Falling renewable power costs for onshore wind and other tech will be the solution to boosting global climate action. One report from the International Renewable Energy Agency said..
In 2018, the global weighted-average cost of electricity from solar photovoltaics and from onshore wind declined by 13% compared to 2017.
In addition, the report said, cost reductions for these two technologies “are set to continue to decline into the next decade.
So we are talking over 3/4 for onshore wind and 4/5 of solar PV capacity. All that is due to be commissioned in 2020. It will produce power at lower prices than the cheapest new coal, oil or natural gas options.
IRENA, based in Abu Dhabi, is an inter-governmental body with around 160 members. In its report it said that it continues to revise its cost forecasts for solar PV and onshore wind. However renewables have been “beating earlier expectations.”
At the beginning of 2018, IRENA’s analysis of auction and PPA data suggested that the global-weighted average cost of electricity could fall to just under five US cents per kilowatt-hour for onshore wind and five and a half cents per kilowatt-hour for solar PV in 2020.
At the beginning of 2019, the “potential value” for onshore wind in 2020 had dropped a further 8%. All to four and a half cents per kilowatt-hour. That’s while that of solar PV dropped 13%. Again that’s to less than five cents per kilowatt-hour.
The report said that onshore wind and solar PV costs between three and four cents per kilowatt hour are “already possible” in areas with good resources and enabling regulatory and institutional frameworks.
Renewable Beats Coal in USA
Then EcoWatch reports:
What’s the future of coal? The answer may be blowing in the wind. Or running through our waters. Or, maybe it’s at the end of a sunbeam.
Wherever the answer is found, the message is clear. Coal is on a downward trend in the U.S. As well as renewables are on the rise. All according to a new report released by the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission, or FERC.
The report also shows that renewable energies had slightly more installed capacity than coal. This is according to CNN reporting. So this means that power plants are capable of producing more energy from clean sources than they are from coal.
“Coal has no technology path,” said Jeff McDermott, managing partner at Greentech Capital Advisors, a boutique investment bank focused on clean energy, as reported by CNN. “It’s got nowhere to go but extinction.”
While the discrepancy is slight, the trend is clear. The non-profit SUN DAY, which campaigns for renewable energy, analyzed the data. A press release by the non-profit SUN DAY Campaign, which analyzed the data, noted that the new additions of wind, solar and hydropower to the electrical grid ” was enough to push renewable energy’s share of total available installed U.S. generating capacity up to 21.56 percent. By comparison, coal’s share dropped to 21.55 percent (down from 23.04 percent a year ago).”
Yet, that number does not take into account solar panels that people put on their roofs, which accounts for roughly 30 percent of the nation’s solar powered electricity, according to SUN DAY. “That would suggest that solar capacity is now actually 4% — or more — of the nation’s total and could increase by more than 20,000 megawatts by May 2022,” according to the press release.
Source: S&P Global, Jeffrey Ryser, Editor Gail Roberts and Commodity Electric Power, ELECTRIC POWER, 29 May 2019 | 22:42 UTC, Houston, EcoWatch, CNN, SUN DAY
