It’s clear that this week’s news report – much further CleanTechnica – Texas and some neighboring regions froze and lost electricity. The vast majority of the power plants that went offline were thermal power plants (mostly natural gas). They were not equipped enough for the cold. A number of wind turbines were also down because no one bought the ‘cold weather package’. (Note that there are a huge number of wind turbines in cold, snowy, icy climates that work well. The Texas problem was just a Texas problem with poor planning and cost savings.)
Even while some wind turbines were down, other wind turbines produced more than expected, helping the crisis. One of the wonderful things about renewable energy is that it is widely distributed, decentralized, reliable and resilient. The more renewable energy sources on a network, in general, the more reliable and resilient the network becomes.
Image courtesy of S&P Global
With that in mind, the following news sheds some light on a dark week: Texas is expected to add another 20 gigawatts (GW) of solar and wind power in the coming years, from 2021–2023. This is according to data from ERCOT (Electric Reliability Council Of Texas Inc.) on the development pipeline for the next few years. If Greg Abbott, Tucker Carlson and the shale gas mafia get their way, they will slow down the growth of clean energy. Blaming all the network problems that Texas seems wrong for other reasons for renewable energy is a good option for them. However, the response has been strong and broad to this nonsense, and ERCOT’s ‘free market’ approach to the grid will in any case remain apolitical on electricity sources, meaning buyers will have to choose the cheap renewable energy.
The world is turning to renewable energy, and that includes the energy capital of the United States. “The short-term additions – largely supported by interconnection financial deposits, federal tax incentives and power purchase agreements – would more than double ERCOT’s solar and wind footprint to 64 GW in just three years,” writes S&P Global.
Double !!#Texas will add 35 GW more wind + solar power over the next two years, which will double current capacity.
Also study the addition of 26 GW batteries. Https://t.co/QZJaSx4xeU #WWS # WindWaterSolar https://t.co/MU53ThPd9e
– Mark Z. Jacobson (@mzjacobson) 20 February 2021
In addition to wind and solar power, much growth is also expected in energy storage – something that would go a long, long way in a cold week like this. In fact, the expected growth in stationary energy storage on a percentage basis is much greater than even the wind and solar power growth.
Image courtesy of S&P Global
“According to ERCOT data, the installed battery capacity connected to its system could jump to 1.7 GW in 2021 and to 225 GW in 2020 to more than 2 GW in 2022. But it only scratches the surface of the more than 26 GW large-scale battery storage is studied in ERCOT’s deeper interconnection – more than wind and only the only one for solar power.
All of the above about storing wind, solar and batteries is about large-scale projects. There is also a competitive market for storing solar power and house energy on the roof, a market that needs to become popular in the midst of this natural disaster and a network disaster.
Tesla offers its seemingly unbeatable rate of $ 1.49 / watt in Texas, as elsewhere, and you also have the market leader Sunrun, SunPower and many others set up locally. They all now offer the roof-sun-plus-storage combination, and they all need to be able to lower the price of the electrical network – at least with roof-to-roof, if not also with the Powerwall energy storage system built-in.
In addition to the fact that there has been no power or water in the state for a period of time, interest must pile up in a more reliable, secure energy system in Texas. Stay tuned for more stories about it in the days, weeks and years ahead.
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