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Author Topic: The Big Picture of Renewable Energy Growth  (Read 36398 times)

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AGelbert

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Re: The Big Picture of Renewable Energy Growth
« Reply #315 on: May 24, 2018, 07:54:25 pm »

Grist

We know what the Kochs 🦕 want. What about major foundations?

By Nathanael Johnson on May 23, 2018

SNIPPET:
 
Big charitable foundations that shape the climate movement dole out cash for renewables and energy efficiency. 

But where’s the love for nuclear power, carbon capture, and geoengineering? 

It’s nonexistent. That’s the finding of a new paper published this week by Matthew Nisbet, a professor at Northeastern University who studies climate change communication.

Full article:

https://grist.org/article/foundations-pour-money-into-tackling-climate-change-but-not-curbing-carbon/

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AGelbert

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Re: The Big Picture of Renewable Energy Growth
« Reply #316 on: May 28, 2018, 09:23:48 pm »
MAY 27, 2018 JUAN COLE

China’s Green Shift Positions It to Overtake U.S. in Energy, Security

SNIPPET:

The Guardian reports that air pollution in 62 Chinese cities fell by 30 percent between 2013 and 2016, according to the World Health Organization. Beijing, the capital, fell from a global fourth-place ranking on polluted air to 187th.

I was in Beijing in March 2015 for a conference, and did a jaunt out to the Great Wall, bringing my camera. I needn’t have bothered. That day, at least, you couldn’t see more than 50 feet away from your face, and my dreams of photographs of the wall stretching out into the distance were dashed. I was there for a week and my throat got sore from just breathing the air. Things are quickly improving, though. The smog in those 62 cities was largely being caused by burning coal, for household heating and industrial purposes. Coal is the worst emitter of carbon dioxide among the hydrocarbon fuels, but it also puts out, when you burn it, lots of particulate matter that causes lung problems, heart attacks, mercury poisoning and cancer.

Last year, the concentration of PM2.5, or tiny motes of particulate matter smaller than 2.5 microns, which can lodge in the lungs, was down about 40 percent in greater Beijing, compared with 2012.

China’s coal use has fallen enormously as a proportion of its electricity generation. It used to provide 80 percent of China’s electricity, but that is down to 65 percent and falling rapidly as a proportion. Even in absolute terms, despite a minor uptick in 2017, coal use has been declining since 2013.


A recent Brookings study by Wenjuan Dong and Ye Qi says,

“In 2017, renewable energy encompassed 36.6% of China’s total installed electric power capacity, and 26.4% of total power generation. According to Energy Production and Consumption Revolution Strategy 2016-2030, by 2030, 50% of total electric power generation will be from non-fossil energy sources, including nuclear and renewable energy.”
These are astonishing statistics for one of the world’s two largest economies.

Although nuclear energy remains important, most new electricity generation in China in the past six years has come from renewables, according to a just-published paper by John A. Matthews with Xin Huang in the Asia-Pacific Journal that a friend sent me this morning.

This is its key chart:


Matthews argues that massive Chinese adoption of solar panels is the major cause for the rapid decline in their price since 2012, and that this price drop will continue. Likewise, he argues that for all the hype about China building new nuclear plants, it has in fact put most of its eggs with regard to new energy generation in the wind power basket.

New solar power bids are now being occasionally let for less than 3 cents a kilowatt hour. Coal is at least 5 cents a kilowatt hour, if you don’t count its environmental damage. If you take that into account, it is likely closer to 80 cents a kilowatt hour. With regard to China, the Brookings study notes, “In the most recently concluded Third Photovoltaic venture base bidding in China, the bid price for electricity continuously came in new lows. For example, the last two bids for cities Golmud and Delingha, both in Qinghai, came in at 0.31 RMB per kWh, which is even lower than the 0.3247 RMB per kWh price for on-grid desulfurized coal-fired electricity.” Even today, Chinese solar is cheaper than coal, and the competitive advantage of solar will only increase over the next decade.

Matthews further makes an important set of arguments about China’s green shift and global power. By generating its own electricity through renewables and by switching in a big way to electric cars, China is preparing for a vast reduction in its imports of hydrocarbons. In turn, that move makes China less vulnerable to hydrocarbon blackmail or blockade and increases its energy security.

The United States uses about 20 million barrels of petroleum a day. Despite the new production enabled by hydraulic fracturing, its own oil production is about half that. Some oil produced in the U.S., especially in Alaska and the West, can be more cheaply exported abroad than sent to the East Coast where the demand is. You see pundits and Big Oil propagandists hype U.S. production and U.S. exports, but the fact is that the U.S. still imports nearly half of the oil it needs to run its economy, and some of those imports come from unstable places like Saudi Arabia and Venezuela. On transportation (the major use of petroleum), the U.S. is highly vulnerable.

China put 680,000 electric vehicles 👀 on the road last year, and plans to be doing 2 million a year by 2020. These EVs will increasingly be fueled by renewable energy, reducing Chinese dependence on Saudi Arabia and Iran.

Full article:

https://www.truthdig.com/articles/chinas-green-shift-is-positioning-it-to-overtake-u-s-in-energy-technology-and-security/
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AGelbert

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Re: The Big Picture of Renewable Energy Growth
« Reply #317 on: June 07, 2018, 01:49:01 pm »


June 6, 2018: Warren Buffett’s MidAmerican Energy says it will be the first investor-owned utility to get 100% of its power from renewables. A record amount of wind and solar capacity was installed globally in 2017 with new investment reaching nearly $279 billion. In a first, California’s grid got more power from solar than gas on a monthly basis.

TEXANS LIKE TO DO THINGS BIG!

Tallest Wind Turbine in the U.S.  installed at West Texas A&M University
WTAMU Graduate School

Published on May 18, 2018

Installation of the GW 3MW(S) Smart Wind Turbine at the UL Advanced Wind Turbine Test Facility at West Texas A&M University in Canyon, Texas.



