturday. But, in a sign of the hectic times for the nations power system, none of the 12 authorized companies is ready to compete, and plan to roll out new pricing plans later this year.

-- Martin Thompson (mthom1927@aol.com), June 30, 2000