Portable, energy dense fuel is incredibly more valuable than grid electricity - especially back when most of it was burned, before modern battery technology. I

Portable, energy dense fuel is incredibly more valuable than grid electricity - especially back when most of it was burned, before modern battery technology. It is not obvious to me that the net thermodynamics are important here. The only thing that matters is the real world cost vs benefits. Carbon free energy is extremely cheap now, and getting rapidly cheaper, yet still not very portable.