Bad Bunny has a point about our dependence on the power grid. We should listen | Opinion

Did Bad Bunny give us a timely warning? Yes, but it wasn’t about some viewers’ need for English subtitles during this past weekend’s episode of Saturday Night Live, where he gave a stellar performance in the dual roles of host and musical act.

Granted, with assistance from past host Pedro Pascal and SNL cast member Marcello Hernandez, a Miami native, that episode’s skits included more dialog in Spanish than all previous SNL shows combined.

While Bad Bunny’s surprisingly adept skills as a comic actor were on full display on SNL, the Puerto Rican rapper also has a serious side. It has been evident in his outspoken criticism of the way the island commonwealth has been treated.

Nothing symbolizes Puerto Rico’s status as America’s disrespected stepchild more than Donald Trump’s October 2017 visit to the island two weeks after Hurricane Maria caused devastation and death. That’s when Trump jovially tossed rolls of paper towels into the crowd.

Maria had destroyed Puerto Rico’s already fragile and undependable electric grid, leading to what may be the second-longest blackout on record at 181 days. Many Puerto Ricans left the island — some temporarily, others permanently.

Some went north to the New York area. Others opted for Central Florida, a region that’s now home to a very large and growing Puerto Rican community.

Puerto Rico’s long post-Maria blackout inspired Benito Martinez Ocasio — a.k.a. Bad Bunny — to write a song and produce a decidedly R-rated video in response. In “El Apagon” (“The Blackout”) he lauds Puerto Rico’s beauty and culture while lamenting the recurring power outages and other problems plaguing his beloved island.

Power grid failures aren’t limited to Puerto Rico. Now, to the list of natural disasters that can play havoc with the power grid, we can add out-of-control wildfires and freezes such as the one that shut down Texas’ go-it-alone electric grid in February of 2021.

In other words, it’s a nationwide problem. So, as the Associated Press reported last week, the Biden administration is planning to spend $3.5 billion for 58 projects “to strengthen electric grid resilience as extreme weather events such as the deadly Maui and California wildfires continue to strain the nation’s aging transmission systems.”

Adding to the strain on those systems is our growing dependence on the rechargeable batteries that power everything from our phones and laptops to the plug-in electric vehicles the Biden administration is relentlessly touting as a remedy for climate change.

Energy Secretary Jennifer Granholm told the AP “The grid, as it currently sits, is not equipped to handle all the new demand. We need it to be bigger, we need it to be stronger, we need it to be smarter.”

Being smarter would arguably include restoring the supply of replacement parts, notably transformers. Utilities have warned that this essential component of the grid is in short supply.

Worse, the supply chain for the specialized kind of steel used in manufacturing transformers is largely dependent on imports, not domestic production. Given the acts of apparent vandalism and/or sabotage that destroyed electrical power substations in North Carolina and Washington a year ago, the lack of a dependable supply of transformers has to be a concern.

Meanwhile, evidence is piling up that it’s wishful thinking to believe that relying on a deficient power grid and lithium-ion batteries can maintain our quality of life, protect our national security and stave off global warming.

Moreover, as with the steel needed for transformers, the supply chain for lithium extends abroad. Worse, it extends to sources in Africa and other places where China is asserting its economic influence and, in Africa, it extends to mines where child labor is common.

Lithium batteries have other drawbacks. Although authorities have dismissed as “myths” the reports that they can be a fire hazard, they’ve been blamed for causing a growing number of fires in major cities and elsewhere.

Meanwhile, it seems to be dawning on American consumers that transportation in a nation dependent on plug-in electric vehicles could be brought to a halt if a foreign power or a ransomware extortionist hacks into the controls. Many car lots now have a backlog of unwanted EVs.

Did Bad Bunny’s song and video inadvertently make him a Paul Revere alerting Americans to the folly of the Biden administration’s insistence on pushing (and subsidizing) plug-in EVs as a major part of its rush toward making us overly dependent on a vulnerable electric grid? If so, maybe Benito Martinez Ocasio deserves a new nickname: Energizer Bunny.