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Fred Stafford

@fredstaffordcs.bsky.social
1.4K followers 203 following 164 posts

STEM professional, socialist, @jacobin, @catalyst_theory, @thenation, @TheBTI contributor. @damagemag editor. Interested in decarb, tech, power sector, labor. Substack: www.publicpowerreview.org Email: fred@publicpowerreview.org

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Fred Stafford @fredstaffordcs.bsky.social · 21/07/2026
How can you be left advocate of public power, w/ major emphasis on carbon emissions, and stay totally silent about nuclear power? A major source of clean energy that our largest public power utilities are developing, incl. interest from coops. Is it pressure from funders or what?
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Fred Stafford @fredstaffordcs.bsky.social · 02/06/2026
In 2023 the developers of 86 wind & solar projects in New York warned their projects were endangered by supply chain problems cutting into profitability. Each had won subsidies in annual state auction 2016 to 2021. What happened? Ratepayers covered for many. www.publicpowerreview.org/p/when-new-y...
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Fred Stafford @fredstaffordcs.bsky.social · 08/03/2026
NEW: I digitized a decade's worth (1929-1940) of the Chattanooga newspaper LABOR WORLD, a weekly paper by the local AFL, in order to unearth some New Deal public power history. And I used Claude Code to help me do it. Here's the process details for others to learn from. Links 👇
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Madalsa @madalsa.org · 31/01/2026
Massachusetts's Electric Power Division is hiring for an energy analyst. Ratemaking + electrification + reliability. Super cool job! www.mass.gov/alerts/the-e...
mass.gov
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Fred Stafford @fredstaffordcs.bsky.social · 22/01/2026
Request for public power historians, esp in TVA area: Can anyone recommend any articles, dissertations, etc that shines light on the Public Power League of Chattanooga that formed in the 1930s? Please RT to signal boost. 🙏
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Fred Stafford @fredstaffordcs.bsky.social · 18/01/2026
See my debunking of many arguments Romm makes in his new paper against new nuclear in New York, a paper full of misrepresentative citations to research literature and a glaring, shameful misfire on one major argument. Of course Green NGO ppl eat it up tho. www.publicpowerreview.org/p/debunking-...
publicpowerreview.org
Debunking the Latest Antinuclear Claims From New York's Environmental Left
New York environmental left groups like Public Power NY and Third Act are touting a new paper that calls New York's plans for new nuclear plants an "anti-affordability fiasco." Here's my rebuttal.
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Yakov Feygin @buddyyakov.bsky.social · 19/01/2026
It’s small in get grand scheme but I worry the data center back lash will turn into a broader one against any investment into the electrical grid unless there are major changes in how we fund the system and compensate IOUs.
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Fred Stafford @fredstaffordcs.bsky.social · 18/01/2026
See my debunking of many arguments Romm makes in his new paper against new nuclear in New York, a paper full of misrepresentative citations to research literature and a glaring, shameful misfire on one major argument. Of course Green NGO ppl eat it up tho. www.publicpowerreview.org/p/debunking-...
publicpowerreview.org
Debunking the Latest Antinuclear Claims From New York's Environmental Left
New York environmental left groups like Public Power NY and Third Act are touting a new paper that calls New York's plans for new nuclear plants an "anti-affordability fiasco." Here's my rebuttal.
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Matt Huber @matthuber.bsky.social · 07/01/2026
It was really fun to go on Vivek Chibber's "Confronting Capitalism" podcast to talk about socialism and abundance. Listen up! podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/a...
podcasts.apple.com
Abundance Needs Socialism
Podcast Episode · Confronting Capitalism with Vivek Chibber · 01/07/2026 · 46m
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Fred Stafford @fredstaffordcs.bsky.social · 22/12/2025
The climate left when conservatives trot out an academic who argues anthropogenic climate change isn't happening: "he's an outlier whose work is highly disputed!" When they trot out this guy to argue gas worse than coal: "it's science and you're a fossil fuels shill to disagree"
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Matt Huber @matthuber.bsky.social · 17/12/2025
Decided to post something on substack for the 1st time (partially b/c of dissatisfaction with this place & the other place, it must be said). My first post is a response to @simonpirani.bsky.social's critiques of my work with @fredstaffordcs.bsky.social on electricity politics (link in next post).
