California's electrical grid operator (CAISO) declared a stage 3 emergency last Friday, initiating a series of rolling blackouts across the state. Stage 3 emergencies are not trivial events; the last stage 3 emergency was in 2001 during the California energy crisis, which forced a halt to the state's deregulation process and initiated 15 years of litigation and regulatory proceedings.

In late 2018 we published a piece examining potential changes in the hundred-year-old business model of electric utilities. We argued that while new energy technologies posed challenges to the legacy business, the long-term outlook for the industry was strong given trends in electrification.