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There Are Now More Solar Jobs In America Than Oil Jobs
Unfortunately, oil still pays better.
01/12/2016 05:00 am ET
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/entry/solar-jobs-rising_569409e5e4b0cad15e65be87
Solar is the energy employer of the future -- or at least that's how the numbers look today.
A new report on the state of the solar industry out Tuesday from the nonprofit Solar Foundation shows that the number of jobs in the United States in the solar industry outpaced those in the oil and gas industries for the first time ever.
As of November 2015 there were almost 209,000 people who worked in the solar industry, 90 percent of whom only work on solar-related projects, according to the report.
There were only about 185,000 people working in oil and gas in the United States in December 2015, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics.
The oil industry has had a rough 18 months, as the price of oil slid from more than $100 a barrel in the spring of 2014 to just over $30 a barrel in recent weeks. The low price has caused layoffs in what had been a robust and growing shale oil extraction business.
The solar industry, meanwhile, continues to grow as the technology becomes cheaper, making it a better deal for the average household. The Solar Foundation's report also shows how the price of installed solar panels continue to drop:
The bulk of the solar jobs seem to be coming from the installation of solar panels, with some growth in development and sales. Manufacturing actually declined a bit. According to the report, that's probably because another Silicon Valley solar company, QBotix, shut down back in September.
Regardless of that blip in the industry, solar installation jobs are completely taking off:
he one place where solar hasn't caught up to oil and gas, it seems, is in the pay. According to the report, solar installers -- which account for a plurality of jobs in the industry -- get $21 per hour on average. The pay in sales and design is higher, at $28.85 and $26.92, respectively.
But oil and gas workers on average get $44 an hour, according to BLS.
There are reasons for those differences, though. For one thing, oil and gas extraction requires a lot of geoscientists and engineers, both of which are professions that pull in $65-75 per hour (that's comfortably in the six figures annually) and push up the average for the whole industry. Refinery operators make about $29 an hour, and roustabouts (day laborers on oil rigs, basically) make about $17 an hour.
Solar is unquestionably better for the environment than the oil industry. But in the short term, it's unclear whether it's better for the economy.
SUNE Halted...
We are going to win by default... 
2.89
Meanwhile #2 coal miner ACI now ACIIQ @ 25¢ Cap of $5M makes us 9 or 10 times bigger....
#1 coal miner at BTU $85M was $1B+ last year we are getting closer to matching #1 (or beating it)
We are looking pretty good right now...
Who is the White Knight who loves to pump in money at the end of the day?!? And THANK YOU!
Solar Surges Past Wind, Hydro as California’s No. 1 Renewable Energy Source
http://ww2.kqed.org/news/2016/01/11/solar-power-california-top-source-of-renewable-energy
By Pete Danko
January 11, 2016
In just a few short years, solar power has gotten big in California, and now it’s at the top of the renewable energy heap.
Data compiled from daily reports by the state’s major grid manager indicate that in 2015, solar became the No. 1 source of renewable energy in California. Not only did solar beat wind power for the first time, but it also topped drought-depleted hydropower, the long-standing leader in California electricity generation outside fossil fuels and nuclear.
The California Independent System Operator doesn’t cover the entire state, but it does manage about 80 percent of the California grid, including those portions served by PG&E, Southern California Edison and San Diego Gas & Electric, the state’s three big investor-owned utilities.
Every day, CAISO reports on the hourly electrical output from a long list of sources for the electricity used by 30 million Californians, ranging from biogas at the low end of generation to thermal — natural gas, essentially — at the high end.
The reports in sum show that in 2015, utility-scale solar power plants produced 15,591,964 megawatt-hours of electricity for CAISO. That’s 6.7 percent of the system’s total of 231,965,326 MWh. Wind came in at 5.3 percent. Hydro contributed 5.9 percent, with the portion that the state considers renewable, “small hydro,” at 0.6 percent of generation.
