The Number One Issue of Our Time
Steve Mitnick has authored four books on the economics, history, and people of the utilities industries. While in the consulting practice leadership of McKinsey & Co. and Marsh & McLennan, he advised utility leaders. He led a transmission development company and was a New York Governor’s chief energy advisor. Mitnick was an expert witness appearing before utility regulatory commissions of six states, D.C., FERC, and in Canada, and taught microeconomics, macroeconomics, and statistics at Georgetown University.
Look at it. Really take a look at it. At what's going on in our world. At this historic turning point.
You can see that the two are now competing in every arena. Two diametrically opposed philosophies on the electric grid's transformation to low, then very low, then asymptotic-to-zero emissions of climate change gases.
Each of the philosophies is seeking to win the day with their arguments in the forum of public opinion, government policy, company strategy, and regulation. One side is more insistent and demanding. The other is necessarily forced onto the defensive. But make no mistake. A battle — no matter the respectful niceties between the opposing sides — has been joined.
That more demanding side maintains that the grid's transformation to zero must be completed in about fifteen to twenty-five years from today. Not any longer than that. A mandated course of action naturally follows. The industry's investment in emitting infrastructure — including natural gas systems from upstream to downstream and to the customer-side too — needs to be slashed.