Grid integration of renewable energy, especially wind energy, is a controversial topic--and has been for nearly three decades. Frankly, I think the subject has been beaten to death and for my part the questions answered many times over. Nevertheless, those opposed to renewable energy continually raise the subject in the hopes that this is some silver bullet that will put wind and solar energy in its grave. As a consequence, renewable energy advocates ask me for help to rebut the common myths about wind energy's "unreliability". For this reason, I occassionally post articles or reports on the topic of grid integration.
Contrary to the ideas promulgated by some opponents of wind generation, most of the substantial investment in wind farms in South Australia is not being paid for by taxpayers or electricity consumers...
At the heart of the problem has been governments’ trust in market solutions without a sharp eye on the shortfalls in market performance and without adequate leadership on the long term outcome the...
It is a meaningless concept at the least and dangerous at its worst
So, are wind and solar killing coal and nuclear? Yes, but not by themselves and not for the reasons most people think. Are wind and solar killing grid reliability? No, not where the grid’s technology...
Another interesting concept being considered is to locate one or both reservoirs below ground (sub-surface).
A proposal by Northland Power for a project in Ontario, Canada.
Gemany is turning one of its old coal mines into a giant 'battery station' that will store hydroelectric power and provide energy to around 400,000 homes, with hopes of launching similar facilities...
In 1919 the utility installed a wind turbine at Buddinge and connected it to its lines—a first worldwide, a full two decades before the Smith-Putnam machine in Vermont was connected to the grid.[more]
But not only can renewables supply baseload power, they can do something far more valuable: supply power flexibly according to demand. Now nuclear power really is redundant.
Experience with measures and innovations for grid integration in all these categories is given, from several jurisdictions like Germany, Denmark, and California, where renewables already provide...
This year, it will have closer to a third renewable power, close the new target for 2020, which now stands at 35 percent. Moreover, the level of 20 percent – once thought hard to reach by 2020 – has...
The company responsible for more than one-third of Germany’s electricity grid says there is no issue absorbing high levels of variable renewable energy such as wind and solar, and grids could absorb...
In fact, buried deep inside regulatory reports there is official recognition that wind power does have substantial equivalent firm capacity.
“Up to a renewable electricity share of 60%, the addition of power storage devices is not a condition for the addition of solar PV and wind power plants… Even at high degrees of penetration (90% in...
Fluctuating wind and solar power are expected to increase the need for dispatchable generators to ramp up and down quickly. So why has the operating reserve shrunk in Germany?
Nuclear power covered a whopping 87.2 percent of power demand in France and 73.3 percent of power generation in 2013 (the difference stems from power trading). But because France’s nuclear fleet is...
In line with previous investigations, such as the one by Fraunhofer ISE, the AEE finds that storage across weeks at a time will “not become relevant until renewables make up at least 60 to 80 percent...
The answer is that Germany has so far managed to integrate and balance high shares of renewable energy with very modest changes to its power system. Bigger changes will be necessary in the future,...
Many power grids around the world are already transitioning to high shares of renewables. The cases of Germany, California, and Denmark are among the leading examples. Germany has already reached a...
In other words, since 2006 we have witnessed a stabilization of Germany’s impressively reliable grid even as some 35 gigawatts of solar and 35 gigawatts of wind were installed on a grid with peak...
This is what feed-in tariffs do, fundamentally, by setting a fixed price for wind production which is high enough to reassure producers on their initial investment, and low enough to provide a hedge...
That is the point of feed-in tariffs, which provide stable, predictable revenue to wind producers, and ensure that their maximum production is injected into the system at all times, which influences...
According to the FT, National Grid said the closures should not affect the UK’s energy supply. “Demand is low at this time of year, and a lot of wind power is being generated right now,” it said.
But today, 5 out of 16 of the nuclear plants are off line (source: Sygration ). That is 27% of our nuclear capacity, or 3400 MW. The nuclear units that are off line are 50% more than the total...
The Energy Regulatory Commission (ERC) has finally approved the Feed in Tariff (FIT) Disbursement and Collections Guidelines, which will pave the way for an additional 320 megawatts of much needed...
You can find here wind-power generation forecasts, real-time estimates of actual wind-power generation, and historical wind-power generation data.
