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(Former) FERC Chair Jon Wellinghoff: Solar ‘Is Going to Overtake Everything’
FERC Chair Jon Wellinghoff: Solar ‘Is Going to Overtake Everything’
One of the country’s top regulators explains why he is so bullish on solar.
HERMAN K. TRABISH: AUGUST 21, 2013
If anybody doubts that federal energy regulators are aware of the rapidly changing electricity landscape, they should talk to Jon Wellinghoff, chairman of the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (FERC).
“Solar is growing so fast it is going to overtake everything,” Wellinghoff told GTM last week in a sideline conversation at the National Clean Energy Summit in Las Vegas.
If a single drop of water on the pitcher’s mound at Dodger Stadium is doubled every minute, Wellinghoff said, a person chained to the highest seat would be in danger of drowning in an hour.
“That’s what is happening in solar. It could double every two years," he said.
Indeed, as ...
One of the country’s top regulators explains why he is so bullish on solar.
HERMAN K. TRABISH: AUGUST 21, 2013
If anybody doubts that federal energy regulators are aware of the rapidly changing electricity landscape, they should talk to Jon Wellinghoff, chairman of the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (FERC).
“Solar is growing so fast it is going to overtake everything,” Wellinghoff told GTM last week in a sideline conversation at the National Clean Energy Summit in Las Vegas.
If a single drop of water on the pitcher’s mound at Dodger Stadium is doubled every minute, Wellinghoff said, a person chained to the highest seat would be in danger of drowning in an hour.
“That’s what is happening in solar. It could double every two years," he said.
Indeed, as ...
http://www.greentechmedia.com/articles/read/ferc-chair-wellinghoff-sees-a-solar-future-and-a-utility-of-the-future?utm_source=Daily&utm_medium=Headline&utm_campaign=GTMDaily
11 replies
= new reply since forum marked as read
= new reply since forum marked as read
No harm in that, I'm sure. 
And in this case it is.
Conventional Wisdom About Clean Energy Is Still Way Out of Date
“It’s not 1990 anymore.”
CHRIS NELDER: MAY 9, 2013
"We're fifteen to twenty years out of date in how we think about renewables," said Dr. Eric Martinot to an audience at the first Pathways to 100% Renewables Conference held April 16 in San Francisco. "It's not 1990 anymore."
Dr. Martinot and his team recently compiled their 2013 Renewables Global Futures report from two years of research in which they conducted interviews with 170 experts and policymakers from fifteen countries, including local city officials and stakeholders from more than twenty cities. They also reviewed more than 50 recently published scenarios by credible international organizations, energy companies, and research institutes, along with government policy targets for renewable energy, and various corporate reports and energy literature.
The report observes that "[t]he history of energy scenarios is full of similar projections for renewable energy that proved too low by a factor of 10, or were achieved a decade earlier than expected." For example, the International Energy Agency's 2000 estimate for wind power in 2010 was 34 gigawatts, while the actual level was 200 gigawatts. The World Bank's 1996 estimate for China was 9 gigawatts of wind and 0.5 gigawatts for solar PV by 2020, but by 2011 the country had already achieved 62 gigawatts of wind and 3 gigawatts of PV.
Dr. Martinot's conclusion from this exhaustive survey? "The conservative scenarios are simply no longer credible."
There is now a yawning gap between "conservative" scenarios and more optimistic ones, as illustrated in this chart contrasting scenarios published in 2012 by entities like the IEA and ExxonMobil with those offered by groups like the International Institute for Applied Systems Analysis (an international scientific policy research organization), Greenpeace, and the World Wildlife Fund...
“It’s not 1990 anymore.”
CHRIS NELDER: MAY 9, 2013
"We're fifteen to twenty years out of date in how we think about renewables," said Dr. Eric Martinot to an audience at the first Pathways to 100% Renewables Conference held April 16 in San Francisco. "It's not 1990 anymore."
Dr. Martinot and his team recently compiled their 2013 Renewables Global Futures report from two years of research in which they conducted interviews with 170 experts and policymakers from fifteen countries, including local city officials and stakeholders from more than twenty cities. They also reviewed more than 50 recently published scenarios by credible international organizations, energy companies, and research institutes, along with government policy targets for renewable energy, and various corporate reports and energy literature.
The report observes that "[t]he history of energy scenarios is full of similar projections for renewable energy that proved too low by a factor of 10, or were achieved a decade earlier than expected." For example, the International Energy Agency's 2000 estimate for wind power in 2010 was 34 gigawatts, while the actual level was 200 gigawatts. The World Bank's 1996 estimate for China was 9 gigawatts of wind and 0.5 gigawatts for solar PV by 2020, but by 2011 the country had already achieved 62 gigawatts of wind and 3 gigawatts of PV.
Dr. Martinot's conclusion from this exhaustive survey? "The conservative scenarios are simply no longer credible."
There is now a yawning gap between "conservative" scenarios and more optimistic ones, as illustrated in this chart contrasting scenarios published in 2012 by entities like the IEA and ExxonMobil with those offered by groups like the International Institute for Applied Systems Analysis (an international scientific policy research organization), Greenpeace, and the World Wildlife Fund...
http://www.greentechmedia.com/articles/read/conventional-wisdom-about-clean-energy-is-way-out-of-date?utm_source=Solar&utm_medium=Picture&utm_campaign=GTMDaily
There is a lot of negativity on this board and a great deal of it is aimed at the timetable for deploying renewables. The study in the OP confirms my own research on this topic - research that forms the basis for my outlook on what is coming down the pike for our energy future.
