That's smart. Do they do it with roads also? That's a big one near me - developers buying hundred acre farms on unpainted 2 lane country roads and jamming in 2000 houses. Then inevitably the road becomes unusable until the city or county gets around to addressing it.

Always wondered why the county didn't require the road work, or money for it, up front.

What a smart idea! As a home owner I approve of this way to keep supply out of the market (or at least make it expensive enough to prop my price up). Can we invent any more charges?

The “affordable” housing thing seems like such a misdirection. I can’t help but daydream that some moneyed interest somewhere fans those flames, as it looks like a dead end that can absorb endless fervor.

You know what you do if you want an affordable car? You buy used. I think most people understand Ford is never going to build another a car that costs $10k brand new, and the last new car near that price barely sold because it was so stripped.

Your post is largely false, and quite confused.

Grid upgrade costs are frequently socialized onto existing customers, especially for larger upgrades. Your central premise that interconnect charges cover everything is false.

It varies by jurisdiction in the US.

It doesn't even match what's in the article.

> "concluded that expected power demand from data centers was _a_ primary reason for $23 billion in customer price increases "

Also, it's weird that he describes PJM as "the organization that monitors the PJM market" when they describe themselves as "a regional transmission organization (RTO) that coordinates the movement of wholesale electricity" [0]. So are they monitors of the market or are they the market themselves?

I don't know... maybe I'm being picky, but the article just seems off. The whole bit about how data centers could maybe game the system by using less power during peak times also doesn't make sense - that's when they also have the highest demand. Pointing to cryptominers just makes me think he doesn't get what they do, which is basically arbitrage. Of course they stop when power costs go up, it eats up all of their profits and they can simply start back up when the costs go down.

[0] https://www.pjm.com/about-pjm

I find it hilarious nobody ever mentions texas w/r/t this issue. They already required new Large Load Interconect Studies- and paying the cost of new grid infra. And, the hufe influx of study reqiests lead to new laws introducing batching.

I will note- the actual generation is left to market economics. I have much more faith in that working out equitably than regulating the grid. Even so, they've had significant consumer level grod connection fee increases- which I think reflects the end of various easy houshold effeciency gains (eg: incandecent -> CFL -> LED, P4 -> 14th gen, and HVAC. mainly lighting) and privatized profits more than anything.

That's great to hear that we have at least somewhat decent voltages. I thought America was still sort of piddling around with mostly 500kV and under power distribution.

It's not a huge power multiplier (P = VI, so linear), but in principle I do love the idea that if you are going to have these massive transmissions lines we ought use the conductor well, at good high voltages.

China has been doing 1MV and 1.1MV lines for a while now, which is so excellent to see. https://www.bbc.co.uk/future/article/20241113-will-chinas-ul... https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ultra-high-voltage_electricity...

Comments like this are even more tiring. Everyone knows that there are moneyed interests in politics. But decisions on these issues are made at a local level and so are the most addressable by local political actions.