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yes. there is not and should not be an "open market" for power. the sale of electricity from the power grid is highly regulated, and for good reason. deliver

yes. there is not and should not be an "open market" for power. the sale of electricity from the power grid is highly regulated, and for good reason. delivery to residential customers and essential services should always be prioritized over industrial bulk purchasers. bulk purchasers already have the opportunity to use power sources that are not connected to the grid, if they want to use grid power they should be prioritized according to their benefit to society, not their cash on hand.

Dylan16807 2y ago
Charge them more until it's worth it. And sure, tell them they get disconnected first when there's a shortage. But a hard block is worse than taking their money and using it for improvements.
- ars 2y ago
  How do you decide who "them" is, that should pay more? Usually you do the opposite: In exchange for a lower rate you will be the first disconnected in an emergency.
  - Dylan16807 2y ago
    Whoever you were going to refuse to sell power to for capacity reasons.
qeternity 2y ago
> they should be prioritized according to their benefit to society The fact that they have the capability to pay for and consume this power is the strongest signal that they are indeed providing value to society. The money comes from somewhere. If that turns out not to be the case, they have the strongest incentive to stop. But this sort of rationing at the hands of some regulatory body has historically proven to be a far more deadly cure than whatever the presumptive disease was.
- notatoad 2y ago
  right, hospitals and farmers should just massively raise their prices so they can better compete with crypto miners, that will make the world better... money is not a good indicator of value provided to society. there is a ton of ways where it falls apart, and there are a lot of people devoted to finding the ways they can collect the most money while providing the least benefit to society.
  - qeternity 2y ago
    > money is not a good indicator of value provided to society Ok, it's the least worst system we have...unless you have an alternative. I'm all ears.
    - brookst 2y ago
      Usually these things end up with “well obviously my personal priorities are objectively true…”
      - qeternity 2y ago
        Yes but the aggregate of every individual's personal priorities are by definition society's priorities...
        ok_dad 2y ago
        What do you get when 10% of Americans get to decide 67% of the priorities?
        paulryanrogers 2y ago
        Handmaid's Tale?
        doublepg23 2y ago
        Socialism?
ars 2y ago
And how do you plan to measure their benefit to society without using money as a signal?
kortilla 2y ago
>delivery to residential customers and essential services should always be prioritized over industrial bulk purchasers. This is not how the grid works in the US. Industrial is very frequently critical and gets higher priority over residential. Outages at major industrial operations can cost millions in lost revenue and can cause direct damage to hardware. The grid absolutely is a market and should be. Reliable power at fixed prices is a thing you can try to buy from it, but that’s by no means guaranteed.
- sangnoir 2y ago
  > The grid absolutely is a market and should be. ...but generally not a free market in most jurisdictions. The Texas grid is an ongoing experiment, and yet even the Texas legislature had to step in to bail out[1] providers' massive losses from with very high energy spot prices - it turns out the demand for energy is pretty inelastic at below-freezing temperatures. 1. Via a surcharge on all future customers. That's not very free market of them.
  - kortilla 2y ago
    What do you mean it’s not a free market? In the western grid I can absolutely contract for access to the grid without any kind of government intervention. So it’s definitely a free market in who can buy and the price is negotiated. In Texas it’s just a different pricing structure with instantaneous pricing. That’s not more or less free market.
    - sangnoir 2y ago
      > What do you mean it’s not a free market? The state government stepped in to socialize the losses incurred by private companies during the last snowstorm. Perhaps we can call it "Free markets with Texan characteristics"?
    - consteval 2y ago
      Like most US industries, it's a Free Market* * Except big players will never go under, and substantial losses are socialized

Dylan16807 2y ago

Charge them more until it's worth it. And sure, tell them they get disconnected first when there's a shortage. But a hard block is worse than taking their money and using it for improvements.

ars 2y ago
How do you decide who "them" is, that should pay more? Usually you do the opposite: In exchange for a lower rate you will be the first disconnected in an emergency.
- Dylan16807 2y ago
  Whoever you were going to refuse to sell power to for capacity reasons.

qeternity 2y ago

> they should be prioritized according to their benefit to society The fact that they have the capability to pay for and consume this power is the strongest signal that they are indeed providing value to society. The money comes from somewhere. If that turns out not to be the case, they have the strongest incentive to stop. But this sort of rationing at the hands of some regulatory body has historically proven to be a far more deadly cure than whatever the presumptive disease was.

notatoad 2y ago
right, hospitals and farmers should just massively raise their prices so they can better compete with crypto miners, that will make the world better... money is not a good indicator of value provided to society. there is a ton of ways where it falls apart, and there are a lot of people devoted to finding the ways they can collect the most money while providing the least benefit to society.
- qeternity 2y ago
  > money is not a good indicator of value provided to society Ok, it's the least worst system we have...unless you have an alternative. I'm all ears.
  - brookst 2y ago
    Usually these things end up with “well obviously my personal priorities are objectively true…”
    - qeternity 2y ago
      Yes but the aggregate of every individual's personal priorities are by definition society's priorities...
      - ok_dad 2y ago
        What do you get when 10% of Americans get to decide 67% of the priorities?
        paulryanrogers 2y ago
        Handmaid's Tale?
        doublepg23 2y ago
        Socialism?

ars 2y ago

And how do you plan to measure their benefit to society without using money as a signal?

kortilla 2y ago

>delivery to residential customers and essential services should always be prioritized over industrial bulk purchasers. This is not how the grid works in the US. Industrial is very frequently critical and gets higher priority over residential. Outages at major industrial operations can cost millions in lost revenue and can cause direct damage to hardware. The grid absolutely is a market and should be. Reliable power at fixed prices is a thing you can try to buy from it, but that’s by no means guaranteed.

sangnoir 2y ago
> The grid absolutely is a market and should be. ...but generally not a free market in most jurisdictions. The Texas grid is an ongoing experiment, and yet even the Texas legislature had to step in to bail out[1] providers' massive losses from with very high energy spot prices - it turns out the demand for energy is pretty inelastic at below-freezing temperatures. 1. Via a surcharge on all future customers. That's not very free market of them.
- kortilla 2y ago
  What do you mean it’s not a free market? In the western grid I can absolutely contract for access to the grid without any kind of government intervention. So it’s definitely a free market in who can buy and the price is negotiated. In Texas it’s just a different pricing structure with instantaneous pricing. That’s not more or less free market.
  - sangnoir 2y ago
    > What do you mean it’s not a free market? The state government stepped in to socialize the losses incurred by private companies during the last snowstorm. Perhaps we can call it "Free markets with Texan characteristics"?
  - consteval 2y ago
    Like most US industries, it's a Free Market* * Except big players will never go under, and substantial losses are socialized