That’s a vastly changed picture from just a few years ago. As recently as 2012, solar accounted for just 0.9 percent of CAISO generation, less than one-quarter of the 4 percent share that wind had at the time. (Hydro, with the drought beginning to unfold, produced 9.3 percent of the system’s energy that year.)
And here’s the kicker: These figures undercount solar’s true contribution. CAISO’s solar data are derived only from big plants that sell their power at the wholesale level. The agency’s numbers don’t include the ubiquitous small systems installed throughout the state.
Variously labeled rooftop, distributed or behind-the-meter solar, there are hundreds of thousands of small installations on California homes and businesses, and their output adds up. Experts estimate that including these systems would boost solar’s tally by nearly half — meaning solar in all its sizes, shapes and forms probably accounted for close to 10 percent of California’s electricity in 2015.
A Benefit During Drought
One payoff from all the solar: Despite the big drop in hydropower due to the drought, CAISO used less thermal and imported energy last year than it did in 2012. Bernadette Del Chiaro, who heads the California Solar Energy Industries Association, called that “a really interesting story that has not gotten enough play.”
Financial incentives and ever-increasing requirements through the state’s renewable portfolio standard are driving the growth of renewable energy, and solar in California has some particular advantages, Del Chiaro said.
We all know there’s a lot of sunshine here. But beyond that, Del Chiaro said, “As utilities have worked to meet their renewable energy mandates, solar has become a favorite choice because the cost of PV [photovoltaic] panels has declined so much that it is more competitive than most other forms of energy.”
That includes wind, said Mark Jacobson, a Stanford professor who has been researching and promoting scenarios for achieving 100 percent renewable energy for all purposes, not just electricity, by 2050.
“While wind costs in the national average are much lower than both solar and gas due to extremely fast Great Plains wind, they are more comparable in California,” Jacobson said in an email. “And wind has a little more siting difficulty in California.”
According to GTM Research, which tracks solar trends, utility-scale photovoltaic solar in California (including non-CAISO areas) grew from 0.8 gigawatts installed capacity at the beginning of 2013 to 6.6 GW by last October, the most recent update available. Concentrating solar — what CAISO calls “solar thermal” plants, like Ivanpah in the Mojave Desert — adds nearly another gigawatt of generating capacity.
Wind power capacity in the state inched up from 5.5 GW to 6 GW during the same period.
Nancy Rader, executive director of the California Wind Energy Association, says that’s cause for concern.
“We cannot have just solar,” Rader said. “We have to have a mix. It is clear from all the studies that have been done.”
Challenges for Wind Power Development
In an op-ed in the Sacramento Bee last November, Rader blamed wind’s meager growth on “sweeping restrictions” that “have been adopted or are slated for adoption by Los Angeles, San Diego and Solano counties in rural areas hosting some of the state’s best remaining wind resources.” Rader was also critical of a draft plan to regulate desert development that would put “80 percent of the high-quality wind resources on remote federal lands in the vast deserts of Southern California … permanently off-limits.”
The most realistic scenario for adding significant wind power in California is wiring it in from out of state, Rader said. Developers in Wyoming, which has a monstrous wind resource but practically nobody to use it, are especially keen to send wind power California’s way.
California has largely cut off new out-of-state renewables, but that could change. The Legislature last year opened the door to expanding the Independent System Operator, and CAISO has been talking up a plan to bring in PacifiCorp, which serves around 1.8 million customers in six Western states, including California’s far north and big chunks of Utah and Wyoming.
A recent report commissioned by CAISO and PacifiCorp suggested a merger could help solve a problem that comes with the rapid growth of solar power generation: The grid can handle only so much power at one time.
Since solar power is generated only during daylight hours and ramps up rapidly after sunrise, it could create what amounts to an overload and force grid operators to curtail the amount of solar power flowing into the system. Adding PacifiCorp to its system would give CAISO an outlet for the surplus solar power, the report says.
Del Chiaro’s group hasn’t taken a position on the CAISO expansion, but she said solar growth that includes a significant rooftop component would promote grid innovation.
