David DeRosa is president of DeRosa Research and Trading and manages an investment fund. He is also an adjunct professor at Yale School of Management. The opinions expressed are his own. The truth is that decades of market interference in California are to blame. Generation is where power is created.
Transmission refers to the movement of wholesale, high-voltage electricity through a power grid.
Distribution is the slicing of high-voltage power into lower voltages and delivery to residential and commercial users. The California Independent System Operator, a public agency, has responsibility for managing three quarters of the transmission system in that state. California's problems are with generation and transmission. What has exacerbated the situation is the phenomenal growth in power use by the state's computer-related industries. For decades, the state has allowed citizens groups, environmentalists, state regulators and other self-appointed stakeholders in the power market to effectively prevent the construction of new generation plants.