Are feed in tariffs in widespread use? I am doubtful that US utilities would go for something like this unless forced to by government regulation. The entire business of long distance electricity trading only arose because firms could game the system.

When utilities were either municipally or locally owned the interconnects were solely for regional load balancing and backup capability. Now firms think nothing of building a plant where environmental restrictions are lax and shipping the electricity a thousand miles away.

Enron was only unique in that it got greedy and got caught. Selling electricity on the spot market has never made sense to me, so requiring a firm to buy at a fixed price for an extended period of time seems to go against current (US) trends. If there is a movement in the other direction I would like to hear about it.

Policies not Politics
---- Daily Landscape