The term “energy abundance” has an apple-pie quality. Who could be against it? Who doesn’t want unlimited, cheap energy?
Yet many energy insiders I interview hesitate when I bring up the bestselling book by Ezra Klein and Derek Thompson, “Abundance,” which launched a reevaluation of US policies around permitting and building energy projects.
Yes, they favor making it easier to install necessary power projects and infrastructure, but they parse the term “abundance,” recast the argument, and seem generally uncomfortable with the movements bold build-build-build prescriptions.
The problem? The electric grid is complex, and a simple build-more slogan misses how it actually works.
More than that, some advocates of abundance misunderstand distributed energy.
In his eagerness to champion large-scale energy development, Yglesias sweeps aside distributed energy, mocking “solarheads” and “rinky-dink small-scale solar installations.”
A good example comes from a recent Substack essay, “The Case for Clean Energy Abundance,” by Matthew Yglesias, a Vox founder and an influential voice in the abundance movement. Yglesias has done valuable work highlighting the permitting and policy barriers that slow energy development. But when he turns his attention to distributed energy, the abundance argument begins to lose its footing.
In his eagerness to champion large-scale energy development, Yglesias sweeps aside distributed energy, mocking “solarheads” and “rinky-dink small-scale solar installations.”
He criticizes virtual power plants for not actually generating power. (Isn’t that why the word virtual is there?) He skirts the idea that a negawatt and a megawatt look the same to the grid.
He wants us “to create so much electricity that nobody’s bothering to conserve electricity.” Sounds nice. But it overlooks the fact that there is always a two-sided ledger.
All electricity uses some limited resource, whether it’s coal or silicon. And getting that resource generally requires digging up, blowing up, processing or undertaking some action that causes harm and cost money. There is always some loss in order to gain a megawatt and it’s hard to see a future where that will change. Energy planning requires minimizing the fallout and maximizing the gain.
And referring to local energy as “rinky dink” misses the two-fer value offered by customer-sited devices like solar panels. batteries, EVs and adjustable thermostats. Consumers buy them, like them, and benefit from them personally. And at the same time, those devices can serve the grid. Gasoline only moves a car. Electricity moves a car, and when the car isn’t moving, moves electrons on the grid.
We don’t need just more electricity. We need it at the right time and place
Perhaps the biggest flaw in the build-build-build mantra is the assumption that today’s energy challenges are simply a matter of producing more electricity. In reality, the challenge is delivering power where and when it is needed most.
Modern software allows grid operators to manage electricity not just geographically, but temporally, matching supply and demand minute by minute. Distributed energy resources can be deployed precisely where constraints occur and activated when demand peaks. Shipping wind power hundreds of miles into New York City on a sweltering summer afternoon can be like using a fire hose to fill a test tube. In many cases, tapping a virtual power plant, battery fleet, or onsite energy system is the more efficient solution.
The bigger issue: the utility
Another thing to think about when it comes to build-build-build that abundance advocates seem to neglect. Who’s building it, and how will it affect consumers’ pocketbooks?
Utility monopolies build the electric transmission and distribution systems in the US, and depending on the state, the power generation. I recently had a fascinating conversation about this with Michael Lee, former CEO of Octopus Energy US.
Utilities understandably revel in the need for more infrastructure because that’s how regulators allow them to make a profit for their shareholders.
“Utilities don’t make money broadly on selling electricity. What they make money on is building more infrastructure, and the more infrastructure they build, the more money they make. It’s just that simple,” Lee explains, in a podcast to be released June 3, 2026. “Their OpEx is passed through at cost to their customers. “
This is a unique model — most businesses do not have the luxury of sparing shareholders from operational expenses.
Even more egregious is the fact that all of this firehouse-like building is done to serve the grid only about two percent of the time, during periods of peak demand.
“So that means the marginal utilization rate of this CapEx is actually very low. It is extremely low. And so no wonder we’re in this inflationary spiral when we’re building all of this CapEx to be used for a very infrequent amount of time,” Lee adds.
We could solve a big chunk of this problem, he says, with demand flexibility and by paying customers to make their batteries and electric vehicles available to the grid during peak periods.
The problem is that it requires extensive software coordination, and it’s not something conventional utilities do well. Just dismantling utility monopolies isn’t a good solution either because it could hurt many people, from dividend-dependent retirees to low-income customers left to foot the infrastructure bill while wealthier customers generate their own power.
In the podcast Lee offers intriguing ideas for changing the utility model so that both they and their customers benefit.
Abundance for this era
The bottom line is that abundance should not be measured only in megawatts built. It should be measured in how effectively we use those megawatts once they’re on the system.
That’s where distributed energy changes the equation.
A rooftop solar panel, battery, EV or smart thermostat may look small in isolation. But networked together through software, millions of these devices become something much larger: a flexible, responsive energy system that delivers power where and when it is needed most.
That’s an energy system of the digital age. That’s abundance.
For more on abundance and distributed. energy, I’d also suggest listening to these two abundance-related discussions.
- Energy Abundance From the Bottom Up with Kay Aikin, Lorenzo Kristov and Mark Paterson
- An Energy Economist on the Abundance Agenda with Mariko Geronimo Aydin
Last, the Earthshot Foundation has been exploring the abundance agenda with a myriad of energy industry thought leaders and will be holding an event culminating its discussions, The GRIDIRON Finale, Jun 8, 2026, in Washington, DC.
