The United States Has More Power Outages Than Any Other Industrialized NationâĶ And Itâs Getting Worse!
InvestNot only are power outages inconvenient, they can be life threatening:
- Dozens of people died in Louisiana in the aftermath of Hurricane Ida, which knocked out power just before a heat wave. Hundreds more were killed in Texas during a blackout triggered by a deep freeze.
Now, as the country faces record heat waves sending AC units into overdrive, extended drought conditions that reduce hydroelectric power generation, and rising energy costsâĶ grid operators are sounding the alarm:Â use less electricity, or risk having none at all.
But what if there was a way to power even the most energy hungry American homes â 24 hours a day, 7 days a week â without ever worrying about centralized grid failures?
Todayâs presentation is dedicated to the economic potential that comes from disrupting the $450 billion per year electricity industryâĶÂ
And potentially providing every American citizen with access to unlimited renewable energy, at net-zero cost!
Today, the US Power Grid also has more power outages than any other industrialized nationâĶÂ and itâs getting worse!
Going back three decades, the US grid loses power nearly 4x more often than it did in 1984, when record keeping began.
The primary reason for failure? Severe weather.
Weather used to account for about 17 to 21 percent of all root causes. In the last five years, it accounted for 68 to 73 percent of all major outages.
Itâs a problem that costs the U.S. economy an inflation-adjusted annual average of $18 billion to $33 billion.
The Largest Economic Shift in History
Thatâs why itâs no surprise to see the small-scale energy storage market skyrocket: from 13 MW/20MWh in 2017 to 235 MW/540MWh in 2020 (with more than 80% of all small-scale installed in California.)
Power capacity, represented in MW, measures the maximum amount of power a battery system can discharge in an instant. Energy capacity, represented in MWh, measures the amount of energy a battery system can store. Image: Office of Industries of the U.S. International Trade Commission (USITC) â Residential Energy Storage: U.S. Manufacturing and Imports Grow Amid Rising Demand, July 2021
The increase in installations was primarily driven by rising demand for backup power in response to power outages and changes to utility net metering and rate structures.