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jakemcdermott.bsky.social
Western Electricity Markets guy | he/him | views/opinions are only mine, not my employer’s | Bay State to Bay Area
123 posts 383 followers 435 following
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Posts 16 Comments 34

Congrats to California state senator and climate hawk Josh Becker -- SB 540, Western grid regionalization, cleared the state senate on a 33-1 vote.

submitted 11 days ago • 1 comment

This is exactly how I want to slide into the weekend.

submitted 16 days ago • 0 comments

Lots of great work happening to unlock interconnection queues for new generators and get loads online faster - but I wish we’d coalesce a bit more on differentiating interconnecting generating from energizing loads. Different problems with some similarities but will req dif processes to solve

submitted 17 days ago • 0 comments

👏🏻 light 👏🏻 the 👏🏻 beam

submitted 39 days ago • 0 comments

I like to imagine the cardinals around a table with a conversation going like this: “Yeah yeah, but like, do they shit in the woods?”

submitted 39 days ago • 0 comments

🚨 New research alert 🚨 How important is regional power sector coordination for achieving affordable, reliable, and clean power in the Western U.S.? Our new Power Transformation Lab study in @NatureComms dives deep: doi.org/10.1038/s414... 🧵Thread on key findings👇

submitted 41 days ago • 1 comment

👀Okay, I'm going to shout into the void here, but this is remarkable. Data centers are driving up energy costs in VA in a spectacular way. Since the start of 2025, nearly 12% of *ALL* wholesale power costs in VA are attributable to congestion charges from data center demand in Northern VA.

submitted 53 days ago • 1 comment

Commentary: SB 540 is also critical to enabling California’s participation in that market, and ensures our state has a leadership role since other competing market concepts are less likely to share the commitment to our clean energy goals. buff.ly/uHXB7iy 📝 Michael Wara

submitted 54 days ago • 1 comment

Talking about tariffs* was always complicated with non-energy folks, but these tariffs make using the word tariffs** even more difficult. *utility rate schedules **also, utility rate schedules

submitted 66 days ago • 1 comment

Ironically enough, abundance is quite consciously anti-neoliberal in that it seeks to correct the failures of the neoliberal consensus (gutting state capacity and putting the individual "freedoms" ahead of collective goals on everything from trade to housing to energy to the environment).

submitted 83 days ago • 1 comment

Starting to re-read @paulsabin.bsky.social’s Crude Politics - a favorite of mine from undergrad. The “markets aren’t real but are deliberate choices made by government and public finance” genre is one I find endlessly readable. This is up there with @naomioreskes.bsky.social ‘s “the big myth”

submitted 96 days ago • 0 comments

Even better branding: “It’s like a sonos speaker system, but for resiliency.” They’d sell like brownies at a bake sale.

submitted 97 days ago • 0 comments

This draft policy decision on M+ is quite the read lemme tell ya

submitted 101 days ago • 0 comments

In response to lots of comments on here: If you're taking consumer action against certain newspapers: 1. Consider whether you support the owners in other, more substantial ways. Cancelling your WaPo subscription but use Amazon/have Prime? You've got your order of operations wrong!

submitted 104 days ago • 1 comment

Come work with us at the CEC! We're hiring for a bunch of new roles, including this awesome opportunity to manage a very impactful team. This would be a great civil service opportunity for any federal folks looking to make a change too: www.linkedin.com/jobs/view/41...

submitted 110 days ago • 0 comments

EXCLUSIVE: A federal worker at the EPA sent an incredible email to Administrator Lee Zeldin. He's refused to stay silent, and has asked me to share the email - and his name - with the public. My latest: www.muellershewrote.com/p/exclusive-...

submitted 115 days ago • 1101 comments