Comment by jltsiren
15 hours ago
Electricity prices go up when you have access to customers who are willing to pay more. If grid connections to other regions are limited, people in regions with a lot of cheap generation (such as Norway) pay low prices. But if you add grid connections without increasing generation capacity, prices start equalizing between regions, as every power company tries to sell to the highest bidder.
Norway could power itself fully with domestic hydro. But it chose not to, as the power companies make more money by importing foreign power when it's cheap and exporting hydro when it's not.
Washington state has the same problem to a lesser degree. California pays more for cheap Washington hydro, which causes the costs to go up for us, although I guess not as drastic as Norway since our electricity is still considered cheap.
Norway still have cheap electricity in the grand scheme. It is just more expensive than it used to be.
> "Norway could power itself fully with domestic hydro." We have events where the we cannot get enough load from domestic production. Typically in winter when water freezes.