For the first time, California’s grid got more power from solar than gas on a monthly basis. In May, utility-scale solar provided nearly 17% of generation on the state’s grid, while gas provided around 15%. That data does not include rooftop solar or other distributed solar generation. While May is the third-sunniest month of the year, the long-term trend shows solar and other renewables replacing gas. (PV Magazine)




Tesla has installed a gigawatt-hour of energy storage (that’s a lot), which has helped bring down costs.
Industry-wide, the cost of battery storage fell 73% between 2010 and 2016, and it is predicted to continue to drop. In Australia, Tesla has installed the world’s largest lithium-ion battery, which is saving consumers millions of dollars. In Puerto Rico, the company has installed microgrids on more than 1,000 households. Tesla thinks its battery scale-up has increased public awareness of the technology. In other storage news this week, Arizona announced it is building the country’s first standalone battery peaker  ;D outside of California. (Fast Company, Greentech Media)



Iowa-based MidAmerican Energy is going 100% renewable, saying it will be the first investor-owned utility to meet that milestone. The utility plans to invest $922 million in new wind power, with the added capacity allowing the company to freeze consumer rates, potentially up to 15 years. MidAmerican owns 27 wind farms across Iowa. If the plan is approved by regulators, the company will have invested around $12.3 billion in wind in the state since 2014. This new project would create about 300 construction jobs, 28 permanent jobs, and add around $7 million more in state property tax payments. (Des Moines Register)
 

A record-breaking amount of wind and solar power was installed globally last year, a new report says, as the price of renewables continues to fall. An estimated 178 GW of renewable power was added worldwide in 2017 - representing 70% of net additions - according to a new report from the renewables policy organization REN21. New investment in renewables was nearly $279 billion, more than double what went to new fossil fuel and nuclear power capacity. Despite the progress, carbon emissions rose last year for the first time in four years, as population and energy demand grew. The authors of the report noted that while renewables are surging ahead in the electricity sector, they still have a ways to go when it comes to heating, cooling and transport. (Reuters)



The Environmental Protection 👹Agency advanced its plan to weaken pollution standards for passenger vehicles, by submitting its proposal to the Office of Management and Budget for review. The new rules would roll back an Obama-era requirement that automakers nearly double the fuel efficiency of cars to an average of more than 50 miles per gallon by 2025, which would have significantly lowered emissions from the transportation sector. The proposal also calls into question California’s right to require tougher fuel standards than those set by the federal government - a right granted to the state under the 1970 Clean Air Act. California has said they will fight the new rules if they are approved. (New York Times $)


As many 100,000 jobs could be lost in Germany as the electric vehicle market grows, a new study says. The country’s automakers and IG Metall labor union commissioned the study, which found that the transition away from gas and diesel vehicles could affect more than half of the 210,000 workers in that country that develop and produce powertrains for cars. The head of the labor union said that despite the challenges, the transition can be managed with strategies from politicians and industry that address retraining and industrial employment policy. (CNN Money)


"With wind, we don't need to buy fuel to make the energy ⚡," said Adam Wright, MidAmerican's CEO, on the utility’s plan to cover 100 percent of their consumer electricity demand with renewable energy. "This is a big reason why MidAmerican Energy's rates are 37 percent below the national average."   
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AGelbert

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Re: The Big Picture of Renewable Energy Growth
« Reply #318 on: June 11, 2018, 01:21:11 pm »
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Reinventing Power Documentary Highlights Community Benefits Of Renewable Energy

June 11th, 2018 by Steve Hanley

Fear is one of the primary human emotions. Fear of the unknown. Fear of new ideas that disrupt conventional wisdom. Fear is a significant factor in the concerns people have about electric vehicles and renewable energy. Those who have a stake in the status quo🐉🦕🦖 play on our fears to protect their vested interests. They talk about range anxiety and grid resiliency to make us believe the way we did things years ago is the way we should continue doing things in the future.

Reinventing Power is a new documentary produced by Transit Pictures for the Sierra Club. It’s focus is not to preach about the morality of renewable energy — how it will save the Earth, polar bears, and piping plovers — but how renewables are helping people find new economic opportunities that benefit themselves and their communities. It is a film designed to extinguish the fears about renewables fostered by fossil fuel companies and replace it with an acceptance of the benefits that will flow from a transition to renewable energy.

New Jersey Offshore Wind Tubines

“A lot of the arguments you hear about clean energy are moral — like it’s the right thing to do,” Brennon Edwards, head of Transit Pictures, tells Fast Company. “We wanted to go for something different, and show how renewable energy is revitalizing communities and revitalizing industries. There’s basically no political or celebrity attachment to it. These are just real Americans who are having this change affect their lives, and it’s happening all over the country.”

At present, there are more than 800,000 Americans working in the renewable energy sector of the US economy. One of them is Chris Bruce of Michigan, who lost his job in the auto industry in 2008. “After I lost my job, I had about three days of sulking, and then I got up and decided to listen to some of my co-workers’ advice to look into wind turbines,” he says in the documentary. Now he works as a wind turbine engineer.

“We’re telling the story of the clean energy revolution through the voices of the people who are benefiting from it,” says Mary Ann Hitt, director of the Sierra Club’s Beyond Coal campaign. “We wanted the viewers to be able to see themselves in these stories, because there’s still a lot of fear and anxiety around transitioning away from fossil fuels.”

The people in the film include Horace Pritchard, a farmer who lives near Elizabeth City, North Carolina. He was approached about installing wind turbines on his property a decade ago. Today, the lease he has with the wind energy company pays his bills and he is still able to farm most of the land the way he has always done. Pritchard says some of his neighbors also have wind turbines on their farms. Their only concern is that there aren’t enough of them because the turbines provide a more reliable income than farming.


The film focuses on the first offshore wind project in the United States off the shores of Block Island. Power from that installation has allowed the island to shut down its diesel-powered generating plant, eliminating a source of noise and pollution that interfered with its main economic activity — tourism. In its place, new industries have emerged. Locals now take tourists out on the water to view the wind farm up close. Commercial fisherman report they are catching more fish near the turbines than they ever did before in that area. One segment of the documentary follows Bryan Wilson of Deepwater Wind, the company that built the offshore wind farm, as he tells how wind power has transformed Block Island.


The current political rhetoric in America is that renewables are responsible for job losses and are weakening the industries that made America great decades ago. But those industries are dying of their own accord, says Mary Ann Hitt. Renewable energy benefits all Americans, especially those in so-called red states and rural areas, she adds.

“Renewables will require us to rebuild the entire energy infrastructure,” Brennon Edwards says. “Our energy infrastructure is crumbling and it has to be rebuilt one way or another. This is happening regardless of politics.”

