California Renewable Energy Legislation / Progress

[Dave EV]

Yes, they can't get those offshore wind turbines up fast enough. Perhaps the entire process can be streamlined in some manner. The goal obviously is to get at least enough online to replace Diablo Canyon by 2029/30 when those reactors shut down. And given the recent heat waves we are seeing, they also need to speed up the deployment of battery storage to soak up that otherwise curtailed solar surplus.

Yes, offshore wind and more batteries to go with the solar are key. The wind resources we have now tend to be fairly quiet during heat waves like this one - anyone know how the offshore wind locations tend to do?

IMO solar + batteries will still reign king for the summer months - while today's typical 4h duration batteries are being installed for maximum economics (4h duration is all we need to make it past days like we've been having), 8h duration batteries will be the next step in being able to store the solar from a day and allow that solar to be used long through the night.

There was also some weird and counter-intuitive things going on with batteries yesterday - compare yesterday 9/6 where the peak discharge 2,839 MW at 6:40 pm to the day before 3,339 MW at 6:30 pm. Apparently there is some price cap of $1,000 / MWh signal that caused the batteries to start discharging early (if $1,000 MWh is the max price, why not discharge as fast as possible?). So it seems that with some better rules and software in place, the batteries could have been better dispatched to coincide with peak loads.

Discussion related to this on Twitter under this post:

https://twitter.com/x/status/1567287963536465922

 

[iPlug]

...The wind resources we have now tend to be fairly quiet during heat waves like this one - anyone know how the offshore wind locations tend to do?...

Been wondering this question as well but have not been able to find live or precisely timed historical maps of offshore wind. I worry if a heat dome sitting over California also stalls offshore wind here as it does onshore wind. That would not be opportune.

I mentioned in another thread having watched over the years that wind in the upper-Midwest has been reliably good during our heat waves. It also is our best continental land-wind resource area.

The problem is that our CAISO/Western interconnection region does not connect into the Dakotas and Nebraska where most of this reliable wind is. This should be a priority to build strong interconnects into that region.

Wind Map

 

[nwdiver]

Yes, offshore wind and more batteries to go with the solar are key. The wind resources we have now tend to be fairly quiet during heat waves like this one - anyone know how the offshore wind locations tend to do?

IMO solar + batteries will still reign king for the summer months - while today's typical 4h duration batteries are being installed for maximum economics (4h duration is all we need to make it past days like we've been having), 8h duration batteries will be the next step in being able to store the solar from a day and allow that solar to be used long through the night.

There was also some weird and counter-intuitive things going on with batteries yesterday - compare yesterday 9/6 where the peak discharge 2,839 MW at 6:40 pm to the day before 3,339 MW at 6:30 pm. Apparently there is some price cap of $1,000 / MWh signal that caused the batteries to start discharging early (if $1,000 MWh is the max price, why not discharge as fast as possible?). So it seems that with some better rules and software in place, the batteries could have been better dispatched to coincide with peak loads.

View attachment 849983
View attachment 849984

Discussion related to this on Twitter under this post:

https://twitter.com/x/status/1567287963536465922

It's important to keep in mind that those batteries need to be charged by something. Even if that source is renewables if those renewables could have been used to offset a fossil generator you're still not accomplishing anything. It needs to be from otherwise curtailed renewables to really be beneficial.

With the Sol-Ark I installed recently I had to select 'load first' or any solar production would immediately charge the batteries and the grid would meet the load until there was enough solar generation to meet both. What good does that do? If you're not using surplus renewables to charge batteries you're just shifting the time of day to burn the same amount of fuel.

 

[RubberToe]

The problem is that our CAISO/Western interconnection region does not connect into the Dakotas and Nebraska where most of this reliable wind is. This should be a priority to build strong interconnects into that region.

I posted a link to this story a couple weeks ago in a different thread in the forum:

This power line could save California — and forever change the American West

The billionaire who owns the Coachella music festival is preparing to build the nation’s largest wind farm — and a 730-mile power line. Not everyone is on board.

www.latimes.com

 

[iPlug]

I posted a link to this story a couple weeks ago in a different thread in the forum:

This power line could save California — and forever change the American West

The billionaire who owns the Coachella music festival is preparing to build the nation’s largest wind farm — and a 730-mile power line. Not everyone is on board.

www.latimes.com

Yeah, that was a great read. Your prior post:

Prediction: Coal has fallen. Nuclear is next then Oil.

IIRC, it starts in Wyoming (within our existing western interconnection), but exciting this might come to fruition. Hoping for future DC interconnection into the Dakotas and Nebraska as well.

 

[Dave EV]

Been wondering this question as well but have not been able to find live or precisely timed historical maps of offshore wind. I worry if a heat dome sitting over California also stalls offshore wind here as it does onshore wind. That would not be opportune.

