I don't understand why there are so many power grid issues in the USA. It's not that hard to generate power and make it go from A to B, yet for some reason (political? commercial? geological?) there seem to be decades of general issues in generating enough to meet demand. Does someone know what the actual issue is?
Famously the US had an extraordinary power grid for many decades. Among the most reliable of any nation. Blackouts used to be very rare in the US, now they're still rare but not nearly so.
Since the 1980s there has been a significant under-investment in the grid. Since the 1970s there has been a significant under-investment in production. The outcome to that is what you see now.
Good article on the rising blackout phenomenon from 2010:
Musk was commenting on this point in his YC interview yesterday. There can be no assumption that technology will always get better. If people aren't focussed on improving it then the current level of the technology will fall.