The current administration relies on fear to advance its agenda, including its ill conceived and illegal plan to prop up coal and nuclear power with taxpayer dollars. Reinventing Power seeks to address those fears and show that a nation that aspires to true greatness must embrace the future, not the past. The documentary will be available June 27. You can contact the Sierra Club to learn more about how to screen the film for your friends, family, or members of your community.

https://cleantechnica.com/2018/06/11/reinventing-power-documentary-highlights-community-benefits-of-renewable-energy/
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AGelbert

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Re: The Big Picture of Renewable Energy Growth
« Reply #319 on: June 12, 2018, 01:01:16 pm »
Agelbert NOTE: "IEEFA" stands for the "Energy Finance Studies at the Institute for Energy Economics and Financial Analysis" in Sydney, Australia. 😎

India’s New 227 Gigawatt Renewable Energy Target Is Ambitious, Challenging, But Possible, Says IEEFA   

June 12th, 2018 by Joshua S Hill

The announcement earlier this month from India’s power and renewable energy minister RK Singh that his country will increase its interim renewable energy target from 175 gigawatts (GW) by 2022 up to 227 GW has been heavily lauded, and though it “does look excessively ambitious,” according to Tim Buckley from the Institute for Energy Economics and Financial Analysis, he nevertheless believes it is possible.

India’s power and renewable energy minister RK Singh announced last week that his government believes it will overachieve on its existing interim renewable energy of having 175 GW worth of renewable energy by 2022. As such, the minister announced that India was increasing its 2022 target by 52 GW up to 227 GW, which he said would require an additional $50 billion worth of investments over the next few years.

Siemens Gamesa India

Already the world’s fifth-largest country in terms of installed renewable energy capacity with 70 GW, and another 40 GW under tendering or construction, India has been one of the leading locations for solar development in the world. As a country designated as “emerging,” India’s economy is growing at a rate which requires significant energy capacity additions, but to remain in line with the Paris Climate Agreement, the country needs to cut down on its reliance upon fossil fuel sources like coal.

The big question, therefore, is not whether India has the ambition — India has repeatedly shown it has the ambition for huge renewable energy goals but whether India has the means by which to pull off such a mammoth task, considering how far they have to go in under five years.

To answer this question I spoke to Tim Buckley, the Director of Energy Finance Studies at the Institute for Energy Economics and Financial Analysis (IEEFA) in Sydney, Australia. The IEEFA have been closely monitoring India’s energy sector for years, now, and are regarded as some of the world’s leading experts on the sector and its future. As a whole, “IEEFA remains very confident in the impressively growing renewable energy installation trends evident across India, with the Ministry of New and Renewable Energy (MNRE) to-date delivering on its ambitious tendering targets that could see 30-40 GW of annual renewable energy tenders finalised in 2018 and 2019 in order to build a pipeline of projects to put India on track for its long-term vision of 275 GW of renewable energy by 2027 as articulated in the National Electricity Plan 2018 (NEP 2018).”


However, the goal-posts under which these projects were awarded have now been extended. Can India deliver on its new target with the work it has already done?

“The suggestion that India will lift its interim renewable energy target for 2022 from 175 GW to 228 GW does look excessively ambitious relative to the installation activity of 16 GW annually in the last two fiscal years,” Tim Buckley explained to me. “But the level of ambition in India to deliver improved energy security, to wean itself off excessive and costly fossil fuel imports and to drive less polluting, more sustainable economic growth over the long term are clear and ambitious goals of the Modi government.”

According to Buckley, one of the biggest issues for India is going to be integrating so much new variable renewable energy into the country’s electricity grid.

“Grid integration is going to be serious challenge for India to achieve its variable renewable targets, no doubt,” Buckley explained. “Grid investment has been significantly accelerated, but even more will be needed to accommodate greater interstate transmission requirements. But India is currently moving domestic coal up to 1,500 km by rail to coal plants in Southern India – and rail capacity constraints are real and growing. Any suggestion that new non-mine mouth coal is cost competitive and sustainable is ridiculous, particularly given it takes over a decade to open up new interstate rail capacity.”

Coal Mine Dhanbad India

Quote
Coal has already taken a hit from India’s renewable energy drive, with net new thermal power added in the last two years averaging only 6 GW annually, according to IEEFA, down two-thirds on the previous four years. 

“If India were to more than double renewable energy installations to over 30 GW annually, India would have no need for any new thermal power capacity other than possibly some replacement capacity for the 48 GW of thermal power capacity coming to the end of its useful life by 2027,” Buckley explained. “With the average coal fired power plant’s utilisation rate averaging just 57% in 2017/18 across India, there is already excess thermal capacity in the system. With new low cost renewables, it is hard to see almost any financial institutions willing to fund new non-mine mouth coal fired capacity in India.”

Another important point worth making is the role that this new renewable energy target can play in achieving other goals and needs in India’s future. Beyond decreasing the country’s reliance on coal, the country is in need of new jobs, economic development and growth, and India is growing — India is expected to overtake China in terms of population by the middle of the next decade — and with that comes a natural growth of the country’s energy capacity, which the IEEFA expects to grow to 619 GW by 2027. While renewable energy will account for 44% of installed capacity (though less in terms of share of production), it will help to push thermal power generation down from 67% in 2017 to 43% in 2027.

“India has a need for some 20 million new jobs annually, so I would ask why can’t India deliver on this RE target to drive more sustainable growth?” Buckley asks.

“India’s electricity system requires production to grow 5-6% annually for at least the next decade, so this level of total capacity growth is entirely justified and needed. If international capital providers like SoftBank, Macquarie Group, Sembcorp and ENGIE and domestic power majors like Tata, Adani, Greenko, Renew Power, NTPC and Power Grid Corp are willing to provide the magnitude of investment required, India has the clear need for clean energy, and the world has a critical requirement for India to show an energy system transformation can be done successfully if the Paris Climate Agreement is to be achieved. Affordable clean energy will also underpin Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s Make in India strategy.”

India has also set its renewable energy tariffs at 10% to 20% below the cost of existing domestic Indian thermal power generation which, according to Buckley, is “a key factor” making the new renewable energy target “entirely economically rational … One only has to see the latest 500MW wind tariff result for Gujarat in June 2018. A result of Rs2.43-2.45/kWh (US$36/MWh), equal to the record low tariff set in 2017. A fixed flat with no inflation indexation for 25 years. Brilliant and deflationary.”

