I work at a former coal plant now gas plant. I will tell you the issue is real. In the last 10 years we have shutdown over half of our 500 coal plants in the US.

In the last two years we have been very close to rolling brownouts. I have never seen it this bad. We had nearly 30 condition orange situations last year. This year looks to be worse and they have no plan for next year. Couple that with the near state of disrepair of our units. We use to run these plants balls to the wall until outage season. To bring a unit down was the greatest sin. Now they come down all the time for failures and issues. Repair parts are sourced in weeks and months. Even the new units are not maintained with correct manpower or preventive maintenance. We have 1/4 the staff of 10 years ago, and not even less experience. Very few folks between 30 and 60.

I would not rely on the grid in the near future. With the carbon free push from the PUCs, and no solid storage solutions for wind and solar, it doesn't look good. Politicians don't care, they don't feel the pain of blackouts, and most energy companies hands are tied on new generation.

I would be very curious to hear the experiences from other folks in the energy field.