> Developers have applied to build 139 GWac of large-scale solar projects in the territory of six grid operators – around five times what is currently online across the country – and that figure doesn’t even cover the entire United States. By any metric, we are looking at an unprecedented boom in solar development over the next five years.
> The six grid operator queues we investigated also showed more than 16 GW of battery projects which have filed for interconnection. And this number should not be too surprising to anyone who is watching the meteoric growth of energy storage.
> Per the US Energy Storage Monitor, from Wood Mackenzie Renewables & Power along with the Energy Storage Association (ESA), total energy storage deployed expanded by 60% in terms of energy and 300% on a power basis in the third quarter of 2018 versus the prior year. Going out mostly until 2023, the report noted that the front of the meter pipeline expanded to approximately 33 GW of power.
Natural gas picks up the slack until batteries (which everyone underestimates; we're going to have an enormous amount of energy storage cumulatively to go 100% low carbon) get a bit cheaper; wind, solar, hydro, and long distance transmission lines combined with utility scale storage is more than adequate to replace traditional base load (and all are possible today, not decades later if we started building fission/fusion commercial generators today).
> Developers have applied to build 139 GWac of large-scale solar projects in the territory of six grid operators – around five times what is currently online across the country – and that figure doesn’t even cover the entire United States. By any metric, we are looking at an unprecedented boom in solar development over the next five years.
> The six grid operator queues we investigated also showed more than 16 GW of battery projects which have filed for interconnection. And this number should not be too surprising to anyone who is watching the meteoric growth of energy storage.
> Per the US Energy Storage Monitor, from Wood Mackenzie Renewables & Power along with the Energy Storage Association (ESA), total energy storage deployed expanded by 60% in terms of energy and 300% on a power basis in the third quarter of 2018 versus the prior year. Going out mostly until 2023, the report noted that the front of the meter pipeline expanded to approximately 33 GW of power.
Natural gas picks up the slack until batteries (which everyone underestimates; we're going to have an enormous amount of energy storage cumulatively to go 100% low carbon) get a bit cheaper; wind, solar, hydro, and long distance transmission lines combined with utility scale storage is more than adequate to replace traditional base load (and all are possible today, not decades later if we started building fission/fusion commercial generators today).