Renewable energy is now cheaper than fossil fuels
Couple weeks old but pretty amazing news. Apparently, in much the world's biggest economies, renewable energy (solar, wind, etc...) are now cheaper than fossil fuel energy sources.
Advances in technology and economies of scale strikes again, making renewable energy cheaper and hence more marketable than generating electricity via fossil fuels.
This kind of stuff makes me optimistic about the future. Free market capitalism made the world a better place again through competition, not regulations.
Questions are -1) how long it would take until renewable energy sources take over as the primary source of electricity and other energy needs?; 2) Are there regulatory red tapes? If so what are they?; and 3) Will Oil and Gas fight back through lobbies or will they expand into renewable energy and reinvent themselves as energy companies?
Working in energy. Renewables def will become more of the energy balance. Still some coal/thermal/oil plants will stay as renewables arr not able to sustainably produce energy (due to variations is sunlight, water flow..)
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Intermittency is the biggest issue with renewables. Reserve power and energy storage are going to be increasingly necessary as the energy market evolves.
Interesting set of questions.
There have actually been times in the past couple years where the wholesale price of electricity has gone negative in Texas of all places. Once installed the cost of wind or solar power is essentially zero.
I think that the problem is storage. Quite simply, I don't want my lights to not turn on or my computer to not boot up because the sun's not shining and the wind isn't blowing. Batteries are expensive and not that green. There are alternatives like pumped hydro, but they have scalability problems. Until then I think that we will still need 'peaker' plants that can switch on and off at short notice. Sorry coal, that means natural gas. It can go on and off the grid a lot quicker than you can.
The other issue is energy density. Yeah, I can use an electric car to get to the supermarket. probably down the shore too (that's even pushing it in my little runabout since it's 120 miles to the house and I've got a 10 gallon tank) but how do you replace diesel in a cargo ship crossing the pacific or a freight train hauling a mile long consist across the continental US?
Good points.
I heard that in Minnesota they have this interesting setup where they maintain a portfolio of renewable energy sources to meet the demand. They just have an intricate control system to manage all that. Apparently they are almost carbon free up there.
But I guess in some places that might not be feasible at all and you have to have thermal energy plants burning fossil fuels.
As for on the energy density part, wouldn't you just need to make trains and ships last long enough on electricity? Idk where the technology is on that regard. But setting up charging stations where you'd normally get refueled doesn't sound so difficult.
Bunch of engineers needs to work on it for couple years really.
I just happen to think that the biggest impediment would be regulatory red tapes that somehow prevents from all the innovation from happening.
A lot of these studies are kind of misleading. I work in energy and it is definitely cheaper to build a solar plant than pretty much anything else, however at 9pm you have a problem when all of that solar goes offline (see the california duck curve if you want more information on that). Premium is shifting from low priced MWs to when those MWs are being produced (time of day pricing that you might see on your electric bill). In terms of your questions:
1) When will renewables take over: This all has to do with regulation aka RPS requirements or people wanting their power to come from more renewables. The US really doesn't need a lot of new power generators, most loads are barely growing so demand is all driven by popular opinion not necessity. California is saying they want to pretty much go to 100% by 2050 which means an almost unfathomable amount of new capacity but we'll see how quickly this happens as it starts to really impact people's electric bills.
2) Regulation is helping renewables. Other than regulation regarding environmental aspects (think endangered critters or specified crop land) all the wind is at their back for renewables.
3) Oil and gas companies are actually jumping in the fray creating their own renewable companies. It takes a big balance sheet and patience to take a plant from idea to completion. BP lightsource, Shell new energies, Orsted coming into the US, etc.
Batteries are the new industry as you add those to renewables and they allow for load shifting but this is *currently* a pretty expensive way to get MWs, even with the ITC.
With hydrogen. They are working on some prototypes with this.
As stated by Whatever1984, the proliferation of renewables will not be based in investment into the capture, but the storage. I wrote about what investments in renewables looks like here.
1) I'm a big nuclear power guy, so I don't even think renewables should be end goal of being the primary commercial / industrial energy source. Many renewables full life-cycle emissions (production of equipment, energy usage to get them to be able to utilize their capacity factor) is higher than other forms of energy. Michael Shellenberger, renewable energy / anti-nuclear guy turned pro-nuclear guy, points out how Germany, at one point, increased their solar capacity by 3-5% in one year, but Germany's power generated from solar when down by 3-5% (don't remember the actual numbers, but they are in this range). He asked experts during a climate change roundtable, "Why? Why did this happen?" The answer is: it just wasn't that sunny that year. I would also caution to be too optimistic about renewables and watch his video, "
". Since renewables based on factors our of human control, I don't see renewables becoming the majority, barring major improvements in storage technology, provider of power. I see them definitely becoming a significant plurality. Separate of renewables: For nuclear, given the regulatory hurdles in the United States, high capex costs, and variable price of energy based on other power sources (natural gas, renewables, etc.), it is hard to invite investment into nuclear without a significant level of de-regulation. De-regulating nuclear does have some accompanying risk issues, but most companies would seek to implement their own ways to greatly reduce exposure to risk since nuclear power plants are 50-100 year investments.2) There aren't really many regulatory red tapes (there might be some that I am not aware of), mainly technological ones. People are investing in a renewable energy future, just not in the way you think. It's not about massive solar/wind fields or flashy new panels. It is all about the complementary technologies to our current energy sources and production processes. In many solar and wind projects there are three tranches of investors: Cash equity, tax equity, and senior debt. It is easy to entice capital to invest in solar projects since a cash return isn't needed for a large portion of the equity stack. You can juice the returns for the cash equity investor by folding in a tax equity investor.
