About 15% Of Texas Energy Is Now Supplied By Wind

(This chart shows the 2016 energy sources in Texas.)

Although coal and natural gas still provide most of the electricity for homes and businesses in Texas, wind energy is growing fast. In 2016, it has provided nearly 15% of all energy. The following article is by Katherine Tweed at Green Tech Media.

First, some definitions:

Megawatt -- unit of power equal to 1 million watts.

Gigawatt -- init of power equal to 1 billion watts.

1 Megawatt will provide enough energy to supply the needs of 400 to 900 homes (depending on the time of year and location of those homes).

Tweed writes:

Texas grid operator ERCOT announced a new record for wind on Monday. For the first time, wind provided more than 15,000 megawatts of electricity to the state on a single day. 

The record wind on Sunday supplied an average of 41 percent of electricity throughout the day. But it was not an all-time record for wind in Texas. On one day in March, wind supplied more than 48 percent of load during one hour.

It is not the hour-by-hour records that are impressive, however.

Texas is already the clear leader in wind power in the U.S., and that lead is widening. Texas has more than 18,000 megawatts installed and another 5,000 megawatts under construction, according to the American Wind Energy Association.

Wind power made up an average of 11.7 percent of electricity in 2015 in Texas, a figure that will be at least 14.7 in 2016, according to ERCOT.

The final tally of wind power’s contribution to the Texas electric grid will likely be slightly higher, as the wind blows harder in winter and therefore wind power contributions to the power mix usually go up.

Of course, the growing share of wind is still half the amount of coal in Texas and about one-third of natural gas generation.

Coal and natural gas may dominate in Texas, but the investment the state has made in transmission and improving renewable energy forecasts could allow for even more wind and solar in the future.

The wind power in Texas is coming from across the state, including the Texas Panhandle, the west and the south. Texas’ success with wind power is largely due to its Competitive Renewable Energy Zones, which were identified mostly in West Texas and the state's Panhandle region. A key to the project was about $7 billion in transmission lines to carry the wind power where it is needed.

With wind power flowing across the state, solar power is now starting to catch on to take advantage of the transmission lines. In 2015, ERCOT did not even list solar as a fuel source on its annual demand and energy report.

In 2016, the figures are still very small -- but they're growing. ERCOT reports about 685 megawatts of solar will be on-line in Texas in 2016, up from less than 300 in 2015. For the first time, solar energy received its own designation as a fuel type in ERCOT’s annual demand and energy report.

Large-scale solar could grow quickly in Texas, but will not even come close to wind. By 2020, ERCOT expects 2.5 gigawatts of solar on its system, compared to more than 28 gigawatts of wind.

Solar Power Generation Has Doubled For 7 Straight Years

(The image above is by S-kei and was found at Wikipedia.)

The fossil fuel producers, and the power plants generating electricity from those fossil fuels, have to be hating this. Solar power is still in its infancy in this country, but it is growing fast -- and with the price of solar panels dropping each year, that growth is likely to continue unabated. Consider this short article by Zack Colman in the Washington Examiner.

The amount of U.S. electricity generated from solar power is slated to more than double for the seventh consecutive year.

The U.S. Energy Information Administration said that solar has provided 7.4 million megawatt-hours of electricity through June, enough to power about 685,000 homes per year. Aided by a mishmash of federal and state incentives, coupled with plummeting solar panel prices, installations are increasing all over the country — generation this year is more than double the 3.5 million megawatt-hours over the same period last year.

While solar's slice of the U.S. electricity pie is still small — it accounted for just 0.2 percent of total generation in 2013 — the electric utility industry is viewing it as a disruptive force. That's because once residents turn to solar, utility revenues take a hit because they lose a customer.

Some utilities and conservative groups have taken to fighting one of the most pervasive incentives, which is known as net metering. The mechanism allows solar customers to sell excess power back into the grid while remaining connected to it for backup purposes.

Opponents say net metering passes the cost of maintaining the electric grid for solar customers onto non-solar customers.

But its backers say utilities receive benefits because solar suppresses electricity demand during periods of high use, helping utilities avoid running costly "peaker" plants used to head off supply shortages.

A Breakthrough In The Solar Generation Of Energy

The following post is from the staff at Science Alert. I thought it was important enough to repost it here for my readers.

A solar thermal test plant in Newcastle, Australia, has generated “supercritical” steam at a pressure of 23.5 mpa (3400 psi) and 570°C (1,058°F). 

CSIRO is claiming it as a world record, and it’s a HUGE step for solar thermal energy.

"It's like breaking the sound barrier; this step change proves solar has the potential to compete with the peak performance capabilities of fossil fuel sources," Dr Alex Wonhas, CSIRO’s Energy Director, told Colin Jeffrey for Gizmag.

The Energy Centre uses a field of more than 600 mirrors (known as heliostats) which are all directed at two towers housing solar receivers and turbines, Gizmag reports.

This supercritical steam is used to drive the world’s most advanced power plant turbines, but previously it’s only been possible to produce it by burning fossil fuels such as coal or gas.

"Instead of relying on burning fossil fuels to produce supercritical steam, this breakthrough demonstrates that the power plants of the future could instead be using the free, zero emission energy of the sun to achieve the same result,” Dr Wonhas explained.

Currently, commercial solar thermal or concentrating solar power power plants only operate a “subcritical” levels, using less pressurised steam. This means that they’ve never been able to match the output or efficiency of the world’s best fossil fuel power plants - until now.

The commercial development of this technology is still a fair way off, but this is an important first step towards a more sustainable future.

Public's Views On Energy More Reasonable Than Leaders

Right-wingers, like the "Witch of Wasilla", have tried to convince Americans that the way out of our energy problems was to just increase production of the fossil fuels (oil, gas, coal) -- and their mantra was "drill, baby, drill". And after the 2010 elections they were able to seek that to many people. Note on the chart above that in 2011 those wanting more production nearly caught up (closed to within 7 points) with those who say more conservation is the best answer.

