In August, 2003, the lights and everything else went out in a big part of America. I work at home so it was no big deal for me. I don’t do much to begin with, so being in the dark really isn’t a problem. The Lovely Marianne closed our storefront office in town and came home. We sat in the yard with the neighbors that night and built a fire in the outdoor fireplace. We drank some wine and listened to the ballgame on the radio. The stars were gorgeous that night, and that’s something we don’t get to see too often here on the Isle of Long, where there are normally so many lights burning.
How we depend on our electricity.
During the days that followed I listened to the news and smiled as the officials on both sides of the border pointed fingers at each other and tried to figure out what had gone wrong and who was going to pay for it all. I remember the same finger-pointing after the last two blackouts. Everyone agreed that someone should do something, but nothing got done. And the bad guys must have loved this. In fact, I know they did. I heard on the news a couple of days later that some knucklehead from Al Qaida claimed responsibility for the whole thing, and that put voice to the nagging thought I had had since the power went off. You get like that when you live this close to Ground Zero. The lights go out, you think terrorist.
So now we hear that someone is going to have to do something about the electrical infrastructure in this country, but the big question is who is going to pay for it, and I think we both know the answer to that. We’re going to pay for it, just as we do everything else. So make a fire, drink some wine and suck it up. We’re going to be paying more for electricity in the years to come.
Thing is, though, whenever something like this comes along, there’s usually an opportunity standing right next to it. The technology that is bound to arrive with soaring electrical rates will open new worlds for a smart engineer, particularly in one very fascinating area.
For years, I’ve been reading about these little power plants that can produce electricity for a house, while giving the homeowner hot water for heating and domestic use as a byproduct (or vice versa). A few start-up companies have taken a run at this technology since the OPEC embargo of 1973, but they fell by the wayside, mainly because there hasn’t been much incentive for Americans to make their own electricity. Until now, that is.
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