Posts from — October 2009

Renewable energy generates a larger portion of the world’s electricity each year. But in relative terms, solar power generation is hardly a blip on the energy screen despite its long history of technological development.

In this Part I, we review the standard taxonomy of central solar power generating plants by focusing our attention on solar thermal technologies and demonstration projects. The technologies are reasonably well defined yet two formidable hurdles remain: large-scale energy storage technologies and first costs on the order of $5,000/kW, the same cost range as a Generation III+ nuclear plant.

 Future posts will explore a number of interesting commercial projects that have either recently or will soon break ground and the latest developments in hybrid projects that combine many of the available solar energy conversion technologies with conventional fossil-fueled technologies. Hybrid projects offer the opportunity for utilities to reduce fuel costs, while simultaneously helping utilities cope with onerous renewable portfolio mandates.

U.S. Solar Growth: Mostly for Swimming Pools

The U.S. solar industry saw a third straight year of record growth in 2008, but looks can be deceiving. The installation of 1,265 MW of all types of solar power last year brought total U.S. solar power capacity to 8,775 MW, according to the annual report from the Solar Energy Industries Association (SEIA), US Solar Industry 2008.

The report breaks down the new capacity as follows:

1. 342 MW of solar photovoltaic (PV);
2. 139 MWth (thermal equivalent) of solar water heating
3. 762 MWth of pool heating;, and
4. 21 MW of solar space heating and cooling.

Grid-tied PV grew at a rate of 81%, to 292 MW in 2008, compared to 161 MW in 2007. In essence, the amount of utility-scale solar electricity plants installed was miniscule but proponents remain hopeful that the next few years will see explosive growth in larger-scale projects.

So far, the utility-scale projects are relatively small (most such plants are located in the EU). No new concentrating solar power plants came online in the U.S. in 2008, but projects in the offing add up to more than 6 GW, the report said. Among these are projects planned for California’s Mojave Desert, Arizona, and Florida where, understandably, the sun shines year-round. States that led grid-tied PV installation were California (178.6 MW), New Jersey (22.5 MW), Colorado (21.6 MW), Nevada (13.9), and Hawaii (11.3 MW).

Government Quotas and Tax Favors Drive New Utility Projects

A more pragmatic view might find that the relatively high first costs can be a deal-breaker, as Lockheed Martin Corp did when it canceled its $1.5 billion dollar Starwood Solar I that was proposed for west of Phoenix. The 290-MW plant was canceled because Lockheed couldn’t secure financing of the project. The project was conceived as a means for Arizona Public Service to meet its renewable portfolio standard (RPS) of 15% by 2025.

Several other states added or expanded incentives or requirements for solar energy, including California, Hawaii, Maryland, Massachusetts, Missouri, and Ohio. To date, 28 states have renewable portfolio standards that require a certain amount of energy be generated from renewable sources, with 19 of these states mandating that a portion come from solar or distributed sources.

The Emergency Economic Stabilization Act of 2008 included an eight-year extension of the federal solar investment tax credit that has spurred U.S. market growth over the past three years, SEIA said. “This long-term extension will facilitate the long-term planning and investment necessary for the U.S. solar industry to reach its full potential.”

The organization said that the industry’s growth would be supported by provisions in the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009. These include a 30% grant program for commercial and utility-scale solar installations to be administered by the Department of Treasury, a Department of Energy loan guarantee program, and a 30% manufacturing investment tax credit to attract investors to the U.S. market. “Crafted wisely, other policies being debated at the national level—electric transmission infrastructure, national RPS, and global warming legislation—would also stimulate continued growth of the industry,” SEIA added.

Two General Solar Technologies Used in Utility-Scale Systems

In general, there are two alternative technologies used to harness the sun’s energy. The first, and most familiar, is to use photovoltaic (PV) panels. Hook up enough panels in series and parallel and just about any voltage and current can be produced (Figure 1).

In addition to the large space required for PV systems, the major drawback is that electricity doesn’t flow if the sun doesn’t shine. The price of a utility-scale PV electricity producer directly proportional to the price of the PV panels which are rapidly becoming a commodity. The price of a PV plant will also increase if motorized sun-tracking systems are included.

