The Download: future grids, and bad boy bots

Is this the electric grid of the future? Lincoln Electric System, a publicly owned utility in Nebraska, is used to weathering severe blizzards. But what will happen soon--not only at Lincoln Electric but for all electric utilities--is a challenge of a different order. Utilities must keep the lights on in the face of more extreme and more frequent storms and fires, growing risks of cyberattacks and physical disruptions, and a wildly uncertain policy and regulatory landscape. They must keep prices low amid inflationary costs. And they must adapt to an epochal change in how the grid works, as the industry attempts to transition from power generated with fossil fuels to power generated from renewable sources like solar and wind.