There's interesting issues to consider with respect to scale + locality in generation/storage.
My father-in-law's partner has a property in a rural area. Their property runs on 100% solar. The surrounding area has no local (large scale) power generation. During a recent storm the whole town was knocked off the grid. The property with solar kept working (after the storm, not during) while town was without power for days.
It's pretty rare to invest in small scale, local fossil fuel power generation. Small communities have to rely on the grid. But small scale renewable is feasible. There are cost benefits to larger systems, but those benefits need to be weighed up against the risk mitigation of having local systems.
The opposite side to that is that often the best places to run renewable generation is in remote areas and cities may be dependent on larger scale grids. (not that too many people want a fossil fuel plant operating in their city)
I expect that storage system (utility scale batteries) will shift the proposition again. Maybe your rural community doesn't its own generation, just the ability to store enough power to survive a grid failure for a few days.
It's pretty rare to invest in small scale, local fossil fuel power generation.
I think you're ignoring the diesel or natural gas fueled generators that are now installed at most supermarkets, many office buildings, and even apartment buildings and private homes. They are everywhere these days; even 10 years ago you didn't see them as much.
I think you misunderstand OP. You're confusion backup generation (what you mentioned) with full time petroleum generation. Small towns aren't running their own coal plants, and the only geographic region I'm aware of running petroleum generation is Hawaii, which is why their power is so expensive, and they're moving to solar and utility scale battery storage at breakneck speeds.
There's interesting issues to consider with respect to scale + locality in generation/storage.
My father-in-law's partner has a property in a rural area. Their property runs on 100% solar. The surrounding area has no local (large scale) power generation. During a recent storm the whole town was knocked off the grid. The property with solar kept working (after the storm, not during) while town was without power for days.
It's pretty rare to invest in small scale, local fossil fuel power generation. Small communities have to rely on the grid. But small scale renewable is feasible. There are cost benefits to larger systems, but those benefits need to be weighed up against the risk mitigation of having local systems.
The opposite side to that is that often the best places to run renewable generation is in remote areas and cities may be dependent on larger scale grids. (not that too many people want a fossil fuel plant operating in their city)
I expect that storage system (utility scale batteries) will shift the proposition again. Maybe your rural community doesn't its own generation, just the ability to store enough power to survive a grid failure for a few days.