“If we did nothing, obviously we’d have problems,” she said. “But if we model a vision that takes advantage of localized generation and incorporates storage, that is the answer to the concern.”
Residential rooftop solar capacity was at 2.4 GW at the beginning of October 2015, with another 1.9 GW in the “non-residential” rooftop category, according to GTM Research.
Tax, Metering Policies Impact Solar Development
Last month, Congress passed and President Obama signed into law an extension of a 30 percent investment tax credit for solar. It applies to all forms of solar, but will especially aid utility solar, Del Chiaro said. She expects it to continue to thrive in California, although she suspects most new plants will be in the 5 MW to 20 MW range as opposed to the 50 MW and larger facilities that have been built in recent years.
But the tax credit won’t be enough to keep rooftop solar growing, Del Chiaro added. The key there, she said, is the potential for changes in net metering, the policy of compensating small-system owners at the retail rate for the solar power they generate.
Utilities around the country, including in California, say net metering results in non-solar users carrying an unfair burden in maintaining a grid that benefits all. They’re pushing for reduced solar payments and/or new fees for solar adopters. In December, the California Public Utilities Commission proposed maintaining the full retail rate for net metering, with only modest new fees. The commission could vote on that proposal as early as Jan. 28.
After-Tax Income $250,047,513.61
Geeze. I could buy SLTD 4 or 5 times over with that...
Nice Numbers.... (solar at 2.1%) we are mooooving... Wind and solar 8.1%
Renewables = 99% of New US Power Capacity in November
http://cleantechnica.com/2016/01/02/renewables-99-of-new-us-power-capacity-in-november/
January 2nd, 2016 by Zachary Shahan
I know — it’s already January 2016. Unfortunately, it takes FERC a little while to accumulate all of the data on new utility-scale electricity generation capacity, and the November data was released just before the new year.
As you can see below, FERC registered 200 megawatts (MW) of new wind power capacity, 22 MW of new utility-scale solar power capacity, 2 MW of new biomass power capacity, and 5 MW of new natural gas power capacity. Adding in an educated estimate for non-utility-scale solar, the total for November more than doubled, and the share coming from renewables came to 99%.
For the year through November, including an estimate for non-utility-scale solar, 72% of new power capacity is from renewables, 68% being from solar and wind.
Unfortunately, we still have a long way to go in order to transition the majority of the country’s power capacity over to renewables. Concerning total installed power capacity, solar and wind account for just 8% of the total, and all renewables together account for just 18.5%.
Check out the charts and table below for more details.
New US Electricity Generation Capacity (Jan-Nov 2015)
"Other Solar" is estimated based on very educated 2015 projections from top solar market researchers and a bit of math and assumptions from CleanTechnica director Zachary Shahan.
Storing SLTD's solar power at JFW......
Tesla energy-storage system at Jackson Family Wines. Image by author.
Read more: http://www.fool.com/investing/general/2015/12/13/duke-energy-getting-on-energy-storage-bandwagon.aspx#ixzz3w56hbii3
Beating graphene to push supercapacitors closer to batteries
Adding nitrogen to carbon materials boosts capacitance above that of graphene.
by Shalini Saxena - Dec 30, 2015 11:44am CST
Most people think of batteries when they consider energy storage, but capacitors are an alternative in some use cases. Capacitors are used in almost all electronic devices, often to supply temporary power when batteries are being changed to prevent loss of information. In addition to everyday devices, they are also used in more obscure technologies, including certain types of weapons.
Understanding the supercapacitor
Unlike batteries, capacitors use static electricity to store energy. In their simplest form, they contain two conducting metallic plates with an insulating material (dielectric) placed in between. A typical capacitor charges instantly but usually cannot hold a great deal of charge.
Supercapacitors can at least partly overcome this shortcoming. They differ from the typical capacitor in that their "plates" provide significantly larger surface area and are much closer together. The surface area is increased by coating the metal plates with a porous substance. Instead of having a dielectric material between them, the plates of a supercapacitor are soaked in an electrolyte and separated by an extremely thin insulator.