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Fred Stafford @fredstaffordcs.bsky.social · 15/12/2025
Now online today, a feature from our latest print issue: Bob Leighninger, author of my fav New Deal infrastructure book, on the administrative and political importance of bureaucratic efficiency in the era of public works. Subscribe to read! $20 digital, $40 btfl print. damagemag.com/2025/12/15/h...
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Yakov Feygin @buddyyakov.bsky.social · 12/12/2025
I’ll just add the NYPA lost fewer of their projects to tax credit cuts than most developers which should say something.
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Fred Stafford @fredstaffordcs.bsky.social · 03/12/2025
My case for Kathy Hochul as the champion of public power today: www.publicpowerreview.org/p/new-york-g...
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Fred Stafford @fredstaffordcs.bsky.social · 03/12/2025
My case for Kathy Hochul as the champion of public power today: www.publicpowerreview.org/p/new-york-g...
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Fred Stafford @fredstaffordcs.bsky.social · 03/12/2025
This guy is incredibly disingenuous
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Fred Stafford @fredstaffordcs.bsky.social · 15/11/2025
In which I got two Cuomo-endorsing industrial unions to praise Zohran Mamdani on something he said about the state's energy needs, and it's exactly what Governor and NYPA want too. Unfortunately it's also the thing the environmental left he's been close to refuses to budge on!👇
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Heatmap News @heatmap.news · 04/11/2025
It's election day in New York City. Should he win, writes @fredstaffordcs.bsky.social, frontrunner Zohran Mamdani will have the chance to buck the left's increasingly nonsensical stance against nuclear energy development. Read more in this piece from our Ideas section ⤵️:
heatmap.news
Zohran Mamdani Should Embrace Nuclear
The New York mayoral frontrunner has an opportunity to shift the left’s increasingly nonsensical position on a critical carbon-free energy source.
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Alexander C. Kaufman @alexckaufman.bsky.social · 04/11/2025
Really good op-ed by @fredstaffordcs.bsky.social on why Zohran Mamdani should embrace nuclear power. heatmap.news/ideas/zohran...
heatmap.news
Zohran Mamdani Should Embrace Nuclear
The New York mayoral frontrunner has an opportunity to shift the left’s increasingly nonsensical position on a critical carbon-free energy source.
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Matt Huber @matthuber.bsky.social · 11/09/2025
I've been profoundly depressed seeing so many leftists either joke about or celebrate the murder of someone for political speech. Glad to see this political clarity from @benburgis.bsky.social and Meagan Day in @jacobinmag.bsky.social. jacobin.com/2025/09/char...
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Fred Stafford @fredstaffordcs.bsky.social · 10/08/2025
Some thinkers on the left have convinced everyone there's nothing to see here, the ideas expressed in Abundance are just neoliberalism rebranded, etc. They're wrong. Read our review essay to understand what left critics miss, what problems they conspicuously refuse to recognize.
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Seaver Wang @wang-seaver.bsky.social · 07/08/2025
Recommend @matthuber.bsky.social @leighphillips.bsky.social @fredstaffordcs.bsky.social in @jacobinmag.bsky.social as a key intervention on abundance. Both private market interests + an NGO-govt-legal bureaucracy hinder abundance. Class struggle must overcome both to deliver a plentiful future.
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Matt Huber @matthuber.bsky.social · 07/08/2025
A really nice engagement with our Abundance piece (in the context of a stale/toxic debate). "I’ve seen so much online discourse devolve into purity tests, tactical pessimism, and knee-jerk hostility. This piece cuts through that." stephnakhleh.substack.com/p/jacobins-s...
stephnakhleh.substack.com
Jacobin's socialist case for abundance
With notes and astonishments from a reader who expected to disagree
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Olivia Gonzalez Killingsworth 🌹🦾 🐜 @oliviakillingsworth.com · 03/08/2025
"Those of us... who come from the Left and remain connected to industrial labor — can tell you plainly: it’s both unaccountable markets *and* an unaccountable NGO-academia-legal bureaucratic class that are stalling public progress."
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Matt Huber @matthuber.bsky.social · 03/08/2025
I was confused by the wholesale Left rejection of "Abundance" both bc it's central to the general socialist project & bc the book itself has valuable insights. So here finally is our sympathetic/critical review of the book & its critics (w @leighphillips.bsky.social & @fredstaffordcs.bsky.social).
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Jacobin @jacobinmag.bsky.social · 02/08/2025
Abundance is the precondition of socialism, but socialism is also the precondition of abundance.
jacobin.com
Abundance for the 99 Percent
Abundance is the precondition of socialism, but socialism is also the precondition of abundance.
