Power grid layout prevents most utilities from helping

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Power grid layout prevents most utilities from helping

By Akweli Parker INQUIRER STAFF WRITER Hamstrung by geography and the layout of the U.S. power grid, there is little that East Coast or Midwest utilities can do to ease the kilowatt carnage in California, utility officials said yesterday.

For one thing, electrical resistance on transmission lines greatly reduces power as it is sent over long distances.

Also, the lines are owned by different utilities, and each charges other companies a fee, much like a highway toll, to use its facilities.

And getting power from the middle of the country over the Rocky Mountains is difficult because of the limited interconnections over the range. Thus, the main transmission arteries on the West Coast run north-south.

"That's why you notice California is buying most of its power from the Northwest," said Bill Jones, a spokesman for the Exelon Generation subsidiary of Exelon Corp., parent of Peco Energy Co.

Attempts have been made to build more transmission capacity between the West Coast and the rest of the country, but " 'not-in-my-backyard' " protests have blocked such projects, Jones said.

In addition, some would-be competitors regard California's deregulated wholesale market as overly complex and burdensome.

"That's why we're not out there," said Thomas E. Capps, chief executive officer of Dominion, a natural gas and electric utility based in Richmond, Va.

Capps cautioned against indicting deregulation because of the failed California experiment. "Pennsylvania did a good job" with deregulation, he said. "You can't say that deregulation doesn't work."

http://inq.philly.com/content/inquirer/2001/01/19/national/POWERSIDE19.htm?template=aprint.htm

-- Martin Thompson (mthom1927@aol.com), January 21, 2001


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