With the necessary political ambition and economics, what else needs to happen for India to achieve such a mammoth renewable energy target?
Quote
227 GW of RE by 2022 would be a truly herculean task, and probably should be only considered an aspirational direction on the path to the NEP 2027 plan,” Buckley told me.

“Beyond massive interstate grid upgrades, international export markets for Indian generated electricity would need to be created in Bangladesh, Nepal, Bhutan and Myanmar, and a significant step up in pumped hydro storage capacity would also be a must, given the lack of competitively priced domestic gas for peaking capacity.

“But India is transforming its grid, and the level of historic inefficiencies have seen industry build 51GW of captive thermal power capacity, and I’ve seen reports there are upwards of 70GW of backup diesel generators, so far better India invests in the on-grid lower cost alternatives of variable renewables supported by properly costed on-grid peaking generation alternatives.”


http://www.dnaindia.com/business/report-gujarat-urja-vikas-nigam-can-buy-500-mw-wind-power-at-rs-243unit-2622190

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AGelbert

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Re: The Big Picture of Renewable Energy Growth
« Reply #320 on: June 14, 2018, 02:19:01 pm »
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Scotland Hits Annual GHG Emissions Target Third Year Running

June 13th, 2018 by Joshua S Hill

Scotland’s Climate Change Secretary announced this week that the country met its statutory annual greenhouse gas emissions target for the third year in a row in 2016, which resulted in emissions being down 49% on a 1990 baseline.

Wind Farm in Scotland

scotland wind energyScotland announced on Tuesday the publication of its latest report detailing the country’s progress on reducing greenhouse gas emissions, based on its most recent and complete data, 2016. According to the new Official Statistics report from the Scottish Government, greenhouse gas source emissions were down 49% from 1990 to 38.6 million tonnes of carbon dioxide equivalent (MtCO2e) in 2016, representing a 10.3% decline since 2015. When these figures are adjusted to account for Scotland’s participation in European Union-wide emissions trading, they are down 45.2% to 41.481 MtCO2e in 2016, and down 2.5% from 2015.

In comparison to other western European countries, Scotland is second only to Sweden which has decreased its emissions by 51%, and they stand ahead of Finland with 42%, Germany with 25%, and Denmark with 23%.

“These statistics are hugely encouraging and show we have almost halved the greenhouse gases emitted in Scotland – underlining our role as an international leader in the fight against climate change,” said Scottish Climate Change Secretary Roseanna Cunningham. “But we must go further and faster if we are to meet our responsibilities to our children, grandchildren, and future generations.

“Our ambitious Climate Change Bill will ensure we do exactly that – by setting a new 90% reduction target for 2050 and paving the way towards achieving net-zero emissions as soon as possible.”

Of the basket of greenhouse gasses monitored by Scotland, it is unsurprising that carbon dioxide accounted for 70.8% of the total. The next closest was methane, which only accounted for 16.8%.

The largest source of net emissions in 2016 was the Transport sector with 14.4 MtCO2e, followed by the Agriculture and Related Land Use sector with 10 MtCO2e. The only sector which was able to display a net emissions sink was the Forestry sector, with -12.7 MtCO2e.


Expanding the timeline out to 1990, the emissions from the Energy Supply sector (such as power stations) from 1990 to 2016 was 15.6 MtCO2e, a 68.5% reduction. Waste Management Emissions such as those from landfills worked out to be 4.4 MtCO2e, a 72.8% reduction, while the decrease in the Business and Industrial Process sector was 5.8 MtCO2e, a reduction of 40.5%.

“It’s fantastic to hear that Scotland has hit its annual climate change target for the third year in a row,” said Claire Mack, Chief Executive of Scottish Renewables, the country’s renewable energy trade body, speaking in response to the report’s release. “The announcement today shows that setting ambitious targets is the best way to achieve results.

“The energy supply sector has seen the largest reduction in CO2 emissions, with a 68.5% reduction since 1990. This demonstrates that phasing out fossil fuels in favour of clean, green alternatives is having the desired effect.”

“It’s great news that Scotland has hit the annual target and reduced its climate emissions by 45% compared to the 1990 baseline and is well ahead of the 42% 2020 target,” added Tom Ballantine, Chair of Stop Climate Chaos Scotland (SCCS). “Everyone who has played their part in achieving this reduction should be proud.

Back in 2009, when Scotland’s first Climate Act was passed, there was no clear path to meeting the 42 per cent emissions reduction target and many were sceptical it could be achieved.

Today’s results show that setting stretching targets works by driving innovation and strong policy delivery. This success, along with support from the public, leading scientists and farming groups, should give the Scottish Government the confidence to aim high once again and set a net zero emissions target, by 2050 at the latest   , in the new Climate Change Bill.

“2016 reflects the first full year since the closure of Longannet power station, showing the big impact you can have by phasing out dirty coal and switching to clean renewables.

https://cleantechnica.com/2018/06/13/scotland-hits-annual-ghg-emissions-target-third-year-running/
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AGelbert

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Re: The Big Picture of Renewable Energy Growth
« Reply #321 on: June 28, 2018, 10:25:11 pm »


Pumped Hydropower 💦  Plus Wind 💨, Solar 🌞 Is Path To 100 Percent Renewable Energy ✨

The muddled path to 100 percent renewable energy just got a little bit clearer.🌈

June 27, 2018

By Jennifer Runyon [Chief Editor]

The first grid-scale storage summit took place in Charlotte, NC in June 25-26, 2018.
         
If you want to build pumped storage hydropower plants, don’t talk about pumped storage hydropower. That was the message delivered by Adam Rousselle, president of Renewable Energy Aggregators (REA) during the first Grid-Scale Storage Summit, which took place on June 25-26 in Charlotte, NC.https://www.renewableenergyworld.com/articles/2018/06/pumped-hydropower-plus-wind-solar-is-path-to-100-percent-renewable-energy.html?cmpid=enl_rew_energy_storage_news_2018-06-28&pwhid=f38b2fe677b8fe8d4ae5dd34fd096ae59834ce647c289dc39f793c18f7092595493fa5cac5e646c06acf44a4d539d9f4d8c70b6f2664f259baa2fcbc9d77bd1e&eid=388097756&bid=2156441

Rouselle said his company, which develops pumped storage power plants, decided to approach the market differently than most hydropower developers, who are often stymied by what they perceive as a lack of market opportunities for the technology.

