Based on current deployment rates, it is likely that solar will surpass wind as the third-largest source of electricity. And solar may soon topple coal in the number two spot.
Looking ahead, through July 2028, FERC expects no new coal capacity to come online based on its “high probability additions” forecast. Meanwhile 63 coal plants are expected to be retired, subtracting 25 GW from the 198 GW total, and landing at about 173 GW of coal capacity by 2028. Meanwhile, FERC forecasts 92.6 GW of “high probability additions” solar will come online through July 2028.
“Will pass wind”
Haha
Cool
my dylexic brain read it as “US soldier will pass wind in 2025 and leaves coal dust soon after…”
holycrap wtf did they feed them as part of military experiment or wtf is going on???
Even with an admin as renewable-hostile as the current one, you just can’t beat cheap, I guess.
That’s been the joke of Solar for a while. Engineers could have told you all the way back in the 1970s (really, the 1910s) that it costs less money to leave a big plate out in the bright sun than to drill a giant hole and hope there’s enough spicy rocks at the bottom of it to justify the expense.
We should have crested this hill a lot sooner, but the heavy emphasis on subsidized fossil fuels during the 80s, 90s, and 00s kept these fuels artificially cheap. Meanwhile, fossil fuel firms actually did invest in Green Energy R&D but only for the purpose of erecting “patent thickets” that would hinder competitive growth of these alternatives.
This “patent thicket” can create barriers to innovative low-carbon technologies, particularly in markets requiring expensive licensing fees or with complex patent litigation (Cannuscio 2008). A strengthened IPRP can increase market concentration and reduce competition (Liu et al. 2018), with large corporations able to maintain market control in such environments through patents on key technologies. This control not only restricts the entry of emerging low-carbon technologies into the market but also perpetuates the reliance on existing high-carbon technologies.
This has lead to big surges in the development and deployment of Green Energy grids outside of the countries doing most of the cutting edge research. Americans are only now catching up.
You’re really discounting that fossil fuels have hella bang for the buck, loads of power per gallon. tl;dr: Energy dense
I can run my little generator at camp all night long if there’s as little as 3 gallons in there. Space heater or AC unit, lights, all that. I’d have to have many panels and batteries to compare to that output. My best battery is a huge LIPO4, trolling motor can’t kill it, not even close. But leaving the LED lights on for a little over a day drained it dry.
We need way more solar infrastructure to get where we’re going, and I’m all about it. But since since the GOP has decided to go back in time, China is going to smoke America, both in renewables and the associated economic benefits.
Did not know about the patent thing! Know any examples?
You’re really discounting that fossil fuels have hella bang for the buck, loads of power per gallon. tl;dr: Energy dense
Coal is generally the worst of the lot. Oil and gas burn cleaner and have more combustible by weight. Coal is energy dense but also heavy af and dirty as hell. It’s also very common place and comparably safe to transport. And it is simpler to use.
Fine enough to warm your home or grill some meat. But you’re not putting a rocket into orbit with coal.
My best battery is a huge LIPO4, trolling motor can’t kill it, not even close. But leaving the LED lights on for a little over a day drained it dry.
Sure. Broadly speaking you want to be hooked up to the grid to benefit from electricity. Anything portable is very ineffective for a litany of reasons.
Patents have a short life span. The patent wall keeps expiring and then everyone can use it no cost. the big improvements are long gone and all they can patent is small improvements you can do without (though you may not want to). They also run into those making things do their own r&d and have their own patents.
Patents have a short life span.
Years, depending on how it is used and renewed. But the point is that you’ve got a minefield of potential legal liabilities every time you try and launch a business. You don’t know whether what you’re doing is patented until you check. And if enough entrepreneurs have their businesses blown up early on, it delays how quickly alternative energy can be built out and deployed by at least as long as these patents survive.
When the government is in your corner, handing out subsidies, leaving environmental rules unenforced, securing new oil fields overseas through military force, and generally making your life as an energy tycoon easier, you’re at a comparative advantage to the wind farm guy who has to argue with the Kennedys over hurting a bird or obstructing the Massachusetts Bay skyline.
