Texas has passed longtime national leader California in wind energy.
What’s happening, or not, with California’s landmark Renewable Portfolio Standard (RPS) shows that implementation is a key element of action. The state is coming up short on meeting its mandate of having 20% of its electric power from renewable energy sources in 2010.
The RPS, leading to much greater use of renewable energy resources such as solar, wind, biomass, tidal, and geothermal rather than fossil fuels, is a critical element in the state’s bid to sharply curtail greenhouse gas emissions. Cars are the leading source of the emissions and the electric power industry is second.
The original plan, signed into law in 2002 by then Governor Gray Davis, was for California to have 20% of its electric power come from renewable energy sources by 2017. But Arnold Schwarzenegger, who said in conversations in 2002 and 2003 that he thought that wasn’t aggressive enough, once in office as governor accelerated the RPS requirement from 2017 to 2010.
The state Public Utilities Commission, responsible for overseeing the mandate, in a brief new report makes things sound good on California’s progress with headlines like “Utilities Are Making Steady Progress Toward Ambitious 20 Percent By 2010 Goal.” The report hedges on the question of whether the mandate will be met. Its chart on future renewable power for the state indicates that California will fall somewhat short of the mark, even as it makes the assumption that all contracts will come through. They all certainly will not.
“Although IOUs (investor-owned utilities) have signed contracts for as much as 3,936 megawatts (MW) of renewable capacity, only 242 new MW are actually on line and delivering energy. Because the RPS statute includes provisions for flexible compliance—with retail sellers given up to three years to make up deficits in current year RPS targets—the IOUs have argued that they have until 2013 to meet the 20 percent by 2010 goal.”
Of course, when Schwarzenegger said 20% by 2010, he meant 2010, not 2013. 4200 megawatts of additional renewable power is the amount identified in the state’s Energy Action Plan as the amount necessary to get California to the RPS mandate.
What’s causing the hang-up? Several factors, including “insufficient transmission upgrades” and additions to the grid, a murky contracting process, failure to consider contract failure and project delays, and “inattention to near-term opportunities to repower old and out-of-date wind turbines at sites where infrastructure already exists.”
The wind power situation is highly ironic, given that wind energy in America essentially began here with then Governor Jerry Brown’s once derided energy policy of “wood chips and windmills.” Which, of course, included quite a lot of other things, including the big shift to natural gas, the cleanest of the fossil fuels, seen then as the “transition fuel” to the renewable future.
As NWN reported last year, since 2002 Texas has installed more than 1500 megawatts of wind power, pushing oil man George W. Bush’s state past longtime national leader California.
How are the state’s big utilities doing?
“San Diego Gas and Electric (SDG&E) has made the most progress in increasing its renewable purchases—moving from 1 percent in 2002 to 5.2 percent in 2005—but still has far to go to meet the 20 percent goal by 2010. Similarly, by the end of 2005, Pacific Gas and Electric (PG&E) had only increased its renewable generation by 1.5 percent compared to 2002 levels and will need an additional 8.1 percent to meet its 2010 goal. Southern California Edison (SCE), although furthest along in meeting the 2010 goal, has only increased its renewable generation by 0.2 percent between 2002 and 2005, making little progress in the last three years despite the proximity of Tehachapi.”
I’ve been warning about this lack of progress for the last couple of years and will continue to do so now that the facts are becoming clear.
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| Comments (36) |
Bummer, man.
Schwarzeneger better get on this.
Let’s see, California hasn’t achieved forcing consumers to pay extra for electricity through the higher price of renewables, and the Gov. thinks that’s a bad thing? We already are experiening grid reliability issues (last summer heat wave all the wind turbines could do is watch) so we want more bad medicine. This insanity, and the lack of choice makes CA the national laughing stock anad has to stop. Remove the RPS, don’t make it worse.
The higher price … that’s too short sighted and right wing even for me.
NWN: a murky contracting process, failure to consider contract failure and project delays, and “inattention to near-term opportunities to repower old and out-of-date wind turbines at sites where infrastructure already exists.”