Quote
“We approached the business by asking a different question. ‘When could you do it? Under what geologic circumstances is it possible?’” he said.

His business set out to follow the money and he found an answer in the form of corporates and other entities committed to clean energy.

Related: Corporates #RocktheGrid by Driving Up Renewable Energy Demand

Rouselle cited a National Renewable Energy Laboratory study that indicated that customers are willing to pay a 1.837-cent premium for renewable energy and went straight to those customers, which include corporations like Anheuser Busch and cities such as Philadelphia, which have committed to using renewable energy.

Quote
“They want to buy renewables 24/7/365 and they can't have it,” he said.

Since wind and solar power depend on the sun shining and the wind blowing, one way to deliver 100 percent renewable energy to a customer is by pairing that energy with pumped hydropower storage.

“So the question is where can you site pumped storage electrically proximate to what we call renewable energy load centers?” he asked. Renewable energy load centers are regions in which renewable energy is in demand and the existing transmission grid is congested.

Rouselle said that with assistance from power flow software, his company set out to acquire renewables in congested areas and figure out where to site pumped storage near them to help alleviate that congestion.

Quote
“Our business model is to aggregate renewables and firm them and deliver [that energy] to those customers through a PPA,” he explained.

“It won't work everywhere,” he cautioned but there are lots of cases in which it will work.

Renewable Energy Aggregators is currently building two 500-MW pumped storage hydropower plants in Pennsylvania and FERC recently determined that the plants will not need a license from the government organization to operate.

According to a recent press release, the facilities will exclusively use renewable energy to pump ground water from abandoned and flooded coalmines. FERC was able to issue a favorable order because REA's design uses no surface or otherwise navigable waters.

The company has additional pumped-storage projects in development to which the FERC orders may also apply.

“We make pumped storage hydro, but I'm not in the pumped storage hydro business. It's not what we do,” said Rouselle.

Quote
“We deliver renewable energy to customers that want to write a check and the selected technology happens to be pumped storage hydro,” he said.

https://www.renewableenergyworld.com/articles/2018/06/pumped-hydropower-plus-wind-solar-is-path-to-100-percent-renewable-energy.html
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AGelbert

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Re: The Big Picture of Renewable Energy Growth
« Reply #322 on: July 09, 2018, 07:52:24 pm »
Sweden Will Reach Its 2030 Renewable Energy Target This Year
JULY 5, 2018

By Joe McCarthy

Renewable energy can now viably replace fossil fuels.  

Why Global Citizens Should Care

Sweden is showing that renewable energy can viably replace fossil fuels, a transition that is necessary to protect the planet from the worst consequences of climate change. You can join us in taking action on this issue here.

Sweden is on pace to reach its 2030 target for renewable energy more than a decade ahead of schedule, according to Bloomberg — and wind energy 💨 is the driving factor.

For the past several years, windmill installations have soared throughout the country because of government subsidies, Business Day reports.

Sweden will have 3,681 windmills operating throughout the country by the end of 2018, and enough windmill capacity by 2020 for 12 gigawatts of energy, according to the Swedish Wind Energy Association.

In 2011, the country was only producing around 3 gigawatts of energy, Bloomberg notes.

The US, by comparison, has more than 52,000 windmills, but a population that’s more than 30 times greater than Sweden’s.

The other main source of renewable energy in Sweden is hydropower, which accounts for around half of its electricity production. Nuclear energy accounts for the bulk of the country’s remaining electricity supply, which, while not renewable, doesn’t release greenhouse gas emissions.

Read More:
Fighting Climate Change Could Save the World $30 Trillion, Report Finds

If Sweden reaches its renewable energy target ahead of schedule, it may set more ambitious targets and pursue a wholly renewable electricity grid by 2030.

Other countries are reaching their renewable energy targets early, fulfilling the Paris climate agreement’s vision of countries being able to update their goals every few years.

China, for instance, reached its 2020 emissions target 600 days ahead of schedule earlier this year and is investing three times as much as the US on renewable sources of energy.

Nordic countries, meanwhile, are transcending fossil fuels altogether. Both Iceland and Denmark can produce all of their electricity through renewables, according to the Independent.

Read More: Germany Produced Enough Renewable Energy in 6 Months for the Rest of 2018

Elsewhere, Costa Rica gets nearly all of its electricity from hydropower, and Portugal generated 103% of its electricity from renewables in March.

These achievements show that renewable energy can viably replace fossil fuels 🦖.

If investments continue to increase in clean energy alternatives, then the Paris climate agreement’s goal of keeping global temperatures from rising more than 2 degrees Celsius above pre-industrial levels may be within reach.

TOPICS Environment Finance & innovation Current events Wind power Renewable energy Hydropower Paris climate agreement Wind Nuclear energy Wind energy


https://www.globalcitizen.org/en/content/sweden-reach-renewable-energy-goal-this-year/
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AGelbert

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Re: The Big Picture of Renewable Energy Growth
« Reply #323 on: July 09, 2018, 08:07:29 pm »


July 9, 2018

#Energiewende

Bundesamt für Naturschutz

No change in support for energy transition – survey 

A majority of 61 percent of the German population think the transition to an energy system dominated by renewables is the right way to go, 30 percent are undecided and 7 percent 🦖 are opposed to the idea, the 2017 edition of the bi-annual survey on “nature awareness” conducted by the Federal Environmental Protection Agency (Bundesamt für Naturschutz) shows. The results were the same in 2015. In 2013 acceptance of the energy transition (Energiewende) was lower, at 56 percent. 😎

https://www.bmu.de/fileadmin/Daten_BMU/Pools/Broschueren/naturbewusstseinsstudie_2017_de_bf.pdf
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AGelbert

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Re: The Big Picture of Renewable Energy Growth
« Reply #324 on: July 10, 2018, 04:18:19 pm »
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Global Clean Energy Investment On Par With 2017, Hits $138.2 Billion In First Half    
July 10th, 2018 by Joshua S Hill

Bloomberg New Energy Finance has published its latest clean energy investment figures for the first six months of 2018 which reached $138.2 billion, down only 1% on the same six months a year earlier in 2017, while investment in the second quarter actually increased compared to a year earlier.

