Natural monopolies are not inherently bad inof themselves, so long as adequate precautions are taken.
The national energy grid is a good example of both things working well and things working poorly. It only makes sense to provide most customers with one electrical service. As long as the billing adequately reflects the cost of the delivered energy and the upkeep of the delivery system, and as long as there is a uniform set of standards to which that system is to be run, it's good.
The lack of competing grids is itself the result of regulation. That makes it inherently excluded from being "natural", due to government control over the supply of market competition.
You can support this, you can oppose this, it ultimately doesn't really matter where you stand on it. But it's not a natural monopoly.
The lack of competing grids is itself the result of regulation.
No, it's a consequence of physics.
Do you know what happens when two alternating current systems which are not in phase exist in close proximity to one another?
They fight. Literally. The phase angle between the two power signals resists each other. They don't even have to be physically attached, simply running two out of phase ac systems close to each other will cause some induced load from the opposed phases because wires are not perfect conductors.
If they connect, well...
Whichever system has more inertia will win (assuming the contact point survives for more than a few milliseconds). The other system's phase angle will be physically (violently) dragged up or down to the phase angle of the system that has more spinning mass. In effect, the generators which are out of phase will cease to be generators and momentarily become electric motors. This has profoundly bad consequences for both systems. In extreme cases it can cause turbine blades to fucking snap. Although realistically all it will do is cause a whole lot of breakers and safety relays to operate and cause a blackout.
Because they cannot coexist out of phase. As long as the phase angle isn't in sync, they aren't "powering" things, they're fighting each other.
This is why the proposed junction between the three grids (Tres Amigas Superstation) is designed around these giant fucking 20 mile long superconductive HVDC cables. Because to even think about having the grids coexist with each other, you first have to strip out phase angle entirely and convert the energy to DC.
How would "competing electrical grids" work? You'd run a new set of lines for each company to their own power plant? Every house would need to replace their end run if they switched power companies? Would everyone need their own set of poles, or would someone have a monopoly on that infrastructure?
Each power (or power distribution) company runs its own set of lines. States or cities could regulate right-of-way for utility paths the same way they manage traffic rules. Linking to your other comment, Japan has competing rail systems that mostly serve complementary routes but sometimes share space at stations. (though the government subsidizes JR and they are an oligopoly on the national scale)
Large thoroughfares could be duplicated in places where space is not at a premium. The issue comes as it gets closer to your house. It's not reasonable to have more than one set of power poles approaching your house. And trust me you only want to have to to that last-mile maintenance once after a storm.
I agree, and this is probably the furthest Left position I support.
Infrastructure monopolies are kinda the point of the government. You can't have competing electrical grids any more than you could have competing road/rail systems, competing electromagnetic spectrum, competing gas/water delivery etc. These things take up serious physical space and pretty much need to be universally accessible to be useful, so you regulate them via government.
What you can have is competing producers, ie private power plants or ISPs delivering service using government infrastructure, private shipping and transport using government roads
The problem that tends to arise is the government reaches too far, say with health care and education, and tries to regulate themselves a totally unnecessary monopoly.
Natural monopolies are not inherently bad inof themselves, so long as adequate precautions are taken.
The national energy grid is a good example of both things working well and things working poorly. It only makes sense to provide most customers with one electrical service. As long as the billing adequately reflects the cost of the delivered energy and the upkeep of the delivery system, and as long as there is a uniform set of standards to which that system is to be run, it's good.
The lack of competing grids is itself the result of regulation. That makes it inherently excluded from being "natural", due to government control over the supply of market competition.
You can support this, you can oppose this, it ultimately doesn't really matter where you stand on it. But it's not a natural monopoly.
No, it's a consequence of physics.
Do you know what happens when two alternating current systems which are not in phase exist in close proximity to one another?
They fight. Literally. The phase angle between the two power signals resists each other. They don't even have to be physically attached, simply running two out of phase ac systems close to each other will cause some induced load from the opposed phases because wires are not perfect conductors.
If they connect, well...
Whichever system has more inertia will win (assuming the contact point survives for more than a few milliseconds). The other system's phase angle will be physically (violently) dragged up or down to the phase angle of the system that has more spinning mass. In effect, the generators which are out of phase will cease to be generators and momentarily become electric motors. This has profoundly bad consequences for both systems. In extreme cases it can cause turbine blades to fucking snap. Although realistically all it will do is cause a whole lot of breakers and safety relays to operate and cause a blackout.
Because they cannot coexist out of phase. As long as the phase angle isn't in sync, they aren't "powering" things, they're fighting each other.
This is why the proposed junction between the three grids (Tres Amigas Superstation) is designed around these giant fucking 20 mile long superconductive HVDC cables. Because to even think about having the grids coexist with each other, you first have to strip out phase angle entirely and convert the energy to DC.
How would "competing electrical grids" work? You'd run a new set of lines for each company to their own power plant? Every house would need to replace their end run if they switched power companies? Would everyone need their own set of poles, or would someone have a monopoly on that infrastructure?
Each power (or power distribution) company runs its own set of lines. States or cities could regulate right-of-way for utility paths the same way they manage traffic rules. Linking to your other comment, Japan has competing rail systems that mostly serve complementary routes but sometimes share space at stations. (though the government subsidizes JR and they are an oligopoly on the national scale)
Large thoroughfares could be duplicated in places where space is not at a premium. The issue comes as it gets closer to your house. It's not reasonable to have more than one set of power poles approaching your house. And trust me you only want to have to to that last-mile maintenance once after a storm.
I agree, and this is probably the furthest Left position I support.
Infrastructure monopolies are kinda the point of the government. You can't have competing electrical grids any more than you could have competing road/rail systems, competing electromagnetic spectrum, competing gas/water delivery etc. These things take up serious physical space and pretty much need to be universally accessible to be useful, so you regulate them via government.
What you can have is competing producers, ie private power plants or ISPs delivering service using government infrastructure, private shipping and transport using government roads
The problem that tends to arise is the government reaches too far, say with health care and education, and tries to regulate themselves a totally unnecessary monopoly.