The reason I think it has worked reasonably well is that there has been no need to invest in new capacity since the deregulation (in 1996) as demand growth has been slow and there were some overcapacity. And now when there is a need to invest the power companies will just uprate the nuclear power plants (by a whopping 1500 MW!), so there has luckily been no opportunity to build natural gas plants.
What people are complaining about is that Eon (owned by German interests), Fortum (owned by the Finnish state), Statkraft (owned by the Norwegian state) and Vattenfall (owned by the Swedish state) dominates the market entirely and use their market power to raise prices. This might be true. And since the vast profits of the state owned energy companies goes straight into the state budgets, they work like an indirect tax on electricity. Which means the states are not interested in doing anything about it all.
What the foolish economists are saying is that we should split the companies to increase competition. Thee result will only be that our national champions will be bought by foreign national champions and the oligopoly will continue.
Re-regulation is, imho, the only solution. Peak oil is not an energy crisis. It is a liquid fuel crisis.
So the situation is like that of the German deregulation, apparently (except for no semi-monopolist fight against upsurging regeneratives).
Re-regulation is, imho, the only solution.
Agreed for the current macroproducers, though I'd also like major reform in the form of feed-in laws - that would create small local competitors. *Lunatic*, n. One whose delusions are out of fashion.
The reason I think it has worked reasonably well is that there has been no need to invest in new capacity
Privatised infrastructure does not work when regulations are lax. Regulations must make sure there are enough investments. Our old power regulations demanded power companies invested a certain amount in new capacity and backup capacity etc (or really that they could guarantee there was only like one power shortage in five years or something like that, but in effect it means having to invest in capacity). Peak oil is not an energy crisis. It is a liquid fuel crisis.