However, the real takeaway from these latest figures is not so much the overall picture, but the mixture of highs and lows, because while the overall picture is healthy, investment in the solar industry fell while wind power and energy smart technologies increased.

In the overall, clean energy investment rebounded in the second quarter as compared to the first quarter of 2018. Figures published in April by Bloomberg New Energy Finance (BNEF) showed that the first quarter investment figures only hit $61.1 billion, down 10% on the previous quarter. The second quarter did much better, however, increasing year-over-year to $76.7 billion, thus helping bring the total for the first half of the year up to a respectable $138.2 billion, down only 1% on the same period a year earlier.

It was the sectoral picture, however, that is most important to look at. Solar investment was down 19% to $71.6 billion over the first half of 2018 as compared to the same half a year earlier. Meanwhile, wind investment was up 33% to $57.2 billion thanks to several mammoth large-scale project financing which were recorded in the first half of the year. These included the $1.5 billion taken in for the 731.5 megawatt (MW) Borssele 3 and 4 offshore wind farm in Dutch waters, $1 billion raised for the 478 MW Hale County onshore wind project in Texas, and $627 million for the 120 MW Formosa 1 project — which we have covered before and expands upon the first offshore wind farm in Taiwanese waters.

For the solar industry, however, BNEF analysts highlighted two main developments which caused the slippage in first-half investment figures — a drop in capital costs for solar PV projects, which therefore means fewer dollars are needed to build even more; and a drop-off in China’s solar installation boom, heralded by the country’s decision to cap solar installations.

“On June 1, the Chinese government released a policy document restricting new solar installations that require a national subsidy, with immediate effect,” explained Justin Wu, head of Asia-Pacific at BNEF. “We expect this to lead to sharp drop in installations in China this year, compared to 2017’s spectacular record of 53 [gigawatts (GW)].”

“It will also mean overcapacity in solar manufacturing globally, and yet steeper price falls,” added Pietro Radoia, senior solar analyst at BNEF. “Before the Chinese announcement, our team was already expecting a 27% fall in PV module prices this year. Now we have revised that to a 34% drop, to an end-2018 global average of 24.4 US cents per watt.”

Thus, while China invested $35.1 billion in solar in the first half of 2018, itself down 29%, that figure is expected to only fall further in the second half of the year.

However, looking back at the overall picture, it is not necessarily expected that the downturn in the solar industry’s investment figures will necessarily cause a similar downturn across the board. Beyond the growth in the wind energy sector, both offshore and onshore, smart technology industries such as electric vehicles and batteries are already running above levels seen in 2017, increasing by 64% to $5.2 billion.

https://cleantechnica.com/2018/07/10/global-clean-energy-investment-on-par-with-2017-hits-138-2-billion-in-first-half/
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AGelbert

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Re: The Big Picture of Renewable Energy Growth
« Reply #325 on: July 13, 2018, 12:11:16 pm »


Ireland Is Officially the First Country to Divest From Fossil Fuels

By Yessenia Funes

July 12, 2018 Filed to: MONEY 💵 TALKS

The Irish 🍀 have beaten the rest of us to it. The Republic of Ireland is the first country in the world to move toward divesting from fossil fuels. The divestment process should be wrapped up in five years, per the Guardian.

First, the move to divest has to pass through parliament, though. The lower house of parliament passed a bill Thursday to sell off fossil fuel investments in its $9.3 billion national investment fund, including those in coal, oil, gas, and peat, which is organic plant matter extracted from swamps.

Now, the bill is expected to flow pretty easily through the upper chambers of parliament. If all goes smoothly, this bill should be law before the year ends. And the roughly $350 million currently invested in 150 companies can find a much more meaningful purpose in Ireland’s portfolio.

This amount is small potatoes compare to how deeply embedded the U.S. is in oil and gas profits. New York City’s pension alone has $5 billion invested in this corporate sector. Still, make no mistake: This is a big f u c k i n g deal.

The divestment movement has been gaining momentum around the world with U.S. cities like New York pledging to keep their public money out of the pockets of our oil and gas overlords. Banks throughout Europe have also taken steps to break financial ties with specific fossil fuel companies, especially after the battle the Standing Rock Sioux Tribe put up against the Dakota Access Pipeline in 2016.

An entire country though? That’s unprecedented.
 

“The [divestment] movement is highlighting the need to stop investing in the expansion of a global industry, which must be brought into managed decline if catastrophic climate change is to be averted,” said Thomas Pringle, the independent member of parliament who introduced the bill, to the Guardian. “Ireland, by divesting, is sending a clear message that the Irish public and the international community are ready to think and act beyond narrow short-term vested interests.”

To a casual observer of Irish politics, this move may seem rather surprising. Ireland is known for its deeply conservative stances on many social issues, especially compared to some of its other European neighbors. Same-sex marriage was illegal in Ireland until 2015, and abortion is still a touchy topic. The country is finally going to reform its current policy, which is that a mother must keep the baby unless the mother’s life is at risk.

The country’s disdain for fossil fuel execs (or perhaps concern over climate change?) is less complicated, apparently.

Still, divesting its assets from these greenhouse gas-spewing corporations is one thing. Preparing for the hotter future is another. The country will see sea level rise, summer water shortages, and an increased risk of disease.

Solving those will take some serious action.

[h/t The Guardian]

https://earther.com/ireland-is-officially-the-first-country-to-divest-from-1827552460

Agelbert NOTE: Divestment is the sine qua non step that comes right before making the exploration for, eploitation of, refinery production and marketing for profit over planet of the burning of fossil fuels a criminal (i.e. ECOCIDE) offense. The sooner everybody gets with this program, the sooner the hydrocarbon hellspawn get fined out of business (and their CEOs go to JAIL!).

He that loveth father or mother more than me is not worthy of me: and he that loveth son or daughter more than me is not worthy of me. Matt 10:37

AGelbert

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Re: The Big Picture of Renewable Energy Growth
« Reply #326 on: July 18, 2018, 12:05:05 pm »

The Renewable Revolution

Jul. 18, 2018 8:42 AM ET  | Includes: ABB, AES, BP, DNNGY, FSLR, GCTAY, RDS.A, RDS.B, SBGSY, SIEGY, SPWR, TM, TOT, TSLA, VWDRY
   
Henry Miles
Long only, value, medium-term horizon, dividend
(586 followers)

Summary

With the migration from dirty to clean energy well underway, it’s time to consider whether we have entered the Renewable Revolution.