These are lack of oversight and lack of enforcement issues…so a lot of people in management: do not understand their job or are not doing their job or can’t do their job…
Last summer’s California heat storm was an extreme weather event brought about by the confluence of climate change, increased urbanization, and an intensified usage of electricity.
It caused record power usage day after day, hitting usage levels not forecast for years to come.
With conventional power in short supply, not just in California but around the country, it pointed up the need for major transmission upgrades and an expanded broad portfolio of energy sources.
Barbara, the PUC is the responsible agency. They didn’t like it when I pointed the potential problem out about two years ago.
Wouldn’t Texas be the “laughing stock” because it leads the country in wind power? lol
If America never changes addiction to fossil fuel it never loses vulnerability.
Our dear friends in the ME would like nothing better than for California to abandon the alternative energy path.
I don’t believe that Governor’s moving the compliance date to 2010 was necessarily suggested with a realistic probability of compliance uppermost in mind, when the prospects for compliance by 2017 were a bit optimistic to begin with. The problem with this power for a utility with an obligation to serve power to customers is that it isn’t very dispatchable, so even if it is contracted for, the utility must also purchase back up power to serve the load at peak demand without counting on the wind to be there when needed.
The PUC won’t even allow any transmission upgrades to occur at the Tehachapis or anywhere else that might get power on line from renewable sources. Usually they give in to objections from the environmental community, ironically enough.
The entire renewable process is a problem, and the only realistic way out of this is to work hard to get individual homeowners on solar power, and don’t worry about meeting the mandates on utilities by a date certain.
Our dear friends in the ME would like nothing better than for California to abandon the alternative energy path — this is where the debate about the costs to the US of Iraq and the ME policies generally should be focused. The big threat to national security is that we continue to make the Saudis and all very wealthy benefactors of Islamic radical bombers.
Gov. Schwarzenegger is ahead of schedule on the original Gray Davis plan, visionary in its own right, and behind schedule on his own plan. It could be worse, I suppose.
I am amused by the lack of urgency and in some cases churlish disdain from the conservatives here. The Iraq debacle makes it obvious that we can’t simply invade our way to a sustained fossil fuel-based economy. The ruinous expense of the Iraq disaster is far more expensive than any subsidy for renewable energy.
It warms my little heart to see a responsible, informed discussion of California’s energy situation on this site.
Just like you can’t be for jobs and against employers, you can’t be for renewable energy that is site-specific and against the transmission lines needed to connect it to the grid.
You can set all the goals you want, but alternative energy production is a function of technology, location and finances. The dismal progress towards reaching the Governor’s unrealistic renewables goal is caused by transmission delays and fiscal uncertainties. Clearly wishes and plans do not generate megawatts. Nor do wind generators produce electricity on the hottest days when we need every electron available. The open secret in the energy world is that wind capacity needs to be “derated” by 95% during superpeak periods.
Where do the failure of renewables and the greenhouse gas reduction plans lead California? Towards the construction of new nuclear power plants. It is the only responsible sustainable solution, one adopted by France and Japan to cut their own dependence on foreign oil. Some enviros and even Democrat leaders (Senator Boxer most recently) seem resigned to this inevitability.
And please give the waste storage issue a rest. Now even environmentalists agree that it is relatively safe to store casks of low-level waste on nuclear sites pending a permanent, nation waste solution. That small risk is much better than the absolute certainty of contributing the millions of tons of CO2 a fossil fuel plant would generate in its 30-40 year lifetime.
Any serious, viable plan to address global warming includes the expanded use of nuclear power. Otherwise, its just pop-science and politics.
I think nuclear is going to be in the mix as part of a global solution. I reject the either/or left/right thinking implicit in your post which posits nuclear as the only answer. Just as I reject thinkers from the left who posit renewables as the only answer.
Incidentally, noting that transmission is needed for renewables — I did just that, of course — hardly means that renewables don’t work.