Carbon supercapacitors offer high electrical power, low weight, and fast charge-discharge cycles. But it's difficult to get carbon to provide a high enough surface area to bring the energy density up to where it could compete directly with batteries.
Though some carbon materials have been made to exhibit a high supercapacitance in theory, they are not able to translate those gains into real-world applications. For example, graphene supercapacitors exhibit a theoretical capacitance of 550 F/g but only reach 300 F/g when used in real-life applications.
Improving one atom at a time
Recently, scientists have focused on altering the surface of carbon-based supercapacitors to increase their potential to store charge. In this case, the supercapacitor system under investigation is composed of carbon plates that contain nano-sized pores (mesoporous carbon) with a polymer insulator. They have altered the surface of the mesoporous carbon plates by the addition of nitrogen. Doping in nitrogen has allowed for reactions between the nitrogen and carbon. These "redox" reactions result in the movement of electrons from one species to another.
In this study, the scientists demonstrated the ability to produce an electrochemically active substance from layered carbon (similar to graphene) by nitrogen doping.
In order to make the material, they used a sacrificial porous silica template containing self-assembled tubes. This material was then covered with a thin layer of carbon. The silica was then etched away, leaving a self-supported ordered superstructure, with a thickness of only a few atomic layers of carbon.
Since this process was rather involved, they also demonstrated a simplified, template-free method to produce a similar carbon structure with the same overall performance.
These materials were imaged and found to have nanometer-sized tubes that are evenly spaced throughout the material. The tubes themselves were found to be composed of graphene-like sheets with fewer than five total layers. After nitrogen doping, these structural features still remained, but the surface area increased dramatically, as did the total pore volume. The higher surface area should allow it to store more charges.
Performance doping with nitrogen
The scientists tested the capacitance of the nitrogen-doped structure using an aqueous electrolyte. The system was found to have a capacitance of 855 F/g—quite a big step above the graphene-based materials. They also found that the system can be charged and discharged very quickly.
The unusually high capacitance exhibited by this system can be attributed to robust redox reactions. In the course of these reactions, the nitrogen reacts with the carbon on the surface of the plates, forming a variety of compounds. As a result, the layered carbon material is transformed into an electrochemically active substance while maintaining its electrical conductivity. Nitrogen doping also altered other physical properties that are conducive to supercapacitive performance, including resistance, hydrophobicity, and electrostatic charge.
After nitrogen doping, these carbon-based systems can store 41 watt-hours per kilogram. Though that's still not enough to compete with batteries in their energy-storage capabilities, this approach demonstrates that significant improvements in supercapacitor energy storage are still possible.
Science, 2015. DOI: 10.1126/science.aab3798 (About DOIs).
Beating graphene to push supercapacitors closer to batteries
Adding nitrogen to carbon materials boosts capacitance above that of graphene.
by Shalini Saxena - Dec 30, 2015 11:44am CST
Most people think of batteries when they consider energy storage, but capacitors are an alternative in some use cases. Capacitors are used in almost all electronic devices, often to supply temporary power when batteries are being changed to prevent loss of information. In addition to everyday devices, they are also used in more obscure technologies, including certain types of weapons.
Understanding the supercapacitor
Unlike batteries, capacitors use static electricity to store energy. In their simplest form, they contain two conducting metallic plates with an insulating material (dielectric) placed in between. A typical capacitor charges instantly but usually cannot hold a great deal of charge.
Supercapacitors can at least partly overcome this shortcoming. They differ from the typical capacitor in that their "plates" provide significantly larger surface area and are much closer together. The surface area is increased by coating the metal plates with a porous substance. Instead of having a dielectric material between them, the plates of a supercapacitor are soaked in an electrolyte and separated by an extremely thin insulator.
Carbon supercapacitors offer high electrical power, low weight, and fast charge-discharge cycles. But it's difficult to get carbon to provide a high enough surface area to bring the energy density up to where it could compete directly with batteries.
