{"id":11661,"date":"2012-10-04T13:12:06","date_gmt":"2012-10-04T19:12:06","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/idaho\/?p=11661"},"modified":"2012-10-04T08:45:55","modified_gmt":"2012-10-04T14:45:55","slug":"why-idahos-electricity-is-cheaper-than-the-rest-of-the-nations","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/idaho\/2012\/10\/04\/why-idahos-electricity-is-cheaper-than-the-rest-of-the-nations\/","title":{"rendered":"Why Idaho&#8217;s Electricity Is Cheaper Than The Rest of The Nation&#8217;s"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>Lately, we&#8217;ve <a title=\"After The Wind Boom, A Fight Over Idaho\u2019s Energy Future\" href=\"http:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/idaho\/2012\/09\/21\/after-the-wind-boom-a-fight-over-idahos-energy-future\/\">covered<\/a> the wind industry&#8217;s aggressive move into Idaho, and utilities&#8217; attempts to rein in the industry&#8217;s expansion in the state. Related to that reporting, it&#8217;s worth taking a look at the big picture of electricity generation in Idaho.<strong><\/strong>\u00a0 With that in mind, we posted <a title=\"Map: Where Idaho\u2019s Energy Comes\u00a0From\" href=\"http:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/idaho\/2012\/09\/28\/map-where-idahos-energy-comes-from\/\">this map<\/a> last week.\u00a0 Now, let&#8217;s size it up from another angle.<\/p>\n<p><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/docs.google.com\/a\/boisestate.edu\/spreadsheet\/oimg?key=0AtNHLtezDs_XdHlPUmtyYUlMM096LWM0S3l6X3V2X2c&amp;oid=1&amp;zx=ivwj79idngog\" alt=\"\" \/><\/p>\n<p class=\"source\">Source: Institute for Energy Research<\/p>\n<p><!--more-->As the chart above shows, hydroelectricity accounts for nearly 80 percent of Idaho&#8217;s total electricity generation.\u00a0 That results in an energy mix that is very different from the national one, in which coal, nuclear and natural gas account for more than 85 percent of generation.<\/p>\n<p><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/docs.google.com\/a\/boisestate.edu\/spreadsheet\/oimg?key=0AtNHLtezDs_XdFkyejRsQzRUYzZhVXhMYURlYjZsemc&amp;oid=1&amp;zx=59k20qrxawlu\" alt=\"\" \/><\/p>\n<p class=\"source\">Source: Institute for Energy Research<\/p>\n<p>One result of this atypical energy mix: electricity is cheap in Idaho.\u00a0 According to the right-leaning, non-for-profit Institute for Energy Research, the state has the <a href=\"http:\/\/instituteforenergyresearch.org\/states\/\" target=\"_blank\">second cheapest electricity in the nation<\/a>.\u00a0 The only state that beats Idaho&#8217;s cost of 6.49 cents per kilowatt hour is neighboring Wyoming, at 6.09 cents.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Lately, we&#8217;ve covered the wind industry&#8217;s aggressive move into Idaho, and utilities&#8217; attempts to rein in the industry&#8217;s expansion in the state. Related to that reporting, it&#8217;s worth taking a look at the big picture of electricity generation in Idaho.\u00a0 With that in mind, we posted this map last week.\u00a0 Now, let&#8217;s size it up [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":46,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[13],"tags":[68,100,43],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/idaho\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11661"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/idaho\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/idaho\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/idaho\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/46"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/idaho\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=11661"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/idaho\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11661\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/idaho\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=11661"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/idaho\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=11661"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/idaho\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=11661"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}