High Gas and Coal Prices Keep Renewable-Energy Rollout on Track

[mahatmakanejeeves]

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High Gas and Coal Prices Keep Renewable-Energy Rollout on Track

Build-out of wind and solar farms is accelerating as rising power prices help offset input cost inflation

By Rochelle Toplensky
https://twitter.com/rtoplensky
[e-mail]
Dec. 1, 2021 8:56 am ET

Higher energy prices are a worry for consumers and central bankers this winter, but they have the odd benefit. Case in point: fueling the renewable-energy revolution.

This will be another record year for building wind and solar farms, according to a report published Wednesday by the International Energy Agency. About 290 gigawatts of generating capacity is expected to be installed, up 3% on an exceptionally strong 2020. The trend should continue with an average of 305 GW forecast annually through 2026.

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[Walleye]

1. I was hoping this would be the result

Gas prices in this country have been kept artificially low exactly to make renewable energy more expensive

[Alexander Of Assyria]

2. Give it up fossils fuel dinosaurs...resistance to renewables is futile.

[NNadir]

3. Actually low wind conditions caused gas to spike. Once again we see illiterate power units used...

...as equivalent to energy.

The unit of energy is the Joule, not the Watt. Still we hear this misuse of basic science units every damned day.

The capacity utilization of solar is typically less than 20%, except in deserts, assuming there aren't dust storms.

The capacity utilization of wind energy is roughly 30%.

Note that these "percentages" do not refer to when the energy is available.

All of this junk has a lifetime of around 20 years.

305 "GW" at 25% capacity utilization is actually a little more than 76 GW, albeit with the absolute requirement that redundant systems be available, usually gas. Given the number of seconds in a year, 31,536,000, and the fact that a Watt is a Joule/second, 76 GW amounts to about 2.4 EJ.

Humanity consumes now more than 600 EJ, dominated by dangerous fossil fuels.

In the most recent World Energy Outlook in my files (2020), the growth in the use of dangerous natural gas from 2017 to 2018 was, by comparison 6.95 exajoules to reach a total of 137 EJ. Coal in the same period by 2.97 exajoules to reach 157 EJ.

In 2018, the fossil fuel component of energy amounted to 485.46 EJ, or 81.0%, up from 2017s 472.77 EJ, or 80.8% of energy demand.

Moreover all of that so called "renewable energy" capacity will need to be replaced when kids in diapers today are entering college, and they will have to pay to clean this shit up.

Anyone who buys this tiresome horseshit that so called "renewable energy" is "cheap" or that it's effective is simply not paying attention.

The reason that we are seeing the climate disaster that is rapidly worsening is the fact that people take this kind of junk talk seriously.

There is a deep set refusal to think critically. If you want to know why the climate is collapsing, that would be a good place to start, a complete and total refusal to engage in rather simple critical thinking..

This is not a cause for celebration. It is simply denial, nothing more.

[mahatmakanejeeves]

4. Joule v. Watt

I don't have the print edition in front of me. I'm not able to see if that mistake was made throughout the article. I can look at it tomorrow, if I get to to the library after donating blood.

As always, thanks for the insight.

[NNadir]

5. It is routine for journalists irrespective of their position on the political spectrum to use...

...the "Watt" as a unit of energy, which motivates my frequently utilized "joke" that you cannot get a degree in journalism if you've passed a college level science course with a grade of C- or better.

The most obscene use of this confusion is made by the "renewables will save us" advocates, many of whom prattle on here as we surge toward 422 ppm of CO2 in the atmosphere, sure to be hit in 2022.

I recently analyzed from the CAISO website, the capacity utilization of all the so called "renewable energy" installations in the State of California, with five minute time period resolution - over a period of weeks. The number of times that any renewable energy facility in the entire state - the small geothermal excepted - reached the rated capacity was zero. In fact the number of times they came close to capacity was zero.

The "reporters" participate in this grotesque ignorance repeatedly, confusing peak capacity, which is never realized with energy.

There were huge stretches of time that the Diablo Canyon Nuclear Plant was producing more power on a 12 acre footprint than all of the wind turbines in California, installed over well more than 1000 square miles of once pristine wilderness.

