By Robert Bradley Jr. — January 6, 2022
“’Before maybe the end of this decade, I see wind and solar being cost-competitive without subsidy with new fossil fuel,’ Chu told an event at the Pew Charitable Trusts.” (below)
Energy history matters. In the marketplace, what energies performed and at what cost; in energy policy, who said what and when. In this regard, intermittent, dilute energies have a bad history.
Obama’s DOE Secretary Steven Chu has a ten-year anniversary of a statement that is now falsified. As reported by the American Security Project in “Wind, Solar Becoming Cost Competitive: Chu,”
Clean sources of energy such as wind and solar will be no more expensive than oil and gas projects by the end of the decade, US Energy Secretary Steven Chu said Wednesday.
President Barack Obama’s administration has been encouraging companies to invest in green growth, calling it a new source of jobs and fearing that other nations — led by China — are stealing the march.
“Before maybe the end of this decade, I see wind and solar being cost-competitive without subsidy with new fossil fuel,” Chu told an event at the Pew Charitable Trusts.
“So the country and the companies who develop those renewable energy and resources that become cost competitive without subsidy all of a sudden have a world market. And, boy, we can’t lose that world market,” he said.
The US Congress has rejected attempts to mandate curbs on carbon emissions blamed for climate change, with many members of the Republican Party arguing that reducing dependence on fossil fuels would be too expensive.
But the Obama administration has been hoping to seek bipartisan cooperation on what it hopes are less controversial efforts such as encouraging renewable energy….
Wind energy, never competitive with fossil fuels, remains uncompetitive as demonstrated by the desperate attempt by the Biden Administration in BBB (Build Back Better) to extend the Production Tax Credit for a 14th time. Yes, what began in 1992 for wind’s PTC was extended in 1999… 2002 … 2004 … 2005 … 2006 … 2008 … 2009 … 2012 … 2014 … 2015 … 2016 … 2019 … 2021.
It’s time to pull the plug and let the market decide between energies. The government–the taxpayers–should be neutral.
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The way forward is incredibly simple – a single government announcement as follows:
“The cost of wind and solar electricity has come down so fast that they are now fully competitive with all other sources of electricity. There is now no need for any wind or solar subsidy or mandate, so the government is delighted to announce that all subsidies and mandates for renewable energy have now been ended. We are expecting this to cause a massive surge in the roll-out of renewable energy installations, so the government is putting in place new fast-track processes so that all new renewable energy installations can proceed to completion as fast as possible. The government now expects renewable energy to provide 100% of all electricity by 2025.”
Some people may feel that there is a gap in the logic somewhere, but the above statement is every bit as logical as any other government statement or action on renewable energy over the last 30 years. It is so sad that governments around the world seem to be incapable of drawing logical conclusions from all the reports showing renewable energy to be the cheapest. A change of policy as above would usher in a new age of abundant cheap energy for all.
While the myth that renewables are cheap is generally accepted as it’s repeated so often in the media and elsewhere but the cost of incorporating them onto a grid is overlooked and that is a significant cost.
What I do not see is the fact that asynchronous renewables (wind, wave, tidal or solar) cannot replace fully synchronous conventional generation and if too much asynchronous (basically uncontrollable output) is fed into a grid that must keep frequency within very close limits are trips as frequency goes out of limits.
The more renewables feeding the grid the less stable and less reliable it becomes. There is no question of renewables taking over from conventional power generators, renewables are not equivalent to conventional generators. 100% renewable grid generation is when you will see the sky full of flying pigs.
Wind and solar are nowhere near competitive with traditional sources, which AVERAGE 5 c/kWh, WHOLESALE.
“All-in” Electricity Cost of Wind and Solar in New England
http://www.windtaskforce.org/profiles/blogs/cost-shifting-is-the-name-of-the-game-regarding-wind-and-solar
Pro RE folks point to the “price paid to owner” as the cost of wind and solar, purposely ignoring the other cost categories. The all-in cost of wind and solar, c/kWh, includes:
1) Above-market-price paid to Owners
2) Subsidies paid to Owners
3) Owner return on invested capital at about 9%/y
4) Grid extension/augmentation
5) Grid support services
6) Future battery systems
Comments on table 6
– Vermont legacy Standard Offer solar systems had greater subsidies paid to owner, than newer systems
– Wind prices paid to owner did not have the drastic reductions as solar prices.
– Vermont utilities are paid about 3.5 c/kWh for various costs they incur regarding net-metered solar systems
– “Added to rate base” is the cost wind and solar are added to the utility rate base, used to set electric rates.
– “Total cost”, including subsidies to owner and grid support, is the cost at which wind/solar are added to the utility rate base
– “NE utility cost” is the annual average cost of purchased electricity, about 6 c/kWh, plus NE grid operator charges, about 1.6 c/kWh
for a total of 7.6 c/kWh.
– “Grid support costs” would increase with increased use of battery systems to counteract the variability and intermittency of increased build-outs of wind and solar systems.
NOTES:
1) NE wholesale grid price averaged about 5 c/kWh, starting in 2009, due to low-cost CCGT and nuclear plants providing at least 65% of all electricity loaded onto the NE grid, in 2019.
2) There are Owning costs, and Operating and Maintenance costs, of the NE grid
ISO-NE charges these costs to utilities at about 1.6 c/kWh. The ISO-NE charges include:
Regional network services, RNS, based on the utility peak demand occurring during a month
Forward capacity market, FCM, based on the utility peak demand occurring during a year.
SEE URL FOR COST TABLE
Sample calculation; NE utility cost = 6, Purchased + 1.6, (RNS + FCM) = 7.6 c/kWh
Sample calculation; Added to utility base = 17.4 + 3.5 = 20.9 c/kWh
Sample calculation; Total cost = 17.4 + 5.2 + 2.1 + 3.5 + 1.6 = 29.8 c/kWh
Excludes costs for very expensive battery systems
Excludes costs for very expensive floating, offshore wind systems
Excludes cost for dealing with shortfalls during multi-day wind/solar lulls. See URL
“Added to rate base” is for recent 20-y electricity supply contracts awarded by competitive bidding in NE.
“Added to rate base” would be much higher without subsidies and cost shifting.
Areas with better wind and solar conditions, and lower construction costs/MW have lower c/MWh, than NE
Yep, seconds out – and let’s have a fair fight … before wind and solar are concerned to the very rare niches in which they make sense!
As has been pointed out a million times, and many times below.
All wind and solar require 100% backup by gas/coal/nuclear at minimum. There in lies the cost
Gas/coal/nuclear, require no back up from wind and solar. Therein lies the savings
Alberta is 12GW grid connected load.
Based on AESO stats of 1/3 availability we need 36GW of installed wind (solar is a joke here at the top of the world). ~11,000 3.3 mw turbines (currently we have ~700? in the best wind resource areas already giving us the awesome 1/3 availability )
Grid scale batteries are a fantasy so we also need gas/coal backup to ensure 100% supply, so we need ~130% or 15.6 GW of that installed to ensure we always have enough power when needed.
Which we pretty much have today. If we didn’t have it we would have to build it, maintain it, run it so its available 24/7 to back up the wind.
Cost on top of cost on top of cost.
Its so easy and so i wonder why Griff et al refuse to see it.
We have a grid now.
If we add in 11,000 wind turbines we still need the rest of it currently existing, we cannot get rid of it lest we die in the next winter weeklong -30 wind desert.
Why is this difficult for some?
When the magic batteries exist, then we can talk.
Without magic batteries, its a pipe dream
Not today – no wind, no generation!