But that was short-lived. The current gap favors conservation by 23 points, which is more like opinions since 2000. People know that we are not going to drill our way out of our energy problems. There is a finite amount of fossil fuels, especially oil, and we are at or near the point where production will begin to fall no matter how much drilling is done. The only reasonable answer is more conservation, coupled with alternate and renewable energy sources (wind, solar, etc.).

The chart above was made from information in a series of Gallup Polls -- with the last being between March 6th and 9th of a random nationwide sample of 1,048 adults (with a 4 point margin of error). Here are some other results from that poll, showing what the general public supports and opposes. It shows that most Americans are a lot smarter than the teabaggers when it comes to energy.

Government should spend more money developing solar & wind power.
Support...............67%
Oppose...............32%

Government should spend more money developing alternate fuels for automobiles.
Support...............66%
Oppose...............33%

Higher emissions and pollution standards should be set for businesses and industry.
Support...............65%
Oppose...............35%

Federal Environmental regulations should be more strongly enforced.
Support...............64%
Oppose...............34%

Mandatory controls should be placed on emissions of CO2 & other greenhouse gases.
Support...............63%
Oppose...............35%

Set higher emissions standards for automobiles.
Support...............62%
Oppose...............35%

Set stricter standards for extracting natural gas, including fracking.
Support...............58%
Oppose...............37%

Expand the use of nuclear energy.
Support...............47%
Oppose...............51%

U.S. Falling Behind In Solar Energy

At the turn of the century it looked like the United States was going to be a leader in solar energy (the ultimate in clean and renewable energy production). In 2001, this country produced 27% (more than a quarter) of all the world's solar panels. But with not enough money going into solar energy research and some companies going out of business, production in the United States has dropped to only about 5%. Now other nations have taken the lead. Production in Taiwan has risen from 1% to 15%, and production in China has jumped from 1% to 47%.

The United States seems determined to ride the fossil fuel production until the end -- even though we know it will run out (and in the case of oil, they may be soon) and pollutes the environment. Americans have always been afraid of any kind of change. It took many years of hard fighting to get started on women's rights, racial civil rights, and homosexual rights -- and those battles still have not been completed. It looks like the same must happen with energy production. Americans will have to be dragged into the future, kicking and screaming, and begging for their fossil fuel fix.

Americans like to think of themselves as a forward-thinking country, but the truth is that most Americans aren't forward-thinking at all. They cling to the past with a ferocious tenacity -- even after it becomes obvious that the old ways are hurting the country and its citizens. We need to wake up and realize that the "good old days" were just a myth. The best days lay ahead of us -- after we dump fossil fuels, and embrace the many clean and renewable types of energy (including solar).

Voters Want More Solar Power Developed

Once again, Willard Mitt Romney (aka Wall Street Willie) is out-of-step with the views of the American people. He has said on the campaign trail that he would cut the government subsidies for the development of renewable energy sources. In the recent debate, he tried to justify this by remarking that 50% of the "green" firms that the government has helped with loan guarantees have gone out of business. This was a lie. Out of the 26 recipients of those loan guarantees, only 3 have gone out of business.

The truth is that the American people like the idea of clean and renewable energy sources (solar, wind, etc.). A recent survey shows that 92% of all voters thought the development of solar energy was either "very important" or "somewhat important, and only 8% thought it was not important. And the figures for the all-important swing voters was the same (with 93% thinking it was very or somewhat important).

And that's not all. The voters think the government should be doing more to support the development of solar energy -- not less. About 70% of the voters say the government should be offering more financial incentives for the development of solar energy technology (just the opposite of what Willard wants to do). And that figure rises to 72% among swing voters.

And the support for developing more solar energy cuts across all political lines. It has the support of 98% of Democrats, 95% of Independents, and 84% of Republicans. Willard is clearly going against the wishes of the voters, including many in his own party (except for the teabaggers -- the only group that a recent Pew Research Poll found viewing negatively the need for clean energy & action on global climate change). In fact, that same Pew Poll found that every demographic group (with the exceptions of those over 65 and the right-wing teabaggers) think a higher priority should be put on clean and renewable energy sources instead of traditional energy sources (fossil fuels).

New Way To Produce Fuel From The Sun

Mankind has known for a long time that one of the best sources of energy is the Sun.   It powers the world and has done so since the earth was formed.   The problem for mankind has been to capture that energy and use it as we see fit.   Solar panels have been developed and are in use, but the energy from them cannot be bottled and transported to some other location -- it must be used where it is collected and can only be saved for a short period of time (like with batteries).

But researchers in the United States and Switzerland may be on the way to solving that problem.   They have invented a solar machine (pictured above) which uses the Sun's energy to create a fuel that can be stored and transported.

The machine has a chamber filled with ceria (cerium oxide) -- which is readily available as the most abundant of the "rare earth" metals.   Water or carbon dioxide is pumped into the ceria chamber and is heated by the Sun's rays.   The product is either hydrogen, or a combination of hydrogen and carbon monoxide which can be used to make a synthetic fuel.   Either way, the product can be stored and transported.

So far, they are only harnessing about 0.8% of the solar energy taken into the chamber.   But scientists say with a smaller aperture and better insulation they believe they can get that up to at least 19%.   That could make the process very viable, especially if a low carbon-use policy is adopted (as is needed to avoid global climate change).

This is very exciting news, and it's just the kind of innovation that is needed.   Even if a low-carbon policy is not quickly adopted, we are probably at or near peak oil production (the point at which production starts to fall no matter how much new drilling is done).   Thank goodness at least a few scientists are thinking about the future -- even if governments are not.