Though some carbon materials have been made to exhibit a high supercapacitance in theory, they are not able to translate those gains into real-world applications. For example, graphene supercapacitors exhibit a theoretical capacitance of 550 F/g but only reach 300 F/g when used in real-life applications.
Improving one atom at a time
Recently, scientists have focused on altering the surface of carbon-based supercapacitors to increase their potential to store charge. In this case, the supercapacitor system under investigation is composed of carbon plates that contain nano-sized pores (mesoporous carbon) with a polymer insulator. They have altered the surface of the mesoporous carbon plates by the addition of nitrogen. Doping in nitrogen has allowed for reactions between the nitrogen and carbon. These "redox" reactions result in the movement of electrons from one species to another.
In this study, the scientists demonstrated the ability to produce an electrochemically active substance from layered carbon (similar to graphene) by nitrogen doping.
In order to make the material, they used a sacrificial porous silica template containing self-assembled tubes. This material was then covered with a thin layer of carbon. The silica was then etched away, leaving a self-supported ordered superstructure, with a thickness of only a few atomic layers of carbon.
Since this process was rather involved, they also demonstrated a simplified, template-free method to produce a similar carbon structure with the same overall performance.
These materials were imaged and found to have nanometer-sized tubes that are evenly spaced throughout the material. The tubes themselves were found to be composed of graphene-like sheets with fewer than five total layers. After nitrogen doping, these structural features still remained, but the surface area increased dramatically, as did the total pore volume. The higher surface area should allow it to store more charges.
Performance doping with nitrogen
The scientists tested the capacitance of the nitrogen-doped structure using an aqueous electrolyte. The system was found to have a capacitance of 855 F/g—quite a big step above the graphene-based materials. They also found that the system can be charged and discharged very quickly.
The unusually high capacitance exhibited by this system can be attributed to robust redox reactions. In the course of these reactions, the nitrogen reacts with the carbon on the surface of the plates, forming a variety of compounds. As a result, the layered carbon material is transformed into an electrochemically active substance while maintaining its electrical conductivity. Nitrogen doping also altered other physical properties that are conducive to supercapacitive performance, including resistance, hydrophobicity, and electrostatic charge.
After nitrogen doping, these carbon-based systems can store 41 watt-hours per kilogram. Though that's still not enough to compete with batteries in their energy-storage capabilities, this approach demonstrates that significant improvements in supercapacitor energy storage are still possible.
Science, 2015. DOI: 10.1126/science.aab3798 (About DOIs).
Preparing for large-scale solar deployment
January 1, 2016 by Nancy W. Stauffer
Deploying solar power at the scale needed to alleviate climate change will pose serious challenges for today's electric power system, finds a study performed by researchers at MIT and the Institute for Research and Technology (ITT) at Comillas University in Spain. For example, local power networks will need to handle both incoming and outgoing flows of electricity. Rapid changes in photovoltaic (PV) output as the sun comes and goes will require running expensive power plants that can respond quickly to changes in demand. Costs will rise, yet market prices paid to owners of PV systems will decline as more PV systems come online, rendering more PV investment unprofitable at market prices. The study concludes that ensuring an economic, reliable, and climate-friendly power system in the future will require strengthening existing equipment, modifying regulations and pricing, and developing critical technologies, including low-cost, large-scale energy storage devices that can smooth out delivery of PV-generated electricity.
Most experts agree that solar power must be a critical component of any long-term plan to address climate change. By 2050, a major fraction of the world's power should come from solar sources. However, analyses performed as part of the MIT "Future of Solar Energy" report found that getting there won't be straightforward. "One of the big messages of the solar study is that the power system has to get ready for very high levels of solar PV generation," says Ignacio Pérez-Arriaga, a visiting professor at the MIT Sloan School of Management from IIT-Comillas.