Even at 30% penetration, results indicate that the PJM system can handle the additional renewable integration with sufficient reserves and transmission build out.
Based on our best estimate, Germany managed to get 34 percent of its electricity from wind and solar over a 24-hour period on Sunday – measured in gigawatt-hours, not gigawatts. Prices on the...
Sustainable renewable energy (RE) policies must be based on a wise mix between technologies and applications. In the case of variable but predictable RE technologies such as wind power and solar PV,...
Most of the time, Esperance uses all the electricity the wind farms produce, and the power station makes up any shortfall so that a reliable supply of electricity is always available.
The California Energy Commission (CEC) has published on August 1, 2013 the 2012 data for the whole California power system [1]. This analysis completes the preliminary analysis from the California...
In a previous article for The Conversation I reported on the initial results of computer simulations by a research team at the University of New South Wales that busted the myth that renewable energy...
Long awaited, low specific capacity-high specific area turbines are the kind of technology needed to make wind energy an essential low-cost component of moving society toward 100% renewable energy.[more]
Addition of wind generation to a large power system does not require construction of back-up generating capacity.
Wind turbines tend to be overshadowed by solar power projects, which get most of the attention from the public and policymakers. . . Despite its second-class status, wind is a much bigger producer of...
Just as power demand is peaking in the area, California is losing its nuclear plants. At the beginning of June, a decision was made not to reopen the troubled San Onofre nuclear plant, and just this...
From January to May 2013, Germany weather was very different from other years, mainly with less sun than average. To assess if those exceptional conditions had an important impact on electricity...
18 years ago, a skeptic of wind power reviewed a German book on the history of wind power in the German daily Frankfurter Allgemeine (FAZ). The journalist still publishes for the paper. His comments...
At 2030 technology costs and with excess electricity displacing natural gas, we find that the electric system can be powered 90%e99.9% of hours entirely on renewable electricity, at costs comparable...
There's naturally a push to stop further investment in renewables - but here's the second hard truth: the cat is out of the bag: once renewable energy reaches a critical mass, its impact on power...
Dismissing this as one of the "flakier arguments" in the renewables debate, Smith points to a recent analysis National Grid undertook for the Scottish Parliament. It concluded that over an 18 month...
Since the beginning of November, wind power has been the largest source of electricity within Spain – ahead of even nuclear and coal power – according to the Spanish wind power association's blog....
Germany likes to sell itself as a leader in environmental protection, but not everyone is convinced. In particular, the Anglo world remains devoted to nuclear power and criticizes Germany for not...
For the first time ever, power production from PV and CSP were separately reported in December for California. French energy expert Bernard Chabot took a look at the figures, especially to determine...
As French energy expert Bernard Chabot explains, December was a strong month for wind power in Germany, and in the last week of the month, when power demand was low because of the holidays and...
The deceptively-named Global Warming Policy Foundation (often mentioned on ET, try here and here) think-tanks on climate change (obfuscation), renewable energy (opposition), and conventional energy...
French electricity spot prices rose on Wednesday, decoupling from lower German prompt prices, boosted by a sharp decline in French nuclear power capacity caused by a series of unplanned outages,...
An article today in German weekly Die Zeit reveals how completely overblown the likelihood is of power outages resulting from the country's Energiewende. . .
During September Spanish tubines generated so much wind power that coal use in Spain crashed, reducing emissions from fossil fuels. . .
The news is especially important because nuclear power, which provides slightly more than 75% of France's power supply, is often held to be an especially inexpensive source of baseload power....
One reason why Germans believe they can switch to renewables so fast is that one of their neighbors, Denmark, proves that it can be done. At the end of September, the Danish Energy Agency announced...
French energy expert Bernard Chabot takes a look at German power production over the past 12 months and finds that an increase in onshore wind would make the supply of renewable power more reliable....
Last spring, when the German government resolved to shut down eight of the country's 17 nuclear plants within a week, there was concern about whether the country's grid would remain reliable. Not...
It shows unequivocally that wind power can significantly reduce carbon emissions, is reliable, poses no threat to energy security, and is technically capable of providing a significant proportion of...
French energy expert Bernard Chabot updates his analysis of the German intermittent power sector with data from July. . . the variability of the productivity ratio of the combined [Wind + PV]...
