A Golden Age of Renewables Is Beginning, and California Is Leading the Way
California has hit record-breaking milestones in renewable electricity generation, showing that wind, water and solar are ready to cover our electricity needs
LADWPs Pine Tree Wind Farm and Solar Power Plant in the Tehachapi Mountains of California.
Irfan Khan/Los Angeles Times via Getty Images
Something spectacular is happening in the Golden State. California—the fifth-largest economy in the world—has experienced a record-breaking string of days in which the combined generation of wind, geothermal, hydroelectric and solar electricity has exceeded demand on the main electricity grid for anywhere from 15 minutes to 9.25 hours per day. These clean, renewable electricity sources are collectively known as wind-water-solar (WWS) sources.
It is impossible to understate how monumental this clean, renewable energy milestone is and how quickly WWS supplies have ramped up. In 2022 and 2023, California reached 100 percent WWS on the grid but only for the occasional day on a weekend—never two days in a row and never during the week. Now it’s an almost daily occurrence during spring. And it heralds in a new era of clean, renewable electricity, which will ultimately power the entire U.S. and the rest of the world for nearly all energy purposes.
At press time, for 39 of the past 47 days (through April 23, supplies of WWS electricity have exceeded demand on the grid. On April 20, WWS supply peaked at 148.3 percent of demand (see top chart below). About half of the excess electricity each day is exported to other Western U.S. states; most of the rest is stored in batteries. Some electricity is even thrown away due to lack of demand. Battery electricity is then used to provide electricity for California’s grid at night. On April 21, nighttime battery electricity output reached a new record of nearly 6.5 gigawatts on California’s grid. That is the equivalent of the output of more…
Read the full article here
