Opinion | Speeding Up the Update of Our Electrical Grid

To the Editor:

Re “We Desperately Need a New Electrical Grid. Here’s How to Make It Happen” (editorial, May 7):

Kudos for recognizing that the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission is the agency best equipped to consider and approve proposals to build long-distance interstate electric transmission needed to deliver affordable but remote renewable energy to where it is needed. Otherwise, America will not be able to decarbonize our grid or our economy.

Fortunately, the proposed Streamlining Interstate Transmission of Electricity (SITE) Act would provide F.E.R.C. the authority it needs to help solve this problem.

Since enactment of the Federal Power Act in 1935, states have effectively had veto power over the siting of interstate electricity transmission, resulting in expensive delays of a decade or more for many crucial projects. Most never get built. No surprise, then, that over the last decade America and Canada combined have built just seven gigawatts of large-scale interregional transmission power lines, compared with 44 GW in Europe and 260 GW in China.

F.E.R.C. has decades of experience approving interstate natural gas pipelines. The outcome has been timely construction of a robust interstate gas pipeline system that has produced significant economic benefits for consumers and the nation, while helping gas displace most coal use, a process responsible for nearly three-fifths of U.S. carbon dioxide emissions reductions from 2005 to 2021. And recently, under pressure from the Biden administration, F.E.R.C. has been more responsive to the legitimate needs of states and other stakeholders when siting pipelines.

It’s time that Congress acts to deliver the affordable clean power Americans want and deserve.

Daniel Adamson
Paul Bledsoe
Mr. Adamson is a principal of Energy Reg Strategies and former director of the Office of Energy Projects at the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission. Mr. Bledsoe is a strategic adviser for the Progressive Policy Institute and served on the White House Climate Change Task Force under President Bill Clinton.

To the Editor:

This editorial argues that the U.S. power sector needs to be restructured to support the electrification of our economy. What we really need is a reality check as the administration pursues an unrealistic renewable energy transition timetable that threatens an already fragile grid.

Energy experts warn that fossil fuel power plants, mostly coal-fired, are closing faster than less dependable wind and solar plants and transmission lines can be built. Asked at a recent Senate Energy Committee hearing whether coal could be eliminated in the near future while maintaining grid reliability, all four commissioners from the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission answered no.

Meanwhile utilities have announced plans to retire more than 40 percent of the U.S. coal fleet before 2030, with the remainder at risk of premature retirements because of new Environmental Protection Agency regulations.

The government can spend billions incentivizing renewable energy projects — look at the Inflation Reduction Act — but it cannot buy time, and that is a commodity fast running out for reliable electricity.

Michelle Bloodworth
Arlington, Va.
The writer is president and C.E.O. of America’s Power, a national trade organization of the industries involved in producing electricity from coal.

To the Editor:

As the ranking member of the House committee that oversees energy development on our public lands and waters, I appreciate your editorial. Planning for electric transmission projects and cost allocation reforms are much needed.

However, I was troubled by the assertion that we must curb bedrock environmental laws, namely the National Environmental Policy Act, or NEPA, to spur renewable energy development.

Weakening NEPA and other fundamental protections isn’t just a guaranteed assault on communities already overburdened by pollution; it’s not even a real solution for accelerating permitting.

For one, around 99 percent of all projects are exempt from detailed environmental review under NEPA. When project delays do happen, the most common culprit is the permit applicants themselves — whether it’s because they failed to complete applications or paused the project on their own.

In fact, cutting NEPA’s public input processes can actually backfire, causing delays and cancellations.

If we want to speed up environmental reviews, strong early engagement and fully staffed permitting offices are the reforms we need. That’s why Democrats secured more than $1 billion for that very purpose in last year’s Inflation Reduction Act.

NEPA won’t derail reform. False solutions will.

Raúl M. Grijalva
Washington
The writer, an Arizona Democrat, is the ranking member of the House Committee on Natural Resources.

To the Editor:

The biggest problem in expanding the electric grid is that people will fight any new grid construction, conveniently forgetting that the electricity they get to keep them warm or cold, keep their food safe and light their homes comes through power lines that run through other people’s property and have an impact on those people.

It won’t matter who is making the decisions, whether it is F.E.R.C. or a local municipality or a state; people will hire lawyers to fight the project and it will be held up or abandoned.

Until Americans give up the NIMBY attitude, expanding the grid will be very difficult or impossible.

Charles Reichner
Revere, Pa.

Stories About Puberty, for Those Undergoing It

To the Editor:

As an adult, I must cop to reading The New York Times for Kids, a monthly print-only Sunday section that the editors say “should not be read by grown-ups.”

The Puberty Issue on April 30 brought tears to these ancient eyes. It’s thoughtful and exceptionally well written for its audience; I wish it had been available to me during my traumatic adolescence.

Grown-ups should take heart from this, reading it as a way to engage with their children finding their way through this most decisive period of their young lives.

Katherine Benjamin
Austin, Texas

To the Editor:

This was a wonderful issue! Written for kids: informative, language that was not insulting to them, with illustrations that did not need explanations.

I only wish this had been available to me as an 11- and 12-year-old girl! I am 72 now. These conversations were verboten then — whether at school or at home, no real information.

I clearly remember regularly climbing trees, after being warned by my mom and landlady not to. One day, I fell and hurt my side. Later that night, unknown to me, my period had started. I cried all night, thinking I had “damaged” my insides.

The next morning I had to tell my mom. She continued to wash dishes, never looked at me and gave me some kind of explanation as to “the bleeding.” I was relieved to find out I had not permanently damaged myself. But, unfortunately, the landlady had the tree cut down the next day!

Cathi Richard
Hilton Head, S.C.

A.I. Truth and Lies

To the Editor:

Re “When Chatbots ‘Hallucinate’” (Business, May 8):

Why are we surprised that artificial intelligence can make stuff up and deliver incorrect information convincingly? Many humans can do that. It is a facility enabled by intelligence, whether artificial or not.

How can we expect to hold computers to a higher standard of veracity than we hold ourselves? If we cannot enforce truthfulness from material posted on the internet or even from a president of the United States, how can we expect to enforce truthfulness from a computer that learns from such sources?

Orest Hurko
Lincoln, Mass.