Without the ability to store energy, all solar (and wind) power devices are intermittent sources of electricity. When the sun is shining, electricity produced by PVs flows into the power system, and other power plants can be turned down or off because their generation isn't needed. When the sunshine goes away, those other plants must come back online to meet demand. That scenario poses two problems. First, PVs send electricity into a system that was designed to deliver it, not receive it. And second, their behavior requires other power plants to operate in ways that may be difficult or even impossible.
Figure 2: How PV generation affects demand that must be met by other generating units on a summer day on a Texas-like power system. Yellow areas are demand met by PV generation; brown areas are “net demand” that must be met by other power plants. When PV penetration is low, net demand decreases midday. But as PV share grows, net demand is far lower midday and must ramp up quickly when the sun sets — a rapid change that requires expensive gas-fired plants.
The result is that solar PVs can have profound, sometimes unexpected impacts on operations, future investments, costs, and prices on both distribution systems—the local networks that deliver electricity to consumers—and bulk power systems, the large interconnected systems made up of generation and transmission facilities. And those impacts grow as the solar presence increases.
Supporting local distribution
To examine impacts on distribution networks, the researchers used the Reference Network Model (RNM), which was developed at IIT-Comillas and simulates the design and operation of distribution networks that transfer electricity from high-voltage transmission systems to all final consumers. Using the RNM, the researchers built—via simulation—several prototype networks and then ran multiple simulations based on different assumptions, including varying amounts of PV generation.
In some situations, the addition of dispersed PV systems reduces the distance electricity must travel along power lines, so less is lost in transit and costs go down. But as the PV energy share grows, that benefit is eclipsed by the need to invest in reinforcing or modifying the existing network to handle two-way power flows. Changes could include installing larger transformers, thicker wires, and new voltage regulators or even reconfiguring the network, but the net result is added cost to protect both equipment and quality of service.
Figure 1 below presents sample results showing the impact of solar generation on network costs in the United States and in Europe. The outcomes differ, reflecting differences in the countries' voltages, network configurations, and so on. But in both cases, costs increase as the PV energy share increases from 0 to 30 percent, and the impact is greater when demand is dominated by residential rather than commercial or industrial customers.
The impact is also greater in less sunny regions. Indeed, in areas with low insolation, distribution costs may nearly double when the PV contribution exceeds one-third of annual load. The reason: When insolation is low, many more solar generating devices must be installed to meet a given level of demand, and the network needs to be ready to handle all the electricity flowing from those devices on the occasional sunny day.
One way to reduce the burden on distribution networks is to add local energy storage capability. Depending on the scenario and the storage capacity, at 30 percent PV penetration, storage can reduce added costs by one-third in Europe and cut them in half in the United States. "That doesn't mean that deployment of storage is economically viable now," says Pérez-Arriaga. "Current storage technology is expensive, but one of the services with economic value that it can provide is to bring down the cost of deploying solar PV."
In some situations, the addition of dispersed PV systems reduces the distance electricity must travel along power lines, so less is lost in transit and costs go down. But as the PV energy share grows, that benefit is eclipsed by the need to invest in reinforcing or modifying the existing network to handle two-way power flows. Changes could include installing larger transformers, thicker wires, and new voltage regulators or even reconfiguring the network, but the net result is added cost to protect both equipment and quality of service.
Figure 1 below presents sample results showing the impact of solar generation on network costs in the United States and in Europe. The outcomes differ, reflecting differences in the countries' voltages, network configurations, and so on. But in both cases, costs increase as the PV energy share increases from 0 to 30 percent, and the impact is greater when demand is dominated by residential rather than commercial or industrial customers.
The impact is also greater in less sunny regions. Indeed, in areas with low insolation, distribution costs may nearly double when the PV contribution exceeds one-third of annual load. The reason: When insolation is low, many more solar generating devices must be installed to meet a given level of demand, and the network needs to be ready to handle all the electricity flowing from those devices on the occasional sunny day.