[hunter]

6. Joules are too small for common use at human scales, just as the calorie is too small in nutrition.

The food Calorie is actually a kilocalorie.

The casual Joule measurement ought to be something relatable to kilowatt hours, if kilowatt hours won't do.

One kilowatt hour = 3600000 Joules.

That's awkward math for most people.

Knock some zeros off for a unit that's 360 kilowatt hours and call it something new that everyone can pay their electric bills by.

Let's call it a "George."

That way any minimally numerate person could understand how much power any solar, wind, or nuclear power project could be expected to produce.

The average U.S.A. household electric consumption is 11,000 kilowatthours (kWh) per year. How many Georges is that?

[NNadir]

7. Many macroscale energy reports, including the World Energy Outlook put out by the IEA, use...

...the unfortunate unit "MTOE," "Million Tonnes Oil Equivalent."

This is a really, really, really bad unit.

One does see, rarely but increasingly, the GWh, MWh, etc. showing up, even in idiotic misleading reports like the one cited in the OP. These are quasi-SI units, derived units, and are, I think, preferable, although I always multiple by 3600 to get Joules when doing calculations.

Another unit that shows up in dumb journalist reports is "homes," as in "The solar installation is enough to power xxxx homes." We also hear the unit "cars" used, as in "the wind farm will prevent the emissions of xxxx cars." These of course, are an even more stupid unit than MTOE. However people who don't want to think too much, and want to ignore the concept of something called "night," or the concept of a windless day usually buy this crap with remarkable credulousness. It is dumbing down, and most people are happy to be dumbed down.

It is credulity that has allowed the "renewable energy will save us" fantasy - which is very much responsible the reality of 420 ppm of carbon dioxide in 2021, sure to be 422 in 2022 - to have destroyed the planetary atmosphere. It's all been a very toxic myth, "renewables will save us."

Units can either help us to understand, or they can obfuscate. The units used generally by the media obfuscate.

I live by the Exajoule on the planetary scale. When I import data into energy spreadsheets for calculations I use SI units. If the data comes in "MTOE" I convert it before using it.

One of the more stupid people I encountered here, when he wasn't posting ROFL emojis effectively to mock the 110-130 million air pollution deaths that took place in the 19 years I wrote here, used to mock the energy unit as "EXA-JEWEL." He was (or is), of course, a moron. Nevertheless he reflected, I think, the contempt held for science by so many self declared "environmentalists" whose ignorance have led us here, to this very, very, very, very onerous situation in which we find humanity.

We will not be forgiven.

[Finishline42]

9. How much worse would the CO2 concentration be if we didn't have Wind and Solar?

In Texas for instance...

The Electric Reliability Council of Texas in June announced wind generation had narrowly edged out coal in the first half of this year, a first since the grid operator began tracking the fuel mix in 2003.

https://www.utilitydive.com/news/texas-wind-poised-to-outstrip-coal-generation-with-87-twh-in-2020-report-p/563481/

[Finishline42]

8. In my lifetime I has seen fuel prices go thru multiple boom/bust cycles.

When it's cheap, it propagates like a weed. Sold as the cheapest way to generate energy (doesn't matter if it's oil, natgas or uranium). Then the tide changes and what was once cheap is expensive but we have already build millions of sq st of inefficient buildings, millions SUV's and a bunch of power plants so we are stuck.

Wind and solar are already cheaper to build and operate than it costs to operate a lot of power plants because their fuel is free. And they keep getting better and cheaper.

BTW, there is a capacity utilization paradox with wind. It involves the fact that when you double the diameter of the blades you x3 the output, therefore bigger and bigger windmills get installed. Which of course means that they need more wind to spin, but when they do spin they more than make up for it in output.

[NNadir]

10. Nonsense.

[Finishline42]

11. Not according to this story

Renewable power is increasingly cheaper than any new electricity capacity based on fossil fuels, a new report by the International Renewable Energy Agency (IRENA) published today finds. Renewable Power Generation Costs in 2019 shows that more than half of the renewable capacity added in 2019 achieved lower power costs than the cheapest new coal plants.