The truth is the PUC has been slow off the mark and the utilities as always take the path of least resistance. Which means they offer resistance. They take as much time as possible, as you see in the column before they do what they are supposed to do, as you see in the column.
If you actually read my column, you see that contracts are coming online. But the megawatts are delayed. The utilities think 2010 means 2013.
Wind is not a joke in Texas and it’s not a joke here, only to conservatives who have other agendas.
In any event, there are many renewable resources to be harnessed here, including geothermal and solar.
Wind isn’t a joke here but it is less dispatchable than solar, obviously, because solar doesn’t need dispatching if installed on rooftops. Everyone hates new power lines in their backyard, and the PUC isn’t too hot on braving the political winds.
Bill is right that utilities don’t care about any of this stuff, and only gave up the fight on the RPS in the first place because they planned to simply buy it to get the credit for it, but never planned to incorporate it into their portfolios and actually use it. Nuclear power of today isn’t anything like Diablo Canyon or San Onofre, but our visionary Energy Commission made a pronouncement anyway last year that they would basically never approve any nuclear power in this state.
That’s not what I said regarding the utilities — they will use the power, they already do use a lot of renewables, don’t forget — and adding/improving transmission capacity will not mean more lines in people’s backyards.
>Bill is right that utilities don’t care about any of this stuff, and only gave up the fight on the RPS in the first place because they planned to simply buy it to get the credit for it, but never planned to incorporate it into their portfolios and actually use it.
Sorry for the inarticulate contribution to the debate. Transmission upgrade is the single most important and useful thing we can do, even if there were no renewables out there to be hooked up. As you know, the energy crisis was in large part due to the problems in getting the power along the grid to where it needed to be — often it was available within the state. Transmission lines don’t go through backyards, but they do do through Native American lands and environmentally sensitive rangelands, particularly in the desert regions, where they need to be installed, and there is often significant resistance to that from many circles.
People are probably going to have to compromise.
We could keep doing what we do. lol
“our visionary Energy Commission made a pronouncement anyway last year that they would basically never approve any nuclear power in this state.”
Not the full story. Long ago, the voters of California decreed that until there was a permanent solution to the storage of nuclear waste from nuclear reactors, no new reactors could be built in California. Because this was done through an initiative, the only ways to remove the restriction are by another initiative voiding the prohibition or by finding that there is a permanent solution. Baring those actions, the CEC is prohibited from approving the siting of another nuclear power plant in California.
Is that right?
And the worst offender on the RPS, is the City of Los Angeles. The LADWP was excluded from the mandate that said 20% of power generated, needs to be from renewables. Mayor Hahn then adopted the state RPS. Mayor Villaraigosa then pushed the date up, so that the LADWP would meet the 20% RPS by 2010. The DWP views it as a challenge-to NOT comply. They have added so little renewables its embarrassing.
The Mayor and the DWP still somehow claim they will meet the mandate by 2010. Im sure they will try to pass on the same BS that others have tried-that is, that there are contracts or RFPs’ out there. Its all BS-and this will hurt Antonio-its another promise that he may not be able to come close to fulfilling. He has appointed top notch commissioners, but the GM and management, and possibly the unions, seem to fight the RPS at every turn.
Bill, thank you for paying attention to this and other environmental initiatives. My fear has been that Governors and Mayors make major pronouncements, but then dont do the follow up to make sure these pronouncements , become deeds.
LA DWP has long quietly bought huge chunks of dirty coal-fired power from the Mountain West. This practice will no longer be allowed under the terms of a bill by Don Perata which Schwarzenegger signed last fall.
All of the municipal utilities and their association were opposed to having to comply with a mandate to reduce according to the timetable in the RPS and they successfully excluded themselves
Solar Energy, the momentum has started
Solar energy is the most abundant natural resource we have, and that technology has been around for awhile, but it wasn’t practical from a financial perspective until now. When we can provide the average homeowner with the ability to produce their own electricity and keep the saving instead of paying for Commercials, Stadiums and other corporate greed we are making headway.