French energy expert Bernard Chabot investigates the changes in wholesale power prices in Germany stemming from the increase in green power production. . .
In countries with a large penetration rate of zero fuel cost renewables (wind power in Denmark and Spain, wind and PV in Germany), the “merit-order effect” (avoiding the most costly means of power...
French expert Bernard Chabot explains another benefit from a balanced mix of wind and solar: their combined daily maximum outputs are lower than the addition of their installed capacity, allowing for...
From January to June 2012, data published on the EEX web site show that, if well balanced, PV and wind production can complement each other along the seasons, leading to an easier to manage...
Summarizes the German Leitstudie (2011) that found 60 TWh of storage would be needed to meet Germany's 2050 renewable targets.
Electricity generation from renewable energy in Germany is reducing power prices and has left the country with a market whose design no longer works, according to Stadtwerke Leipzig GmbH. Renewable...
French consultant and sustainable energy expert Bernard Chabot updates Germany's PV installation data in terms of system size vis-à-vis market share, compares it with the 2009-2011 distribution and...
French consultant and sustainable energy expert Bernard Chabot analyzes Germany's PV and wind power installations performance “from power to energy and to percentage of electricity production” and...
One of the persistent comments about wind vs. solar is that solar has a better fit with time of use both time of year and time of day. Most everyone seems to repeat the same phrase that PV has a...[more]
Here is a pair of graphs that demonstrate most vividly the merit order effect and the impact that solar is having on electricity prices in Germany; and why utilities there and elsewhere are desperate...
At very high penetrations, combining wind and solar power improved renewable portfolio performance over individual build-out scenarios by reducing curtailment, suggesting that further reductions may...
A November 5, 2011 article in the New York Times emphasizes the “danger” of excess wind generation in Bonneville Power Authority’s service territory. A perfect storm last year poured heavy rain in...[more]
"The analysis showed that wind generation lowers wholesale prices by over €70 million, which almost exactly offsets the costs of the Public Service Obligation (PSO) levy and other costs associated...
A low carbon portfolio is produced for this system that is capable of achieving an 80% reduction in electric power sector carbon emissions from 2005 levels and supplying over 99% of the annual...
Several misunderstandings and myths have arisen due to the characteristics of wind generation, particularly because wind-energy generation only occurs when the wind is blowing. . .
An excellent primer on the value and integration of wind into utility systems.
[W]hen wind turbines are operated as parts of an interconnected grid for which the dominant share of energy is provided by generators burning fossil fuels (coal, oil, natural gas), wind power...
In summary, wind power prices are comparable to those of fossil fuel ppower plants, but (i) that price is guaranteed not to change over the next 20 years, (ii) when wind is blowing, it brings down...
Arne Kildegaard on the Merit Order Effect
Presentation on Integrating Renewable Electricity into the Grid by a French authority on renewable energy. Chabot's conclusion: Think Big! We already have the technology we need to go to 100% RE.
Grid integration of renewable energy, especially wind energy, is a controversial topic-and has been for nearly three decades. Frankly, I think the subject has been beaten to death and for my part the...[more]
At 8 pm on January 12, 2007 Danish wind turbines produced 58% of total Danish consumption or 2725 MW of a 4735 MW load. There is 3,100 MW of Danish wind turbines on line. Danish turbines produced...[more]
by Frank Sensuss, Massimo Genose, Mario Ragwitz (on the Merit Order Effect)
The Midwest Wind Integration Study, which was required by the Minnesota legislature in 2005 to evaluate reliability and other impacts of higher levels of wind generation, found that the total...[more]
New Energy reports (2/2006) that on 16 February, 2006 during the peak of consumption in Spain at 9:25 pm, Spanish wind turbines delivered 20% of total generation. This was during a period of low...[more]
Even with the added costs to deal with intermittency, wind is roughly competitive with other generation technologies under a strong carbon constraint.
When wind serves upwards of 60 percent of demand, the model chooses to install more GT than GTCC capacity because the lower rates of gas utilization dictate the use of lower efficiency, lower...
We find that, with somewhat optimistic assumptions about the cost of wind turbines, the use of wind to serve 50% of demand adds ~1-2¢/kWh to the cost of electricity, a cost comparable to that of...
