There is simply not enough electricity to meet high winter demands. Right now, at current levels, and long before every home is using electric heat and every vehicle on the road needs to be plugged in.
Don’t take our word for it.
ISO New England, an independent Regional Transmission Organization serving the six New England states produced a presentation that said:
“Fuel supply issues may threaten ability to meet consumer demand if the region sees extended periods of extreme cold weather … If these risks materialize and threaten power system reliability, the ISO will turn to several operating procedures to manage the grid, up to and including controlled power outages.”1
Eversource Energy recently sent a letter to President Biden warning:
“ISO-New England, the region’s electricity grid operator, and the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission have acknowledged for many months that New England will not have sufficient natural gas to meet power supply needs for the region in the event of a severe cold spell this winter. This represents a serious public health and safety threat.”2
Groton Electric Light in Massachusetts warned its customers, saying:
"If there is an extended cold snap, there is a high probability of rolling blackouts. If we experience rolling blackouts, there will be times when the transmission lines to our substation will NOT be energized. That means there is nothing that [Groton Electric Light] will be able to do to provide electricity."3
It provides a solution for its customers though:
"Fill up your five-gallon fuel containers – they will be needed for generators if there are rolling blackouts."4
Every home that switches to electric heat increases the strain on the power grid. Every gallon of Bioheat® fuel used reduces it.
While legislators sit in their offices expounding on the need to force everyone to switch to electric heating, the companies that provide the electricity are telling them there’s not enough and international organizations are anticipating a 20-year timeline to upgrade the grid.
Renewable energy provides only about 12% of the power that runs electric generation power plants. Nuclear energy provides another 8%. Fossil gas, coal and other carbon-producing energy sources provide 80% of the power to generate electricity.5 “Zero-carbon electricity” is a pretty dream, but we are far from it.
U.S. power plants use more than 500 million tons of coal each year – 90% of all coal consumed in the country. That’s enough coal to fill more than 4.3 million train cars – a train that long would stretch more than 55,512 miles. That's long enough to zig-zag across the U.S. from New York to California more than 19 times!
Next time someone talks about “clean electric heat,” ask them about the 24 million tons of carbon emissions Northeast power plants create each year, and then let them know you would need to charge 2.6 trillion smartphones or drive 4.7 million cars to produce that much carbon.
Bioheat® fuel reduces carbon emissions as soon as you start to use it. You have heating choice – choose the real path to net-zero carbon with Bioheat® fuel.