Figure 1. The 6.3 MW Mühlhausen Solarpark under construction in 2006. The cost of the photovoltaic plant was about $6,250/kW. The 57,600 PV panels are spread over 62 acres.

Our focus in this article is the second, and much more interesting, family of solar thermal or concentrating solar power (CSP) plants. Concentrated sunlight has performed useful work for humans for many years. There is one notable example of Auguste Mouchout, a French inventor, who in 1866 successfully powered a steam engine with sunlight, making him the first known person to construct a concentrating solar-powered mechanical device.

Concentrated Solar Projects Build on Familiar Technology

CSP plants have a marked resemblance to conventional steam plants. The obvious difference is the fuel source: A CSP system concentrates solar radiation to either heat an organic working fluid or to superheat steam, which then is expanded in a turbine-generator to produce electricity. In both cases, the working fluid is condensed after its expansion and returned to the collector to close the cycle. [Read more →]

“In an 1878 letter, [John] Ericsson concluded that ‘the fact is . . . that although the heat is obtained for nothing, so extensive, costly, and complex is the concentration apparatus that solar steam is many times more costly than steam produced by burning coal.’”

- Wilson Clark, Energy for Survival: The Alternative to Extinction (Garden City, NY: Anchor Books, 1974), p. 364.

Renewable energy, particularly wind and solar, are packaged as “new” and “the energy future.” But on close inspection, as the quotations below will show, these technologies are very old and have had many decades of application.

And as sure as the sun shines, solar and wind fail the economics and product-quality tests as dilute, non-stored, intermittent energy sources. And why amid a boom in fossil fuel supplies–a stock of energy from the sun’s work over the ages–would one chose a far more costly and unreliable energy source from the sun’s weak flow?

Unlike wind power, however, solar does have a pro-consumer, free-society niche as an off-the-grid power source. Such ‘micro’   electricity provides electricity that would not otherwise exist.

General

“Windmills, solar power, indeed the entire panoply of favored alternatives, are not new or revolutionary inventions. They do not arise from newly discovered principles of science; neither are they based on, nor do they epitomize, fundamental changes in engineering capabilities. Indeed, most alternative energy technologies are more stone-age in character than high-tech: burning wood and trash, tapping hot springs, capturing running water and the wind. The most exotic of the alternatives, solar photovoltaics, is based on the scientific phenomenon whose discovery yielded Einstein a Nobel Prize, and led to the first solar-electric cell being demonstrated in 1925. We have had more than ample time—75 years—for this technology to follow long-standing commercialization trajectories were it going to do so.”

- Mark Mills, Getting It Wrong: Energy Forecasts and the End-of-Technology Mindset, Competitive Enterprise Institute, February 1999, p. 30.

“Although much interest in the scientific community has been focused on solar energy at various times in history, widespread development of solar power equipment has never been achieved—primarily because of the high cost of developing solar power compared to that of technologies utilizing cheap fossil fuels.”

- Wilson Clark, Energy for Survival: The Alternative to Extinction (Garden City, NY: Anchor Books, 1974), p. 379. [Read more →]

[Editor note: This excerpt from Bradley's next book, Edison to Enron: Energy Markets and Political Strategies, is part of a five-chapter history of Samuel Insull, the father of the modern power industry.]

President Obama just returned from Copenhagen empty handed. His hometown will not get the 2016 Olympics, or as a representative of the Natural Resources Defense Council’s (NRDC) Chicago operation advertised it, the “Blue Green Olympics.”

Given the science, economics, and politics of the global warming, aka climate change, it can be hoped that Obama–and the heads of all governments around the world–come away ‘empty handed’ in Copenhagen in December. No town, city, province, or country should be burdened with energy rationing when consumer-driven, conventional energy has become more sustainable, not less.

The real global issue is economic recovery and growth, which means expanded private property and enhanced market institutions to promote sustainable growth in place of abject poverty and economic underperformance.