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Yakov Feygin @buddyyakov.bsky.social · 16/07/2025
@fredstaffordcs.bsky.social knocks it out of the park with this. The NYPA nuclear announcement should be celebrated as one of the most critical experiments in rebuilding state capacity in the country. The way we win is with big public investment at all scales: jacobin.com/2025/07/hoch...
jacobin.com
Atomic Abundance and Its Enemies
Wrangling over the construction of nuclear power in New York State has revealed the priorities of some of the state’s biggest environmental lobbies. For them, creating bureaucratic procedures they can...
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Seaver Wang @wang-seaver.bsky.social · 03/06/2025
2. Decarbonization as a longterm goal = eventually need to replace the gas (nuclear, geothermal, gas+CCS, hydrogen). That something’s big competitor is precisely the solar/storage/gas combo. Establishing the clean alternative to gas probably requires reshaping market rules favoring solar/gas today.
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Seaver Wang @wang-seaver.bsky.social · 03/06/2025
For more neoliberal center-left Abundance stans: 1. Private independent solar power producers’/asset managers’ interests are not going to be neatly aligned with clean, reliable energy abundance. Be warned.
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Seaver Wang @wang-seaver.bsky.social · 03/06/2025
Part of me has been feeling the time is approaching for a reckoning with the implicit solarmaxxing of both much of the Abundance movement *and* its critics. The next 10 yrs is when these political groups must grapple deeply with the grid and power markets. 🧵
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Alexander C. Kaufman @alexckaufman.bsky.social · 01/05/2025
Scoop on @latitudemedia.bsky.social: Utah is betting on a new developer to revive its nuclear dreams a year and a half after the NuScale deal collapsed. Holtec is setting up a permanent hub in the state to train a workforce and deploy projects to build its SMR-300 reactor across the Mountain West.
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Fred Stafford @fredstaffordcs.bsky.social · 28/04/2025
1/ NEW from me & @matthuber.bsky.social from the new Damage Magazine print issue, Responsibility: WON'T SOMEBODY PLEASE THINK OF THE GRID? Now online for all to read. 🧵 damagemag.com/2025/04/28/w...
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Seaver Wang @wang-seaver.bsky.social · 28/04/2025
Great new piece from @matthuber.bsky.social @fredstaffordcs.bsky.social in @damagemag.bsky.social Are we optimizing for GW of wind/solar by 2030, CO2 by 2050, or degrees C by 2100? Rather we strive for a society more fair, just, free + prosperous, now + in the future. damagemag.com/2025/04/28/w...
damagemag.com
Won’t Somebody Please Think of the Grid?
Liberals and the Left tend to ignore the importance of a reliable electricity system, pushing visions of rooftop solar and 100% renewables out of line with the reality of our electrical grid. A respon...
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Fred Stafford @fredstaffordcs.bsky.social · 28/04/2025
1/ NEW from me & @matthuber.bsky.social from the new Damage Magazine print issue, Responsibility: WON'T SOMEBODY PLEASE THINK OF THE GRID? Now online for all to read. 🧵 damagemag.com/2025/04/28/w...
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Fred Stafford @fredstaffordcs.bsky.social · 12/04/2025
Good thread 👇
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Fred Stafford @fredstaffordcs.bsky.social · 12/11/2024
A generation of liberals have abandoned the core financial tool that America's flagship public power system uses to grow, seeking privately procured renewables instead. For America and for its own decarbonization, it's time for TVA to go nuclear again. www.thenation.com/article/envi...
thenation.com
The Case for Public Nuclear Power
With additional funding, the Tennessee Valley Authority could provide union jobs, kick-start American industrial production, and help the world go green.
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Michael McLean @michaelmclean.me · 05/04/2025
Democrats have spent a lot of political capital to restart Palisades nuclear plant in Michigan. The Environmental Law and Policy Center, based in Chicago, is trying their hardest to slow it down. Why? www.nrc.gov/docs/ML2506/...
nrc.gov
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Xiao Wang @xiaowang1984.bsky.social · 17/02/2025
I want to preface by saying that broadly I agree with Tyler's aim that if the datacenters can connect to the grid with a far greater amount of volumetric sales than infrastructure upgrades that they drive, then they can be greatly beneficial to all ratepayers and the costs of the system.