If so, given their leveragable advantage and resource capacity, I believe investment odds favor a few major renewable integrators that serve utility companies.

Other players in fossil fuels and clean energy will be defeated, acquired, or left to play zero-sum games within modified business models.

Lest anyone has forgotten, human-contributed global warming “got us here”. This reality and its destructive consequences have been demonstrated by a wide array of longitudinal studies conducted by thousands of scientists working almost everywhere. Moreover, people around the world embrace the Paris Climate Agreement. Support comes from public and private sector leaders through organizations such as the World Economic Forum. It also comes from everyday citizens as documented, for example, in the US by the research of Yale and George Mason University.

Public Opinion HaS Shifted

The effect is that the migration from dirty to clean energy is well underway and accelerating.    We know this from the conversion of coal-fired power plants to natural gas, from the rising sales of hybrid and all-electric vehicles, from the presence of more wind and solar farms, from the race to come up with new and improved batteries, and from invention in such areas as tidal turbines and hydrogen fuel cells. And, many believe that the trend to reduce carbon emissions will continue. We see it in the projections of government organizations such as the International Energy Agency, and in other forecasts including by Fred Lambert at Electrek who predicts that the lines for new BEV and ICE sales will cross in 20 years or so.

When I step back from all this, I see a transformation that resembles "The Industrial Revolution" and "The Information Revolution". If, indeed, we are witnessing the makings of "The Renewable Revolution”, it will lead to major dislocations but equally significant investment opportunities.

https://seekingalpha.com/article/4187989-renewable-revolution


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AGelbert

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Re: The Big Picture of Renewable Energy Growth
« Reply #327 on: July 18, 2018, 04:41:58 pm »
Agelbert NOTE: Bill McKibben debunks the hydrocarbon hellspawn 😈 negative propaganda about Renewables.

The Renewable Energy Jobs Myth

July 18, 2018

by  The Sanders Institute
 

One of the largest myths about addressing climate change is that transitioning to renewable energy from fossil fuels (especially coal) will create a net loss of American jobs.

However, renewable energy is doing the opposite of putting Americans out of work. The New York Times reported that in 2016 coal was responsible for 160,119 jobs. In contrast solar employed more than double that amount (373,807 Americans).

The number of renewable jobs is also expected to grow significantly in the coming years. Last year, Business Insider reported that “solar and wind jobs are growing at a rate 12 times as fast as the rest of the US economy and… 46% of large firms have hired additional workers to address issues of sustainability over the past two years.”

In addition to renewables' contribution to overall employment in the United States, there are a number of other economic benefits to American workers when we encourage growth in the renewable energy industry:

Geographic Distribution
While fossil fuel jobs tend to be concentrated in a few states (the vast majority of jobs in coal exist in West Virginia or Wyoming.), renewable energy jobs are spread out around the country. Program Director Liz Delaney at the Environmental Defense Fund points out that “These jobs [in the renewable energy sector] are widely geographically distributed, they're high paying, they apply to both manufacturing and professional workers, and there are a lot of them.”

Supporting and encouraging the renewable energy industry will help hundreds of thousands of Americans find jobs all across the country. These are not simply installation jobs either, maintenance is a large part of the renewable energy industry.

Small Businesses

Environmental Defense Fund Program Director Delaney also mentions that “70% of the 2.2 million Americans who work in jobs related to energy efficiency are employed by companies with 10 employees or fewer.” These are small businesses, hiring American workers, in one of the fastest growing sectors of the economy. In addition, according to Delaney these jobs are also more difficult to outsource because “many sustainability jobs involve installation, maintenance, and construction.” The renewable energy sector is encouraging small business development in America.

Ultimately, encouraging the development of the renewable energy sector is the best path forward for America. Concerns about lost jobs in the fossil fuel and coal industries are legitimate and important to recognize, but those lost jobs should not hinder progress towards a renewable future. This is why training programs should be encouraged to support fossil fuel workers move to other sectors or be trained in budding renewable technology. The New York Times reports that “In Wyoming, home to the nation’s most productive coal region by far, the American subsidiary of a Chinese maker of wind turbines is putting together a training program for technicians in anticipation of a large power plant it expects to supply. And in West Virginia, a nonprofit outfit called Solar Holler… is working with another group, Coalfield Development, to train solar panel installers and seed an entire industry.” These successful test cases demonstrate that America can work towards renewable energy while also supporting and training workers to transition from fossil fuels to renewables in the same way that America is transitioning.

The claim that renewable energy is a job killer or a drain on our economy is a myth, perpetrated by the fossil-fuel business 🦖 😈 👹 and the politicians 🐒 who do their bidding. Don't fall for it. Renewable energy is the path forward for American jobs and the future of our planet.   

https://www.sandersinstitute.com/blog/the-renewable-energy-jobs-myth

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AGelbert

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Re: The Big Picture of Renewable Energy Growth
« Reply #328 on: July 22, 2018, 12:38:28 pm »


Global Investments in Electricity ⚡ Beat Investments in Oil and Gas for Second Year in a Row
July 17, 2018

By Renewable Energy World Editors

[
International Energy Agency's World Energy Investment Report 2018 Credit: IEA
         
The International Energy Agency (IEA) is out with its final 2017 energy investment numbers and, for the second year in a row, more money was invested in electricity than oil and gas. Electrification spending was driven by investments in the grid. More than US $750 billion went to the electricity sector while US $715 billion was spent on oil and gas supply globally. 

IEA said that global energy investment totaled US $1.8 trillion in 2017.

Renewables Down  :(

However, overall energy spending was down 2 percent over the previous year and renewables and energy efficiency investments combined fell 3 percent from 2016 numbers and the agency said that investments in energy efficiency and renewables could fall again this year.

For instance, investment in renewable power, which accounted for two-thirds of power generation spending, dropped 7 percent in 2017. Recent policy changes in China linked to support for the deployment of solar PV raise the risk of a slowdown in investment this year. As China accounts for more than 40 percent of global investment in solar PV, its policy changes have global implications, said IEA.

