Construction of nuclear power plants is held up by deregulation.

California hounded the power companies to absorb excess losses related to Nuclear protesting and powerline siting NIMBY rather than allowing them to pass them on to the consumer during deregulation.

The power companies shrewdly saw this as an opportunity to create a virtual monopoly.

Nobody builds everybody profits.

Each state government saw the magic elixir, deregulation. Consumer’s loved it. Competition. Break up the monopoly. Look how cheap POTS got after the breakup of ATT in 1980ish.

Telephones are cheaper and faster to build than nuclear reactors so deregulation worked.

The utilities watched how deregulation worked in CA, made models and gamed their strategies to win. Merger mania ensued.

Supply was reduced by other means. EPA wants new scrubbers on the old coal plant? Shut them down.

The spot price of power would go up. Load dispatchers would be selling each other power in a private market and the companies were allowed to pass some of the cost to the consumer.

Eventually, it got to the point where one hot summer day some guy in Indiana sold some power to some guy in New Jersey. The load dispatcher told the supplier that the load was too big. Seller put it on anyway.

More current in lines=>
more isquarer losses turn to heat=>
wires stretch=>
resistance increases=>
more heat=>
wires get close enough to ground/tree=>
bus fault=>
reroute=>
cascading failure.

Two kinds of power are put on the grid. Real and Apparent. Real power is the kind you sell. Apparent is the kind you use to push power from seller to buyer. This is subjective to the weakest link and is why it is managed by humans.

All of a sudden the government was all to helpful. New power plants are being constructed with the NRC helping the process along.

Some power companies taking advantage of the opportunity to expand generation. Others are enjoying their virtual monopoly status.