One way to reduce the burden on distribution networks is to add local energy storage capability. Depending on the scenario and the storage capacity, at 30 percent PV penetration, storage can reduce added costs by one-third in Europe and cut them in half in the United States. "That doesn't mean that deployment of storage is economically viable now," says Pérez-Arriaga. "Current storage technology is expensive, but one of the services with economic value that it can provide is to bring down the cost of deploying solar PV."
Another concern stems from methods used to calculate consumer bills—methods that some distribution companies and customers deem unfair. Most U.S. states employ a practice called net metering. Each PV owner is equipped with an electric meter that turns one way when the household is pulling electricity in from the network and the other when it's sending excess electricity out. Reading the meter each month therefore gives net consumption or (possibly) net production, and the owner is billed or paid accordingly.
Figure 3: Results from simulating the operation of a Texas-like power system while changing three factors: penetration of PV as a fraction of peak demand, income per installed watt seen by owners of PV systems, and energy storage capacity on the system. In the absence of storage, as PV penetration increases, PV system owners’ income decreases. But at each level of solar PV penetration, adding storage increases that income, and in general, the more storage added, the greater the upward shift.
Most electricity bills consist of a small fixed component and a variable component that is proportional to the energy consumed during the time period considered. Net metering can have the effect of reducing, canceling, or even turning the variable component into a negative value. As a result, users with PV panels avoid paying most of the network costs—even though they are using the network and (as explained above) may actually be pushing up network costs. "The cost of the network has to be recovered, so people who don't own solar PV panels on their rooftops have to pay what the PV owners don't pay," explains Pérez-Arriaga. In effect, the PV owners are receiving a subsidy that's paid by the non-PV owners.
Unless the design of network charges is modified, the current controversy over electricity bills will intensify as residential solar penetration increases. Therefore, Pérez-Arriaga and his colleagues are developing proposals for "completely overhauling the way in which the network tariffs are designed so that network costs are allocated to the entities that cause them," he says.
Impacts on bulk power systems
In other work, the researchers focused on the impact of PV penetration on larger-scale electric systems. Using the Low Emissions Electricity Market Analysis model—another tool developed at IIT-Comillas—they examined how operations on bulk power systems, the future generation mix, and prices on wholesale electricity markets might evolve as the PV energy share grows.
Unlike deploying a conventional power plant, installing a solar PV system requires no time-consuming approval and construction processes. "If the regulator gives some attractive incentive to solar, you can just remove the potatoes in your potato field and put in solar panels," Pérez-Arriaga says. As a result, significant solar generation can appear on a bulk power system within a few months. With no time to adjust, system operators must carry on using existing equipment and methods of deploying it to meet the needs of customers.
A typical bulk power system includes a variety of power plants with differing costs and characteristics. Conventional coal and nuclear plants are inexpensive to run (though expensive to build), but they don't switch on and off easily or turn up and down quickly. Plants fired by natural gas are more expensive to run (and less expensive to build), but they're also more flexible. In general, demand is met by dispatching the least expensive plants first and then turning to more expensive and flexible plants as needed.
For one series of simulations, the researchers focused on a power system similar to the one that services much of Texas. Results presented in Figure 2 in the slideshow above show how PV generation affects demand on that system over the course of a summer day. In each diagram, yellow areas are demand met by PV generation, and brown areas are "net demand," that is, remaining demand that must be met by other power plants. Left to right, the diagrams show increasing PV penetration. Initially, PV generation simply reduces net demand during the middle of the day. But when the PV energy share reaches 58 percent, the solar generation pushes down net demand dramatically, such that when the sun goes down, other generators must go from low to high production in a short period of time. Since low-cost coal and nuclear plants can't ramp up quickly, more expensive gas-fired plants must cut in to do the job.
That change has a major impact on prices on the wholesale electricity market. Each owner who sends a unit of electricity into the bulk power system at a given time gets paid the same amount: the cost of producing a unit of electricity at the last plant that was turned on, thus the most expensive one. So when PVs come online, expensive gas-fired plants shut off, and the price paid to everyone drops. Then when the sun goes away and PV production abruptly disappears, gas-fired plants are turned back on and the price goes way up.