As Renewable Energy World has reported time and again, the renewable energy industry is largely driven by policy.

[
Europe PV Industry Growth 2005-2015.
As countries launch feed-in tariff programs and then stop them, markets peak in response. Credit: Paula Mints, SPV Market Research

"Such a decline in global investment for renewables and energy efficiency combined is worrying," said Dr. Fatih Birol, the IEA's Executive Director.

"This could threaten the expansion of clean energy needed to meet energy security, climate and clean-air goals. While we would need this investment to go up rapidly, it is disappointing to find that it might be falling this year."

Electric Vehicles Enjoy Government Support

Though still a small part of the market, electric vehicles (EV) now account for much of the growth in global passenger vehicle sales, spurred by government purchase incentives. For electric cars, nearly one quarter of the global value of EV sales in 2017 came from the budgets of governments, who are allocating more capital to support the sector each year.

More Fossil Fuels, Less Nukes

The share of fossil fuels in energy supply investment rose 🤬 last year for the first time since 2014, as spending in oil and gas increased modestly, found IEA. Meanwhile, retirements of nuclear power plants exceeded new construction starts as investment in the sector declined to its lowest level in five years in 2017.

The share of national oil companies in total oil and gas upstream investment remained near record highs, a trend expected to persist in 2018.

Plans to build coal power plants in the coming years declined for a second straight year, reaching a third of their 2010 level. However, despite declining global capacity additions, and an elevated level of retirements of existing plants, the global coal fleet continued to expand in 2017, mostly due to markets in Asia.

And while there was a shift towards more efficient plants, 60 percent of currently operating capacity uses inefficient subcritical technology, said IEA.

The report finds that the prospects of the US shale industry are improving. Between 2010 and 2014, companies spent up to US $1.80 for each dollar of revenue. However, the industry has almost halved its breakeven price, providing a more sustainable basis for future expansion. This underpins a record increase in US light tight oil production of 1.3 million barrels a day in 2018.

"The United States shale industry 🦕 is at turning point after a long period of operating on a fragile financial basis," said Birol.

"The industry 🦕 appears on track to achieve positive free cash flow for the first time ever this year, turning into a more mature and financially solid industry while production ☠️ is growing at its fastest pace ever " 😟

The improved prospects for the US shale sector contrast with the rest of the upstream oil and gas industry. Investment in conventional oil projects, which are responsible for the bulk of global supply, remains subdued. Investment in new conventional capacity is set to plunge in 2018 to about one-third of the total, a multi-year low raising concerns about the long-term adequacy of supply.

https://www.renewableenergyworld.com/articles/2018/07/global-investments-in-electricity-beat-investments-in-oil-and-gas-for-second-year-in-a-row.html
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AGelbert

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Re: The Big Picture of Renewable Energy Growth
« Reply #329 on: July 31, 2018, 09:37:11 pm »
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UK Clean ElectricitySurpassed 50% In 2017 As Renewables Soar


July 31st, 2018 by Joshua S Hill

The latest figures published by the UK Government show that renewable and clean energy sources continue to skyrocket, hitting 29.3% and 50.1% respectively, and led by another strong year for wind energy generation.

The UK Department for Business, Energy & Industrial Strategy published its annual Digest of United Kingdom Energy Statistics report last week — the energy sector’s “bible” — and it was good news for the renewable and clean energy industries. Depending on how you look at it and what you include, renewable energy accounted for 29.3% of all electricity generated in 2017, or clean power (renewables plus nuclear) accounted for 50.1%.

The strong year for renewable energy was led by the wind energy industry, which generated a record total of 50 terawatt-hours (TWh) for the year — half of all renewable energy generation. More specifically, onshore wind generated 29.1 TWh (or 8.6%) in 2017 and offshore wind generated 20.9 TWh (or 6.2%). Generation from hydro sources increased by 10% to 5.9 TWh, while solar generation increased by 11% to 11.5 TWh for the year.

Renewable energy capacity ⚡ for 2017 increased by 12.8% to 18,288 megawatts (MW), with wind capacity increased by 22.6%  :o to 8,529 MW 👍 and solar capacity increased by 7.3% to 2,172 MW 👍. For all other renewable energy sources (all excluding hydro, wind, and solar), capacity increased by 6% to 5,964 MW.

Coal generation fell by 26.5% 👍 compared to 2016 levels and, compared to 2015 levels, decreased by 70.3% 👍. Gas generation actually decreased by 4.6% in 2017 compared to 2016, but this is only in comparison to the large increase seen in 2016, and gas still accounts for the majority of the UK’s electricity supply.

“Today’s record figures demonstrate how fast renewable energy is transforming the way we generate power to create an energy system fit for the future,” said Emma Pinchbeck, Executive Director of RenewableUK, the country’s trade body for the wind, wave, and tidal industries. “This is a radical shift, and we will see ever more low-cost renewables meeting flexible demand from homes, electric vehicles and new manufacturing processes and industries.”

“It’s great to see that the UK’s cheapest power source, onshore wind, is making such a significant contribution to the nation’s power needs. So it’s baffling that Government is still excluding new onshore wind projects from the market place. Opinion polls show that two-thirds of people think Ministers should change their current policy and allow onshore wind to go ahead where it has local support, and most Conservative voters agree with them.”

“As has been widely celebrated, we’ve seen record levels of renewable power generation,” said Léonie Greene, Director of Advocacy & New Markets for the UK Solar Trade Association. “However, behind the sunny generation statistics, the worrying detail on current solar deployment continues. DUKES data shows that overall annual solar deployment is at an eight-year low, and we are seeing annual markets of only around 200MW which is very worrying indeed.

“The data confirms the warnings from the Environmental Audit Committee yesterday that Government simply isn’t doing anything like enough to secure a policy framework that attracts decent levels of investment in clean energy. And let’s remember, when it comes to solar power, we are not asking for public support, we are simply asking for level playing fields on tax treatment and fair market access. That is not hard to deliver.”
https://cleantechnica.com/2018/07/31/uk-renewables-hit-29-3-in-2017-led-by-record-wind-output/
He that loveth father or mother more than me is not worthy of me: and he that loveth son or daughter more than me is not worthy of me. Matt 10:37

 

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