There is a solution! I recently learned of a company that has figured out how to get Clean, Safe, Affordable Solar Power to the masses, and they do it without requiring any significant investment on the part of the homeowner. This company is helping homeowners switch to solar the easy way through a rental agreement. The customer gets a worry free solar system custom designed for 100% of their current consumption of electricity & an electric rate that is frozen at or below today’s rate for up to 25 years. Let’s do something, we can be part of the solution and not be part of the problem. This program is an easy way that you can have an impact on the environment and our pocket book. http://www.jointhesolution.com/2renu
Siting nuclear power plants: The more complete story. The anti-nuclear initiative I recalled did not pass. However, during the campaign to win voter approval of Prop 15, the Legislature enacted a number of laws which did prohibit the CEC from approving the siting and construction of new nuclear power plants until the CEC finds that the federal government has approved, a demonstrated technology or means for the permanent and terminal disposal of high-level nuclear wastes.
So there are three ways for the prohibition to be overturned: a referendum overturning the laws, legislation removing the prohibition or a finding by the CEC that the federal government has demonstrated the appropriate technology.
I think we can eliminate the first option. There’s not much chance of the second happening given the current makeup of the Legislature. And I wouldn’t want to bet on the likelihood of Yucca Mountain opening for business. Hence, the expectation that the CEC will never site a new nuclear power plant. Granted climate change could drive a nuclear renewal in the USA but it is hard to imagine how that would result in siting more nuclear power plants in California.
Sorry about the mistake on the initiative. My only excuse is that it was 31 years ago.
That’s right. But it was driven by the initiative, as a way to head off its more restrictive features.
As a California transplant now in Dallas, Texas, I’m amazed that the latter state has more wind power.
Wasn’t that way in 1999 when this video was shot!
Re: “site-specific” renewables — you’d think that in CA, especially southern CA, we would, by now, have more renewables generated directly at point of use — with photovoltaics.
A guy I met in my neighborhood is working for CitizenRe, which is looking to offer solar as an option for households that can’t manage a $40k loan. And of course, CA has (and should expand) programs to help out with the costs of getting solar… (Oh, I see “2renu” has already mentioned them, perhaps in a more hyperbolic tone.)
The technology for solar is just at the point of making a huge leap, with stuff like thin-film and metal-alloy photovoltaics competing to see who can capture the best percentage of the energy falling on a surface; stoking demand could help drive investment in expanding production of the new technologies.
And there’s still the broad-spectrum solar, developed at Berkeley (but nowhere near commercialization yet) waiting in the wings.
I should note, before Kandy blows his stack, that I’m very interested in the development of reactors based on the Thorium Cycle, which appears to be much safer — producing much less waste per unit of energy released, and with almost none of the waste weaponizable.
In regard to both nuclear and renewables, this is a graph very much worth understanding.
There’s always been plenty of hot air in the Lone Star State. It just wasn’t being properly utilized.
Mr Bradley,
Are you getting notifications on comments held for approval? Or have you just been too busy to bother with such things? (Understandable, if so.)
I had left a comment here which I thought was a constructive contribution, on solar and nuclear power. (Like you, I consider global warming and alt-energy a “pet issue”.) I thought Kandy, especially, might be interested in the nuclear-related links… It got held for approval (I assume the links, and the fact that I’d made a couple other comments recently, led the site’s filters to think that I might be an ad-bot), and still hasn’t been approved… This happened to another of my comments a few days ago, but by the time I came back to see if anyone had responded, and discovered it had never been published, the issue was stale enough that it didn’t seem worth it to bring it up.
Possibly I should just refrain from linking things (maybe include a googlable phrase that would let people find the info I’m thinking of) so my comments will have less chance of getting held?
Thanks,
Auros
Yes, and I’ve been busy. Mulitple links do it and I still don’t see your comment, which is on an old thread, so I have to search for it.
OK… I’ll try to find ways to avoid link-density in future.
Thanks much for the tip.
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