At the very least looking at Windy.com, it's currently blowing quite well off the coast of northern California all the way up to Canada. Unsurprisingly, the wind speeds indicated by Windy match up closely with the NREL wind resource maps, too. The goal is 5 GW of offshore wind by 2030 and 25 GW by 2045. Doesn't seem like a very ambitious goal, really. Offshore wind turbines around 12 MW in size currently, but up to 15 MW, 5 GW is only 333-417 turbines which seems very reasonable.

That said, I would rather see off-shore wind built over on-shore wind, purely from an aesthetics and land-use perspective. But solar beats wind hands down - we haven't gotten anywhere near fully utilizing all available roof space, covering parking lots, covering water canals, etc.

Windy as forecasted

Wind map and weather forecast

www.windy.com

WINDExchange: California Offshore 90-Meter Wind Map and Wind Resource Potential

It's important to keep in mind that those batteries need to be charged by something. Even if that source is renewables if those renewables could have been used to offset a fossil generator you're still not accomplishing anything. It needs to be from otherwise curtailed renewables to really be beneficial.

Absolutely - hopefully those batteries are all charged from solar and wind. Unfortunately some of those batteries are charged overnight from midnight - 6 am using whatever grid mix is available then (still mostly gas), though the bulk of their charging appears to be from 7:30-8:00 or so through 12-1 PM.

With the Sol-Ark I installed recently I had to select 'load first' or any solar production would immediately charge the batteries and the grid would meet the load until there was enough solar generation to meet both. What good does that do? If you're not using surplus renewables to charge batteries you're just shifting the time of day to burn the same amount of fuel.

How do you like the Sol Ark? Have a thread on your setup? What batteries have you paired with it?

I do think that at the end of the day, more granular price signals would go a long ways to figuring out the best time to charge and discharge your batteries, especially as more and more renewables go onto the grid. When the prices are the highest, you have the highest percentage of fossil fuel energy on the grid and when prices are lowest, you tend to have the highest percentage of renewable energy on the grid.

 

[iPlug]

At the very least looking at Windy.com, it's currently blowing quite well off the coast of northern California all the way up to Canada. Unsurprisingly, the wind speeds indicated by Windy match up closely with the NREL wind resource maps, too. The goal is 5 GW of offshore wind by 2030 and 25 GW by 2045. Doesn't seem like a very ambitious goal, really. Offshore wind turbines around 12 MW in size currently, but up to 15 MW, 5 GW is only 333-417 turbines which seems very reasonable…

Will add Windy.com to my bookmarks, thanks.

Spots to watch are the Call Areas where offshore wind leasing is likely:

https://www.nrel.gov/docs/fy21osti/77642.pdf

 

[Dave EV]

Will add Windy.com to my bookmarks, thanks.

Spots to watch are the Call Areas where offshore wind leasing is likely:

View attachment 850085

https://www.nrel.gov/docs/fy21osti/77642.pdf

Found this website which states that the first offshore wind lease sales in Califonia have closed. Haven't read through the 86 comments, but I'm sure they're super interesting!

California Activities | Bureau of Ocean Energy Management

www.boem.gov

Regulations.gov

www.regulations.gov

Despite Humboldt being a much better wind resource area than Morro Bay / Diablo Canyon, the latter has the advantage of having quite a bit more transmission lines in the area thanks to the Diablo Canyon nuclear plant. Humboldt has two 115 kV lines and one 60 kV line out of the area - Diablo Canyon has a three 500 kV lines and a 230 kV line there - with Diablo Canyon still eventually shutting down, that will allow the reuse of a lot of existing transmission line capacaity where Humboldt will need some buildout and probably a couple 500 kV lines eventually.

Map below:

California State Geoportal

Discover, analyze and download data from California State Geoportal. Download in CSV, KML, Zip, GeoJSON, GeoTIFF or PNG. Find API links for GeoServices, WMS, and WFS. Analyze with charts and thematic maps. Take the next step and create StoryMaps and Web Maps.

gis.data.ca.gov

 

[iPlug]

These leases will get us easily to the 2030 goal. NREL estimates the likely range of generating capacity is 1.5 to 3 GW for the Humboldt lease area and 3 to 5 GW for Morro Bay. Haven’t looked at the details of the report to see if they considered the largest capacity turbines on the market.

https://www.nrel.gov/docs/fy22osti/82341.pdf

 

[nwdiver]

How do you like the Sol Ark? Have a thread on your setup? What batteries have you paired with it?

