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NERC Reality vs. AWEA’s Goggin: Chasing a Ghost in Windland

By Kevon Martis -- March 5, 2014

“It is simply dishonest to state that very high levels of renewables can be accommodated with little problem, while NERC states that until we figure out who pays for all the substantial operational and reliability challenges those VERs bring to the system, higher penetrations (above 20%) become problematic.”

Last fall I entered into a debate in the comment section of a post on The Energy Collective with AWEA’s Michael Goggin. As is his style, Mr. Goggin posted a long series of statements about wind energy suggesting that it is neither more difficult to integrate high percentages of wind into the grid than conventional generators nor does it create significant additional expense for grid operators or ratepayers.

I responded with a post stating that a recent paper by NERC entitled “Maintaining Bulk Power System Reliability While Integrating Variable Energy Resources – CAISO Approach” contradicted nearly everything he stated in his post.