Hell. In Florida, FPL is the electric provider, and they are fighting tooth and nail to keep people from installing solar on houses… In Florida, we would have almost free electric for everyone if all houses could install panels…
But FPL lobbied our GOP legislature and force anyone with solar to have a million dollar insurance policy payable to FPL in case something happens. Also got regulations passed to bar home windstorm insurance if any panels are bolted to the roof. So if you have panels, no hurricane insurance for you…and the mortgage holder gets to put their expensive policy on your home.
Fuck FPL
To be fair, Florida building codes are pretty much static electricity holding cardboard together.
Florida has some of the strictest building codes in the United States due to the hurricane and flooding risks.
May I ask the source of your comment?
My father ran a small construction company in Ontario, he was asked to manage building a few house for a client in Florida and at the time, the codes were a complete joke compared to Canada, closer to what we grade as seasonal cottages. This likely had recently changed, only because people can’t even get storm insurance any more. Then there’s the 5,400 trailer parks in Florida. Ontario has 14, seasonal use only.
Yes, FPL has done a lot to prevent rooftop solar, but calling it “almost free” is not correct. Rooftop solar still comes with significant upfront costs. The weather of Florida degrades panels quicker with non-trivial odds of hurricane damage. Finally, Southwestern states receive much more solar irradiance.
If you are willing to be pragmatic and want solar in Florida, FPL’s solar together program is your best option. Like it or not, utility grade solar is 1/3 the LCOE.
Solar may pass wind, but gas and burning gas are actual stinking farts.
Gotta love that headline.
Would have been better as “blow past wind” to match the sentiment of the “coal in the dust” joke.
The answer, my friend, is blowin’ in the wind.
All we are is dust in the wind…
Had to read it twice to understand what they WANTED to say
Phrasing.
You guys still burning coal? We dumped that ages ago.
See, you can build coal plants in poor/black areas, so you don’t have to see the pollution, nor your kids have to get cancer like those silly poors. And then you don’t have to put up with woke shit like windmills. Sigh.
We built wind turbines in view of trumps golf course and it makes him furious. We will build 500 wind turbines and then build 500 more.
I can ride a bike to a coal plant from my house. Thing’s almost as ugly as the five-over-one across the street from my house.
still passing wind though…
Sodium-ion batteries are becoming more viable, which will be necessary to buffer the solar energy surge during the day and lack of energy production at night.
Heh heh. Heh heh.
Preznit Numbnuts will be sure to start closing wind farms then, forcing us all back into using coal so he can slurp up lobby $$
Lol they’ve already announced funding (or intent to fund?) for reviving coal mining
The Republicans. They yearn for the mines.
A recent article about the state of the coal industry in the usa…
Fossil Fuels and Fossilized Minds - Paul Krugman https://share.google/9gGFCB2MFShNzGJrp
They knew what they were doing with that title.
Well despite Trump wanting to reverse it coal has been being phased out for decades. I’d look at how it does vs natural gas.
Aren’t wind turbines mostly diesel generators in disguise?
-edited due to my ignorance: No in fact what they are is in the name “WIND” turbines…
What?
Wind turbines have to be constantly spinning due to inertia to get them started due to that they have big diesel engines that keep them going the minimum speed. I’m not trying to be inflammatory and am welcome to a fact check.
This is complete BS, I could find zero sources for that claim, and several debunking it.
The only tangentially related thing I could find was that in colder climates, they need heat to de-ice the wings, and at one point, the power supply to a Scottish wind farm was cut off, so they put in some temporary diesel generators on-site to power the de-icing system to get the turbines going again.
So, I do not believe that is a thing. Apparently there are some wind turbines with diesel generators attached somewhere, but it’s not for that reason. Offshore wind seems to have them in case they get disconnected from the grid because they rely on some power to protect themselves from ocean air, and apparently a wind array in Scottland had some to keep the turbines from freezing over. Frankly though there just isn’t room in the turbine’s housing to keep a whole diesel engine, at least most of the time.
Edited my OG comment for future people. Thank you for correcting this Franky inexcusably ignorant miss comprehension. I appreciate your civilness in correct me.
No?