I do think that at the end of the day, more granular price signals would go a long ways to figuring out the best time to charge and discharge your batteries, especially as more and more renewables go onto the grid. When the prices are the highest, you have the highest percentage of fossil fuel energy on the grid and when prices are lowest, you tend to have the highest percentage of renewable energy on the grid.

The Sol-Ark is a bit clunky and expensive but it's probably the best hybrid inverter available outside of Tesla. We're using EG4 batteries from signature solar. You can get ~30kWh for ~$9500 and they're UL listed now.

It would be interesting to see what percentage of grid batteries are used to increase the use of renewables and what percentage to increase self-consumption. Sadly the batteries I installed for the Sol-Ark are for increasing self-consumption because Xcel in TX (SPS) is a terrible, terrible company. They provide no credit for exports unless you want to pay $20/mo in which case they'll pay ~$0.03/kWh. Since ~40% of production was being exported investing ~$10k in batteries was almost as good of an investment as the solar itself.

What really kills me is the net uselessness and incredible waste in this particular case. Xcel NEEDS more generation during the day. Spot prices if the wind is low, which is usually when it's sunny, are often ~$200/MWh. Meanwhile at night Xcel NEEDS more demand, spot prices are often negative due to an overabundance of wind. So because of idiotic rate making my customer is storing energy during the day, increasing fossil generation and using batteries at night, increasing the curtailment of wind.... 1000% percent idiotic.

 

[CrazyRabbit]

those EG4 batteries are nice, i like them. didn't know they are UL listed.

 

[SageBrush]

Xcel in TX (SPS) is a terrible, terrible company.

SPS in NM is no charmer either. They are currently the only utility in NM trying to obstruct Community Solar

 

[CrazyRabbit]

In reference to community solar. Grid scale solar and wind keep the wholesale rates low in Texas, you can see it in ERCOT graphs.

 

[STS-134]

Been wondering this question as well but have not been able to find live or precisely timed historical maps of offshore wind. I worry if a heat dome sitting over California also stalls offshore wind here as it does onshore wind. That would not be opportune.

I mentioned in another thread having watched over the years that wind in the upper-Midwest has been reliably good during our heat waves. It also is our best continental land-wind resource area.

The problem is that our CAISO/Western interconnection region does not connect into the Dakotas and Nebraska where most of this reliable wind is. This should be a priority to build strong interconnects into that region.

Using interconnects to source cleaner energy is a good thing, but interconnects should never, ever be required to keep the lights on. Every county/urban area should have enough local generation to keep the lights on in the local area, even if all interconnects to anything outside the region are severed, whether by rain or ice storm or by a geomagnetic storm. It doesn't matter if the local generation is dirty or inefficient or carbon intensive, especially if it isn't expected to operate very frequently, but it needs to be there just in case there's a major cascading failure and the entire grid goes down and you have to bring it back up piece by piece.

The only area I'm aware of in the US states that has done things correctly in terms of having each area able to operate on its own without any interconnects is Hawaii. Each island generates all of the electricity it uses, and if it ever cannot do so, the lights go out. So they absolutely make sure that they can generate enough energy to keep the lights on locally. Even if the do build an undersea interconnect between islands, they should continue to make sure that if it is ever severed, the lights do not go out. California keeps getting in trouble because it uses interconnections as a crutch, instead of looking it as a bonus way of sourcing cleaner electricity when it's available. If any urban area ever lacks the facilities to generate all of the electricity it uses, that should be viewed as an emergency and remedied as quickly as possible.

 

[iPlug]

Using interconnects to source cleaner energy is a good thing, but interconnects should never, ever be required to keep the lights on. Every county/urban area should have enough local generation to keep the lights on in the local area, even if all interconnects to anything outside the region are severed, whether by rain or ice storm or by a geomagnetic storm. It doesn't matter if the local generation is dirty or inefficient or carbon intensive, especially if it isn't expected to operate very frequently, but it needs to be there just in case there's a major cascading failure and the entire grid goes down and you have to bring it back up piece by piece.

The only area I'm aware of in the US states that has done things correctly in terms of having each area able to operate on its own without any interconnects is Hawaii. Each island generates all of the electricity it uses, and if it ever cannot do so, the lights go out. So they absolutely make sure that they can generate enough energy to keep the lights on locally. Even if the do build an undersea interconnect between islands, they should continue to make sure that if it is ever severed, the lights do not go out. California keeps getting in trouble because it uses interconnections as a crutch, instead of looking it as a bonus way of sourcing cleaner electricity when it's available. If any urban area ever lacks the facilities to generate all of the electricity it uses, that should be viewed as an emergency and remedied as quickly as possible.

CA(ISO) doing great, witnessed by record temperatures these last few days and no rolling blackouts.