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Fred Stafford @fredstaffordcs.bsky.social · 03/04/2025
Unpopular post below but it needs to be pointed out to all the liberals rightfully angry that Trump and GOP are futzing with TVA in a way that may - emphasis on *may* - be precursor to breaking it up somehow. Your fav industry has been ready for it.
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Fred Stafford @fredstaffordcs.bsky.social · 03/04/2025
As fate of TVA hangs in the air, consider one group that might be licking their chops at prospect of breaking it up: the renewables industry & cheerleading enviro nonprofits. In recent report on TVA, industry group ACORE floated privatization of TVA transmission as good for renewables. 11/
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ryan cooper @ryanlcooper.com · 03/04/2025
traveling in and reporting on the Nordics has really soured me on American style subcultural bohemian leftism. actually existing egalitarian institutions rely on a lot of dutiful, virtuous, boring ass bureaucrats
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Fred Stafford @fredstaffordcs.bsky.social · 02/04/2025
TVA has submitted SEC filing about this 2nd Board member departure and about the lack of quorum. They summarize what this means below. If GOP called on TVA to do something new with nuclear, then they cannot do any such thing until Trump appoints and Senate confirms someone. 9/
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Fred Stafford @fredstaffordcs.bsky.social · 02/04/2025
Unclear why Trump is breaking TVA; he's said nothing this term. But local GOP argued, absurdly, TVA Board cared more about DEI than building new nuclear needed by Valley. Is it about nukes? Or do they just want to break up our largest public power? 2/ bsky.app/profile/fred...
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Fred Stafford @fredstaffordcs.bsky.social · 02/04/2025
On the flip side, liberals & the left have ignored TVA entirely, except for misleading accusations that it's a bad, dirty, monopoly utility, thanks to environmental NGOs and those concerned more with rooftop solar individualism than electricity grids. 2/2 www.publicpowerreview.org/p/why-tvas-g...
publicpowerreview.org
Why TVA's Grid is Greener than Greens Grant
The Tennessee Valley Authority is "one of the dirtiest utilities" according to many environmental nonprofits and to their sympathetic journalists, politicians, and wonks. They're all wrong.
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Scott Lemieux @lemieuxlgm.bsky.social · 02/04/2025
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Fred Stafford @fredstaffordcs.bsky.social · 02/04/2025
It'll take months for Trump to appoint, Senate to confirm, a new TVA Board member for quorum. Any decisions about new projects, nuclear or o/w, won't happen soon. Hopefully in meantime, hostile GOP & disinterested Dems in Congress will pass leg enabling TVA to build again. 8/
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Fred Stafford @fredstaffordcs.bsky.social · 02/04/2025
🚨 Trump has now broken the Tennessee Valley Authority 🚨 Having now fired 2 board members & after starting with only 6 of 9 seats filled, Trump has decimated TVA's independent board of directors. They no longer have quorum needed to decide anything. 1/ www.knoxnews.com/story/news/p...
knoxnews.com
Trump fires TVA board chair, stripping power from governing body of largest US public utility
After the Trump administration fired another TVA leader without a stated reason, the board was left without a quorum to conduct business.
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Fred Stafford @fredstaffordcs.bsky.social · 02/04/2025
🚨 Trump has now broken the Tennessee Valley Authority 🚨 Having now fired 2 board members & after starting with only 6 of 9 seats filled, Trump has decimated TVA's independent board of directors. They no longer have quorum needed to decide anything. 1/ www.knoxnews.com/story/news/p...
knoxnews.com
Trump fires TVA board chair, stripping power from governing body of largest US public utility
After the Trump administration fired another TVA leader without a stated reason, the board was left without a quorum to conduct business.
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Fred Stafford @fredstaffordcs.bsky.social · 01/04/2025
GOP continues its attack on TVA and TVA Board independence. This local Congressman is neglecting to mention that the independent Board hiring a CEO to manage the utility is precisely the arrangement his party set up in 2000s.
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Alexander C. Kaufman @alexckaufman.bsky.social · 31/03/2025
Big milestone: X-energy -- the reactor company Amazon backed -- and Dow Chemical just submitted a construction permit to build what could end up being the first nuclear-powered industrial site in North America. x-energy.com/media/news-r...
x-energy.com
Dow and X-energy Submit Construction Permit Application to the U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission for Proposed Advanced Nuclear Project in Texas — X-energy
Project supported by U.S. DOE’s Advanced Reactor Demonstration Program Represents a key milestone toward bringing advanced nuclear energy to fruition in the U.S.  MIDLAND, Michigan ...
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