Key Takeaways
Despite having no natural gas reserves of its own, Florida has low residential electricity prices, 15% below the national average.
The state’s electricity is primarily generated from natural gas (75%).
Pennsylvanians paid 27% more, New Yorkers 76%, Californians 137% more in June and even Texans pay more than Florida in part because of their increasing reliance on wind and solar power.
Florida has not embarked on the usual climate change policies such as forcing renewable energy, battery backup and closure of conventional power plants prematurely as some other states have.
Lavish subsidies from the Biden-Harris administration are becoming attractive to some Florida companies looking to profit from the Administration’s fixation upon climate mitigation.
Florida ranks 37th among the states with residential electricity prices averaging 13.89 cents per kilowatt hour in June, 15 percent lower than the national average of 16.41 cents per kilowatt hour. Florida has not instituted climate mitigation policies. It relies on natural gas for 75 percent of its electricity, more than any other large state. Florida has no natural gas reserves, while 4 of the 5 other largest states—California, New York, Pennsylvania, and Texas—all have significant natural-gas reserves, particularly Texas and Pennsylvania. Compared with Florida, residential electricity in June was 27 percent more expensive in Pennsylvania, 76 percent more expensive in New York and 137 percent more expensive in California. Pro-energy Texas had 4 percent more expensive electricity than Florida in June, partly because of its large renewable energy sector, which makes its grid costly and difficult to operate reliably.
Because Florida has avoided the climate policies of other states, it is better positioned to weather the energy-scarcity and reliability crisis now confronting America’s electricity grid. Eight of the 10 most costly states, which are all “blue states,” have enacted renewable portfolio standards, “net zero” carbon-emission mandates, and regional cap-and-trade policies. New York, for example, has refused to develop shale gas resources that have enriched Pennsylvania and it has blocked construction of new natural-gas pipelines, depriving New Yorkers and surrounding states of affordable and reliable electricity.
Electricity demand is soaring across the country, driven by Biden-Harris electric vehicle and appliance regulations and standards and artificial-intelligence data centers. Federal policies, however, are constraining the electricity system’s ability to meet the new demand as grid operators have warned. The Biden-Harris administration rolled back Trump-era reforms to the federal permitting process that benefited renewable as well as fossil fuels. Because massive subsidies from the Democrat-passed Inflation Reduction Act are funding solar and wind projects, nuclear, coal and gas plants needed for base-load generation cannot fully recoup their costs as they are dispatched after renewable technologies.
Further, the Biden-Harris power plant rule would require fossil fuel power plants to adopt very expensive carbon-capture technologies that are unproven at scale. The Biden-Harris EPA expects the new rule to force most coal-fired power plants to close and only allows new natural gas plants with the carbon-capture technology. The EPA has promised to follow up with another rule after the election that could shut down many existing natural gas plants. Between retiring coal plants responsible for 15 percent of U.S. generation capacity and soaring demand projections expected, the United States is facing an electrical capacity shortfall.
While Democrats think solar and wind power can handle the grid’s needs, only a fraction of the proposed solar and wind plants can be built in time and integrated with the grid to avert a capacity shortfall crisis. And the Biden-Harris administration has a “net zero” carbon-emission goal for the utility sector by 2035, which means by that time all coal and gas plants need to be replaced by renewable energy or nuclear power. Wind and solar output fall far short of their capacity ratings, producing at just a quarter to half of rated capacity because they do not generate power continuously. States that currently have high renewable technologies and low electricity prices are geographic anomalies as Washington state, for example, has abundant hydropower, and the Upper Midwest has constant wind and abundant land for turbines. But even those turbines will need to be backed up by expensive batteries once the net-zero policy becomes more than a goal.
Note that, in less than a week, Florida restored electricity to 99 percent of those who lost power in Hurricane Helene, and it is helping neighboring states with disaster recovery, but needs those resources back as Hurricane Milton barreled through the state. While Florida may avoid blackouts and rationing that could plague other states, it is not immune to rising prices or foolish policies forced on American companies by the Biden-Harris administration. Inflation Reduction Act subsidies are becoming popular with Florida companies, and NextEra, which owns Florida Power & Light, has announced plans to cut 52 percent of the utility’s carbon emissions by 2030 and 83 percent by 2040.
Conclusion
Florida generates 75 percent of its electricity with clean natural gas and is able to keep its residential electricity prices below the national average. Large blue states that have implemented carbon mitigation policies have electricity prices 20 to 140 percent higher than those of Florida. Those prices will increase further as new capacity needs to be built to support increasing demand from AI data centers and electrification programs mandated by the Biden-Harris administration and as EPA regulations shutter coal plants to reach the Biden-Harris goal of net-zero carbon emissions by 2035. These programs are likely to be continued if Kamala Harris is elected, which will result in increasing inflation as energy prices spiral out of hand.