Lights are the least of the problems - a tiny fraction of current electricity use in the age of AC and even tinier in the evolving future of EVs and heat pumps. Model the costs to have islanded generation/consumption for the now and future in places with not temperate climates/weather and/or not reliable sun/wind.

 

[nwdiver]

SPS in NM is no charmer either. They are currently the only utility in NM trying to obstruct Community Solar

Should have said SPS in general. It’s the same company. At least in NM they’re constrained by state law.

 

[STS-134]

CA(ISO) doing great, witnessed by record temperatures these last few days and no rolling blackouts.

CAISO barely managed to avoid rolling blackouts, and likely would have had to initiate them if 2 gigawatts of load didn't disappear from the grid after they made a desperate, last ditch effort to get people to turn up their thermostats: a wireless emergency alert sent to nearly every phone in the state.

That came in at 5:48 PM on Tuesday, September 6. And look what happened in the minutes that followed:

They only avoided rolling blackouts because they threw a hail mary pass in the form of a wireless alert and hoped people would cut usage, and luckily, people did cut around 2 gigawatts of usage in the following 20-30 minutes. But they were still importing about 7 gigawatts of power at the time:

If there had been a heat wave in the Pacific Northwest, a lot of that imported power would have disappeared. It simply wouldn't have been available because they would have needed it to power air conditioners in Washington and Oregon. The fact that the CAISO was at EEA3 means that all of the possible resources they had available were online, that customers who had signed up to be curtailed in exchange for lower rates had had their power cut, and they were still short on resources. This is NOT acceptable any way you look at it and they should have enough resources to run the grid with zero imports, one or two power plants down for maintenance, and near record demand, with enough reserves to avoid EEA situations. They clearly don't.

 

[mspohr]

CAISO barely managed to avoid rolling blackouts, and likely would have had to initiate them if 2 gigawatts of load didn't disappear from the grid after they made a desperate, last ditch effort to get people to turn up their thermostats: a wireless emergency alert sent to nearly every phone in the state.

View attachment 851219

That came in at 5:48 PM on Tuesday, September 6. And look what happened in the minutes that followed:

View attachment 851221

They only avoided rolling blackouts because they threw a hail mary pass in the form of a wireless alert and hoped people would cut usage, and luckily, people did cut around 2 gigawatts of usage in the following 20-30 minutes. But they were still importing about 7 gigawatts of power at the time:

View attachment 851222

If there had been a heat wave in the Pacific Northwest, a lot of that imported power would have disappeared. It simply wouldn't have been available because they would have needed it to power air conditioners in Washington and Oregon. The fact that the CAISO was at EEA3 means that all of the possible resources they had available were online, that customers who had signed up to be curtailed in exchange for lower rates had had their power cut, and they were still short on resources. This is NOT acceptable any way you look at it and they should have enough resources to run the grid with zero imports, one or two power plants down for maintenance, and near record demand, with enough reserves to avoid EEA situations. They clearly don't.

They avoided blackouts with record demand. That's good work.

 

[iPlug]

CAISO barely managed to avoid rolling blackouts, and likely would have had to initiate them if 2 gigawatts of load didn't disappear from the grid after they made a desperate, last ditch effort to get people to turn up their thermostats: a wireless emergency alert sent to nearly every phone in the state.

View attachment 851219

That came in at 5:48 PM on Tuesday, September 6. And look what happened in the minutes that followed:

View attachment 851221

They only avoided rolling blackouts because they threw a hail mary pass in the form of a wireless alert and hoped people would cut usage, and luckily, people did cut around 2 gigawatts of usage in the following 20-30 minutes. But they were still importing about 7 gigawatts of power at the time:

View attachment 851222

If there had been a heat wave in the Pacific Northwest, a lot of that imported power would have disappeared. It simply wouldn't have been available because they would have needed it to power air conditioners in Washington and Oregon. The fact that the CAISO was at EEA3 means that all of the possible resources they had available were online, that customers who had signed up to be curtailed in exchange for lower rates had had their power cut, and they were still short on resources. This is NOT acceptable any way you look at it and they should have enough resources to run the grid with zero imports, one or two power plants down for maintenance, and near record demand, with enough reserves to avoid EEA situations. They clearly don't.

No argument against resiliency and contingency planning.

California is the size of several smaller States and “imports” to itself all the time. That’s a net feature, not a net liability.

Many “what if” scenarios for sure with their own avoidance costs.

 

[STS-134]

They avoided blackouts with record demand. That's good work.

I'll give them credit for throwing the "hail mary" pass and having it get caught. And for somehow getting together just enough supply so that said hail mary pass worked to completely avoid rolling blackouts. But having the entire game come down to a "hail mary" pass isn't the product of good planning, that's getting lucky. Next time, they may not be so lucky.