The thoughts I share on the our energy future are often termed "overly optimistic" (to use the most polite phrase), and inevitably the person holding that view will buttresses their argument with the IEA or EIA numbers. I hope this post gives some food for thought for those who misuse the word Cornucopian to let me know they think I'm being unrealistic. One particular poster, in fact, just loves to use the EIA, BP and IEA numbers to create graphs reflecting his feelings of gloom and despair.
Let's recap the numbers above:
..."projections for renewable energy that proved too low by a factor of 10, or were achieved a decade earlier than expected"
in 2000 International Energy Agency saysin 2010 wind power will be at 34 gigawatts;
actual level was 200 gigawatts.
1996 World Bank estimate for China by 2020:
9 gigawatts of wind and 0.5 gigawatts for solar PV
China in 2011 has 62 gigawatts of wind and 3 gigawatts of PV (and they are just getting started - k)
10 years ahead of schedule and wind is 7X+ while solar is 6X. How much do you think they will exceed World Bank predictions by the time 2020 actually gets here?
So when you look at charts like this:
Or tables like this:
Remember who has a record of poor predictions. That isn't saying we are going to address this threat as fast as we need to, but at least let's start the discussion about what we are going to do with a realistic eye on what is good analysis and what isn't.
In 2011 China doubled down on building manufacturing and the prices started plummeting, causing the rate to rise to 74% in 2011.
Here is the global version of the chart in the OP
The number you floated was obviously hyperbole, but let's take a look at 4 doublings over the next ten years, or on second thought, to make it simpler I'll use a doubling every 3 years.
If cumulative capacity of solar were to double thru 2015 to 12.5GW, then double again through 2018, again thru 2021, and once more thru 2024, we could hit 100 GW of capacity at that time.
The US used 95.1 quads (1quad=1.05EJ or 33.5GWy) of PRIMARY ENERGY off all types in 2012. Of that, only 37 quads was actually consumed by a final user. This distinction is important.
If we assume a capacity factor of 18%, that 100GW of solar would be 18GWy of production for Final Consumption.
Total Energy produced by the US Electric Sector for Final Consumption was 415GWy in 2012.
Of that, nuclear provided 88GWy while renewables including hydro provided 127GWy. The remaining 200GWy were provided by coal and natural gas.
If 4 more doublings of solar occurred over an additional 12 years it would bring the total to 1600GW of capacity or - still assuming 18% cf - 288GWy of Final Consumption.
The EPA is preparing rules to regulate carbon emissions. How much room for continued growth do you see?
Oh, and before you answer that, you might want to consider one more important piece of the puzzle:
Cost of Solar Power to Drop 75% by 2020? US Military Embraces It
by Stuart Burns on AUGUST 20, 2013
Not one to shy away from overstatement, Ambrose Evans-Pritchard is not a writer we would normally quote extensively; well-renowned as the Telegraph newspaper is, for which he frequently writes in the Business section, but his article last week on solar power trumping shale gas even had us sitting up and taking notice.
True, many of the figures quoted in his article come from firms involved in the solar industry and as such we can expect them to put a positive gloss on the numbers, but we wouldn’t count the US Energy Department to be biased and they are quoted as saying they expect the cost of solar power to fall by 75% between 2010 and 2020.
By then, average costs will have dropped to $1 per watt for big solar farms, $1.25 for offices and $1.50 for homes, achieving what the Telegraph terms the Holy Grail of grid parity with new coal and gas plants without further need for subsidies. That’s the crunch, isn’t it – the subsidies. But if we think subsidies in the US or UK have been high, consider Germany, early starter in the solar power race.
Households have been bled dry to subsidize solar power – around €100 billion or more has been frittered away on costly feed-in tariffs. In addition, German investors have lost their shirts on a string of solar ventures that have gone bankrupt, only to see the gains leaked out to copycat companies in China which are able to undercut German rivals in their own market with cheap labor and giveaway credit.
Still, that artificially created market has spurred investment around the world; even the US defense establishment is heavily involved, with Evans-Pritchard quoting a string of projects, each of which will help bring down costs and improve efficiencies....
by Stuart Burns on AUGUST 20, 2013
Not one to shy away from overstatement, Ambrose Evans-Pritchard is not a writer we would normally quote extensively; well-renowned as the Telegraph newspaper is, for which he frequently writes in the Business section, but his article last week on solar power trumping shale gas even had us sitting up and taking notice.
True, many of the figures quoted in his article come from firms involved in the solar industry and as such we can expect them to put a positive gloss on the numbers, but we wouldn’t count the US Energy Department to be biased and they are quoted as saying they expect the cost of solar power to fall by 75% between 2010 and 2020.
By then, average costs will have dropped to $1 per watt for big solar farms, $1.25 for offices and $1.50 for homes, achieving what the Telegraph terms the Holy Grail of grid parity with new coal and gas plants without further need for subsidies. That’s the crunch, isn’t it – the subsidies. But if we think subsidies in the US or UK have been high, consider Germany, early starter in the solar power race.
Households have been bled dry to subsidize solar power – around €100 billion or more has been frittered away on costly feed-in tariffs. In addition, German investors have lost their shirts on a string of solar ventures that have gone bankrupt, only to see the gains leaked out to copycat companies in China which are able to undercut German rivals in their own market with cheap labor and giveaway credit.
Still, that artificially created market has spurred investment around the world; even the US defense establishment is heavily involved, with Evans-Pritchard quoting a string of projects, each of which will help bring down costs and improve efficiencies....
