renewables – Knowledge Problem
I’ve been playing around with some ownership type and fuel source data on electricity generation, using the EIA’s annual data going back to 1990. I looked at solar’s share of the total MWH of generated electricity in eight states (AZ CA IL NC NJ NY OH TX), 1990-2012, and express it as a percentage of … More Solar Generation in Key States
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I recently argued that the regulated utility is not likely to enter a “death spiral”, but that the regulated utility business model is indeed under pressure, and the conversation about the future of that business model is a valuable one. One area of pressure on the regulated utility business model is the market for residential … More Should Regulated Utilities Participate in the Residential Solar Market?
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Lynne Kiesling Proponents say yes, but I’m not convinced. Here’s the story: the California Public Utilities Commission is considering some regulatory innovations to increase the share of renewables in the state’s generation portfolio, including a reverse-auction procurement solicitation for the provision of renewable power: In what might be a world first, the California Public Utilities … More Is a Reverse Auction Feed-in Tariff “Market-Based”?
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A Thursday Afternoon Links Roundup
Lynne Kiesling I should probably follow David Zetland’s lead and start calling these speed blogging, because it’s really just me clearing out my links to open and interesting reads! This is an old Environmental Leader article from November, but it describes Sun’s Open Eco application: Sun Microsystems has updated OpenEco.org, an online community that provides … More A Thursday Afternoon Links Roundup
Any Good Analyses Comparing Renewable and Nuclear Costs?
Lynne Kiesling Today several items have floated across my radar screen contending that renewables are cheaper than nuclear power. Here, for example, is a snippet of a talk from Eric Schmidt of Google on the topic. I can see the possibility, given the innovations in renewables, incorporating the savings in foregone wires construction (although that … More Any Good Analyses Comparing Renewable and Nuclear Costs?
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Lynne Kiesling This Wired article summarizes and links to a poster for the American Geophysical Union meetings (pdf) from Elaine Hart, a graduate student in civil and environmental engineering at Stanford. Her power flow simulation suggests that the existing transmission network in California can accommodate up to 70% of renewables in the portfolio on a … More New Analysis: California’s Grid Can Accommodate More Renewables