Flash back to the 1893 Chicago World’s Fair. It introduced the world to the newest energy, electricity, soon to become the energy of energies. A new era of hope and progress was on display. Twenty million visitors had their lives changed by witnessing the results of the transformation of coal inputs into electric outputs. [Read more →]

MasterResource continues to progress in its inaugural year. Our free-market energy blog has a top stable of primary writers, and we continue to attract quality guests that desire a unique home for their commentary.

MasterResource is a scholarly advocacy blog dedicated to energy/climate issues. One question we all ask ourselves is: how will this post appear tomorrow, next month, next year, or in a decade? Are we truth-seekers or mere shouters for the moment?  We advocate private property rights, voluntary market relations (instead of government coercion), and sound science, but our preference cannot come at the expense of scholarship (the factual record; logical and relevant theory). This is our standard, and we invite comments to this end from our readers. (1)

To date we have had 285 posts from 34 authors and approximately 1,750 comments from nearly 400 individuals. We are on the lookout for new talent and obscure writings that deserve a wide audience. Please contact me with requests or ideas.

Our Model

Our niche centers on:

(1) A focus on energy and on related environmental issues, particularly regarding the science, economics, and politics of climate change;

(2) Group participation (versus an individual or organizational blog) to attract top, diverse talent. We represent different institutions and backgrounds and employment situations;

(3) One in-depth blog per day to maximize attention to the writer’s work. [Read more →]

Paul Krugman has been on the warpath lately regarding climate change economics. He has devoted his last two NYT columns (here and here) to the subject, as well as back-to-back blog posts (here and here). True to form, Krugman accuses those who disagree with him of abject stupidity and evil intent; for Krugman it is impossible that any decent economist who cares about human beings could actually think the costs of cap-and-trade legislation will be high. But as we’ll see, Krugman’s own figures don’t jibe with the narrative he’s pushing.

In his September 27 blog post, Krugman takes up his familiar theme of denouncing those who dare to say that Waxman-Markey carries a large price tag. After using a diagram to explain the textbook distinction between the compliance costs of a new tax (or mandate), versus the “deadweight loss,” Krugman excoriates economist Martin Feldstein for allegedly spreading lies:

[Feldstein] took the CBO’s estimate of “compliance costs”, which was $1600 per household in an early report (it’s now down to $900, but who’s counting?), and implied that this was the economic cost of the legislation. But “compliance costs” are basically the sum of the blue rectangle and the red triangle; the true economic costs are just the triangle, and are much smaller.

OK now, this is quite simply hilarious, if you can follow me through the argument. I really don’t think Krugman realizes just how much his pants are down on this one.

First off, Krugman is correct that there really is a distinction between the impact of a new tax in terms of paying extra revenues, versus the overall loss to the economy because of distorted incentives. But when the public wants to know “how much will cap-and-trade cost?”, it is quite reasonable for them to wonder, “How much will my electricity bill, or gasoline prices, go up because of this?” Most people do not realize that Krugman & Co. are netting out the gains to the recipients of free allowances and government expenditures when computing the “net burden on U.S. households.”

For an analogy, consider the debate over health care reform. [Read more →]

For a long time, fans of renewable electricity have made their case by running simulations. Input the right data and (more importantly) the right assumptions, impose a renewable portfolio requirement or carbon plan, compute 30 years forward, and walk into a clean, fully employed future. Just close your eyes, click your heels, remember
to believe, and elect the right federal government.

Then reality intervened in the form of two country-wide case studies.

Denmark

More than a year ago, this column scooped the mainstream media with the truth about Denmark’s 20 percent wind generation. The country actually uses less than half of that power, but can keep the machines spinning thanks to (export) connections with the coal-based German grid and the nuclear- and hydro-based Scandinavian RTO.

For all this, the little mermaid enjoys the highest power costs in Europe. There is now an excellent report with lots of data by a think-tank there called CEPOS, which occupies roughly the same position that the pro-market Cato Institute does in Washington. (Disclosure: I am a Cato adjunct scholar and have taken money from them. Cato itself, like CEPOS, is supported almost entirely by private—as opposed to corporate—money.)

The study points out the sad fact that in a few years Denmark’s neighbors will be producing enough of their own wind power that their grid will have difficulty accepting Denmark’s, even if it comes gratis.

Spain

Spain is a more tragic story. [Read more →]