3) I hope not. But the flip-side is just as bad. Having California get rid of combustion engines through regulation is bad policy. The improvement of combustion engine fuel efficiency, which helped reduce the cost of owning a vehicle to the customer, has been an excellent market force that simultaneously helped reduce emissions and reduce total gasoline usage, per capita. Humans have been incredible at being able to innovate and adapt over the long-haul. My prediction is that the market will eventually iron out into a primarily electric vehicle market. I cannot say the same for power to the home or industrial power usage. Until the market irons out for EV's or renewables in providing energy to industrial processes, oil & gas still have a higher capacity factor. They are more reliable. People will continue adapting to current technologies and creating new ones. Vehicles will continue to get more efficient. Electric vehicles will grow their market share. The oil & gas market will eventually shake out to only apply to usages that will likely not be replaced by batteries, renewables, or nuclear (trains, airplanes, ships).
I think renewables will continue growing in market share due to improvements in complementing technologies, but I do not think they will become the majority source of power.
Happy to hear your thoughts!
Nuclear is cheap and efficient but the waste storage problem remains a very important issue especially in heavily populated areas like Europe. Furthermore, it does not really integrate well with renewables since it ramps up and down very slowly.
Stop letting your ridiculous fear of nuclear waste kill the planet by Michael Shellenberger. The storage of nuclear waste does not present a significant problem since there is not that much of it. We can deal with the storage problem.
It does not need to integrate w renewables, it can address the areas renewables cannot service, if not outright replace renewables. It is cleaner in terms of Full Chain CO2.
Data:
International Atomic Energy Agency. Sustainable development and nuclear power. Vienna: IAEA, 2001.
I'm a big nuclear fan in principle, but the issue is that the Left has made nuclear so difficult and so expensive to get approved and built that it's basically a lost cause, which is super unfortunate. It's why I've kind of given up on nuclear. The global warming alarmists have shown their hand in their stringent, radical, hyperbolic opposition to nuclear energy, and nuclear's supporters simply aren't big enough in number or passionate enough in their defense/offense. So to me, it's a policy lost cause and no point in pursuing.
That said, I think nuclear fusion is going to completely upend the energy market. We've been working a century on net fusion, but like all things in life, things happen slowly and then quickly. The instant we get net fusion is the beginning of the end of this epoch of man and the lead up into the next epoch of mankind. I follow it pretty closely. Net fusion could happen tomorrow or in 10 or 20 years, but it's not 1,000 years away.
Agreed; I think this article sums it up nicely: https://seekingalpha.com/article/4386960-exxon-vs-green-new-deal-buy-exxon-you-5-10-even-20-year-plan
Energy demand is going to increase exponentially and while renewables power generation will increase, so will oil & gas just to meet the enormous energy needs in the future.
I always knew consultants and bankers liked to make linear forecasts 20 years ahead but I never thought they actually took them seriously
@mr.vipul'
I see guys here talking about deregulation a lot since I guess that's a popular term with republicans but the power markets will always be heavily regulated and that's how it should be. Someone selling or buying too many stocks/futures will not blackout an entire city! Renewables function very well in market-based solutions because their supply can be very volatile - but not "free market capitalism". If you guys want to do your own research instead of looking at dumbass TedX talks I suggest taking a look on https://transparency.entsoe.eu/
When people say "free market capitalism" they just mean "market capitalism." No one believes deregulation means zero regulation.
Saw this quick youtube video the other day on how we could supply the energy needs of the entire world if we set up an enormous solar farm in the Sahara desert. It would be utterly gargantuan--the size of New Mexico--but it would barely scratch the surface of the size of the Sahara itself. They didn't get into costs too much, but I assume $10-20 trillion(?) dollars or something like that to build. Given that it would probably take 20-30 years to build and that the entire world could chip in proportionately, it seems to me that it would be relatively affordable and a pretty great solution.
I think this awesome. Energy has always been the most interesting industry to me. It's so important and there's so much room for innovation/growth. Hopefully it can keep up and become even cheaper. There are some obvious issues with renewables like wind and solar, but over time I expect them to improve, along with geothermal, hyrdoelectric, and nuclear.
I personally work in the natural gas industry so hopefully I won't be homeless soon lol
Really is great to see an increased adoption. From an individual perspective, I’m really grateful to be working really closely on renewables. It gives me a sense of value / appreciation of the bigger picture in the work that I’m doing, even if I’m on the financing side (renewables and clean tech financing / investing).
Even though I’m only in my first year, I feel like I’ve learned such an incredible amount in this space and am genuinely excited to see how the energy industry evolves over the span of my career. There’s so many fascinating technologies and other developments right now, and it’s low-key pushing me to study an engineering degree
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