A host of experts and leaders in energy industries and policymakers discussed challenges and innovation at last week’s Advanced Energy Conference (AEC), a forum on energy needs and future outlooks on the energy landscape worldwide.
“The number one issue is that we need more modern generators. It's old. It's really costly,” said Scott Jennings, president and chief operating officer at the Public Service Enterprise Group (PSEG) of Long Island. Jennings estimates that Long Island generators are about 60 years old, and there is a limit to how long these generators can continue to operate efficiently. Old equipment means more maintenance and declining performance, which drives up costs and creates reliability issues.
The AEC, hosted by the Advanced Energy Research and Technology Center (AERTC) at Stony Brook University, was held in Manhattan’s Hilton Midtown. Discussions covered a wide range of topics on the industry's current state and future direction, including the need to power AI, but issues surrounding the affordability and the reliability of New York's current generators stood out.
During Jennings’ panel prior to the closing of the conference, he said, “Those units are so old; they are very inefficient …that is very impactful to the cost of generating power that flows directly through the customers…our delivery side of the bill has been flat, the power supply charge has been growing year over year, like, 7%.”
Replacing generators comes with hurdles; not only would it be costly, but there are also issues with compliance policies and filling the gap left by these older generators.
These challenges aren’t unique to the Long Island area. New York City has the oldest generators. Christopher Raup, vice president of Energy Policy and Regulatory Affairs at CON Edison, said: “New York City doesn't work without that level of reliability… this lack of new generation is starting to put us in a situation where we can't rely on, we can't in the future reliably deliver energy that our customers need.”
These topics are becoming more prominent in everyday life, with people feeling the costs. “The single biggest issue in last year's gubernatorial election was electric prices. It was entirely driven by the generation part of the bill, which we don't control,” Jennings said.
Renita Gobin is a reporter with The SBU Media Group, part of Stony Brook University’s School of Communication and Journalism’s Working Newsroom program for students and local media.