As a result, when PV systems are operating and PV penetrations are high, prices are low, and when they shut down, prices are high. Owners of PV systems thus receive the low prices and never the high. Moreover, their reimbursement declines as more solar power comes online, as shown by the downward sloping blue curve in Figure 1 in the slideshow above.
Under current conditions, as more PV systems come online, reimbursements to solar owners will shrink to the point that investing in solar is no longer profitable at market prices. "So people may think that if solar power becomes very inexpensive, then everything will become solar," Pérez-Arriaga says. "But we find that that won't happen. There's a natural limit to solar penetration after which investment in more solar will not be economically viable."
However, if goals and incentives are set for certain levels of solar penetration decades ahead, then PV investment will continue, and the bulk power system will have time to adjust. In the absence of energy storage, the power plants accompanying solar will for the most part be gas-fired units that can follow rapid changes in demand. Conventional coal and nuclear plants will play a diminishing role—unless new, more flexible versions of those technologies are designed and deployed (along with carbon capture and storage for the coal plants). If high subsidies are paid to PV generators or if PV cost diminishes substantially, conventional coal and nuclear plants will be pushed out even more, and more flexible gas plants will be needed to cover the gap, leading to a different generation mix that is well-adapted for coexisting with solar.
A powerful means of alleviating cost and operating issues associated with PVs on bulk power systems—as on distribution networks—is to add energy storage. Technologies that provide many hours of storage—such as grid-scale batteries and hydroelectric plants with large reservoirs—will increase the value of PV. "Storage helps solar PVs have more value because it is able to bring solar-generated electricity to times when sunshine is not there, so to times when prices are high," Pérez-Arriaga says.
As Figure 3 in the slideshow above demonstrates, adding storage makes investments in PV generation more profitable at any level of solar penetration, and in general the greater the storage capacity, the greater the upward pressure on revenues paid to owners.
Energy storage thus can play a critical role in ensuring financial rewards to prospective buyers of PV systems so that the share of generation provided by PVs can continue to grow—without serious penalties in terms of operations and economics. Again, the research results demonstrate that developing low-cost energy storage technology is a key enabler for the successful deployment of solar PV power at a scale needed to address climate change in the coming decades.
More information: The Remuneration Challenge: New Solutions for the Regulation of Electricity Distribution Utilities Under High Penetrations of Distributed Energy Resources and Smart Grid Technologies: mitei.mit.edu/system/files/20141015-The-Remuneration-Challenge-MIT-CEEPR-No-2014-005.pdf
A Framework for Redesigning Distribution Network Use of System Charges Under High Penetration of Distributed Energy Resources: New Principles for New Problems. mitei.mit.edu/system/files/20141028_UOF_DNUoS-FrameworkPaper.pdf
Read more at: http://phys.org/news/2016-01-large-scale-solar-deployment.html#jCp
Wind, solar power soar in spite of bargain prices for fossil fuels
http://www.dallasnews.com/business/business-headlines/20160101-wind-solar-power-soar-in-spite-of-bargain-prices-for-fossil-fuels.ece
Photovoltaic power panels stand at Abaste's El Bonillo Solar Plant while wind turbines spin at a wind farm on the background in El Bonillo, Albacete province, Spain.
By JoWarrick
The Washington Post
Published: 01 January 2016 09:52 PM
Updated: 01 January 2016 09:58 PM
Wind and solar power appear set for a record-breaking year in 2016 as a clean-energy construction boom gains momentum in spite of a global glut of cheap fossil fuels.
Orders for 2016 solar and wind installations are up sharply, from the United States to China to the developing economies of Africa and Latin America, all in defiance of stubbornly low prices for coal and natural gas, the industry's chief competitors.
Nice day.
$66,000,0000 market cap....
double the revs, double our wallet!
Same as with CABN....
Just sleeping and watching on this one. Not much to lose. More to gain.ZZZZZZZZZ
24 shares AH @ 3.59 to make you feel better I guess!
Merry Christmas!
AI