The report highlights that new renewable power generation projects now increasingly undercut existing coal-fired plants. On average, new solar photovoltaic (PV) and onshore wind power cost less than keeping many existing coal plants in operation, and auction results show this trend accelerating – reinforcing the case to phase-out coal entirely. Next year, up to 1 200 gigawatts (GW) of existing coal capacity could cost more to operate than the cost of new utility-scale solar PV, the report shows.

Replacing the costliest 500 GW of coal with solar PV and onshore wind next year would cut power system costs by up to USD 23 billion every year and reduce annual emissions by around 1.8 gigatons (Gt) of carbon dioxide (CO2), equivalent to 5% of total global CO2 emissions in 2019. It would also yield an investment stimulus of USD 940 billion, which is equal to around 1% of global GDP.

“We have reached an important turning point in the energy transition. The case for new and much of the existing coal power generation, is both environmentally and economically unjustifiable,” said Francesco La Camera, Director-General of IRENA. “Renewable energy is increasingly the cheapest source of new electricity, offering tremendous potential to stimulate the global economy and get people back to work. Renewable investments are stable, cost-effective and attractive offering consistent and predictable returns while delivering benefits to the wider economy.

https://www.irena.org/newsroom/pressreleases/2020/Jun/Renewables-Increasingly-Beat-Even-Cheapest-Coal-Competitors-on-Cost

[NNadir]

12. This nonsense is true if and only if one ignores the cost of redundancy.

I'm rather immune to bad thinking, slick or otherwise. The real cost of this waste will fall on future generations, not the people spreading this unreferenced garbage thinking.

The environmental and economic costs of redundancy is unacceptable. Again, we're at 420 ppm. That's a cost, even if some bean counting types want to focus only on the few times the system works, while ignoring the huge environmental and economic cost of unreliability.

If someone thinks I haven't heard this crap for the last 20 years, they may be the sort of shallow poor thinker who seriously is concerned about Three Mile Island this on a planet dying of climate change with millions dying every year from air pollution.

Measurement matters, not wishful thinking or internet tripe.

The price of electricity is available to anyone who can read, broken down by country. If one can't read or look things up, one can always chant.

I find people who assume I'm stupid because they live in stupid circles annoying.

[Finishline42]

13. Redundancy in engineering is a safety factor

Redundancy in our grid is a measure of it's reliability. It's a given in engineering any complex system. What happens if X fails? then Y fills the void.

Then there's this

Lazard’s most recent Levelized Cost of Energy (LCOE) analysis shows U.S. renewable energy prices continued falling fast in 2019, with wind and solar hitting new lows, after renewables fell below the cost of coal in 2018. LCOE measures the total cost of building and operating a facility over its lifetime, and shows renewables beating fossil fuels by ever-larger margins – even without subsidies – with that trend forecast to continue for decades to come.

I believe you think the solution is nuclear power. I will repeat what I wrote earlier this week. We have over 100 nuclear power plants producing about 20% of our electricity. There isn't a single utility in the country that is trying to build even a single nuclear power plant much less the 100 it would take to double the power produced by nuclear. It's not happening. In fact during the Trump admin there were efforts to support coal plants instead of nuclear and a good number of the nuclear plants are scheduled for closure, which I think is a mistake.

Actually we would make more progress if we passed building efficiency codes on new and the renovation of existing buildings. You drew a line at redundancy but a bigger problem is waste.

[progree]

14. Energy secretary Granholm: "When the winds of change blow, some build walls, others build windmills"

Energy secretary: Offshore wind brings 'gust' of job growth, AP, 12/5/21
https://kstp.com/national/energy-secretary-offshore-wind-brings-gust-of-job-growth/6322616/?cat=12678

... Granholm visited a new offshore wind manufacturing hub in Providence to talk about the Biden administration’s plan to deploy 30 gigawatts of offshore wind energy by 2030 and to promote the investments in the $1 trillion infrastructure deal.

Granholm said looking at the building reminded her of a proverb: “When the winds of change blow, some build walls, others build windmills.”

Granholm also visited a manufacturer of electric vehicle chargers and a clean energy technology company in Connecticut Thursday

Anyway, I've heard Granholm being praised and even lionized for saying kind words about nuclear. Thought they should know she likes dangerous so-called "renewables" too.

Here she is talking like what one DUer has labelled "a little delusional 'renewable energy is cheap' airhead" when similar sentiments were posted by a fellow DUer.