Politics.be - Oliestaat Texas gaat verder vergroenen, +100 GW PV, remember big freeze...

Texas is al de beste US-staat qua zonne-energie, maar gaat maar verder.

Of hoe oliestaat Texas zijn fossiele afhankelijkheid achter zich wil laten.

Texas wilde altijd voor hun eigen electriciteit zorgen, een erfenis van hun olie-imperium. Maar als er dan eens een extreme koudegolf komt bevriest hun gasinfra... en ze kunnen eigenlijk geen electriciteit invoeren van de buren... En dat in Texas waar de zon ook in de winter genoeg energie kon leveren, ja ook tijdens die grote stroomuitval.

Oplossing: smart grid met veel meer hernieuwbare energie.

Het is namelijk ~1 jaar geleden, februari 2021 waar 3 winterstormen een deel van Texas lam legden (4,6 miljoen huishoudens/xx betroffen, met 246 directe doden... ze moeten dus hun energie-infra herzien.

Citaat:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2021_Texas_power_crisis

In February 2021, the state of Texas suffered a major power crisis, which came about as a result of three severe winter storms sweeping across the United States on February 10–11,[6] 13–17,[7] and 15–20. The storms caused the worst energy infrastructure failure in Texas state history, leading to shortages of water, food, and heat.[8] More than 4.5 million homes and businesses were left without power,[9][10][11][12] some for several days. At least 246 people were killed directly or indirectly,[3] with some estimates as high as 702 killed as a result of the crisis.[4]

State officials including Republican governor Greg Abbott[13] initially blamed[14] the outages on frozen wind turbines and solar panels. However, data showed that failure to winterize power sources, primarily those of natural gas, had caused the grid failure.[15][16] Texas's power grid has long been separate from the two major national grids to avoid federal oversight;[17] this disconnection made it difficult for the state to import electricity from other states during the crisis.[18] Deregulation of its electricity market beginning in the 1990s resulted in competition in wholesale electricity prices, but also cost cutting for contingency preparation.[18]

Een verse studie toont aan dat enkel hun zonne-energie toch al 11 van de 13 dagen ~ deels kon opvangen, moest de nodige slimme net-infra er geweest zijn.

Citaat:

https://electrek.co/2022/02/11/heres...-power-outage/

Here’s how rooftop solar could have prevented 2021’s Texas big freeze power outage

Michelle Lewis - Feb. 11th 2022

A year on from the big Texas freeze that knocked out the state’s power system and caused at least 246 deaths, new research released yesterday found that rooftop solar could have supplied more than enough electricity to meet the shortfall on all but two of the 13 days when power production fell short of forecasted demand.

** (vertaling ) According to the paper from Environment America Research & Policy Center, Environment Texas Research & Policy Center, and Frontier Group, titled “Rooftop solar and the 2021 Texas power crisis,” even on the two days when the divide between supply and demand was greatest (February 15-16, 2021), rooftop solar could still have made up approximately 40-60% of that gap by substantially reducing the need for electricity from centralized power plants.

Luke Metzger, executive director of Environment Texas, said in an emailed statement:

Even as millions of Texans, including my family, shivered in the cold last February, the sun was shining over our heads. We have this inexhaustible energy source above us that could have kept the heat on and we’re barely using it, that just doesn’t make sense. Solar is clean, more affordable than ever, and primed to help build a more resilient electric grid.

The paper contrasts the role that solar played during the freeze with the role that it could play in lessening the impact to the electric system in future extreme weather events. The authors used data from the National Renewable Energy Laboratory (NREL), the US Energy Information Administration (EIA), and the Electric Reliability Council of Texas (ERCOT) to estimate how much power rooftop solar could have been generated in Texas during the 2021 storm if every suitable rooftop across the state had been fitted with solar panels. **

Solar power has grown 123-fold in Texas over the last decade – Texas is a solar leader in the US – and the state’s solar capacity has increased substantially in the last year alone. Because of that growth, Texas would now produce about 70% more solar power than it did a year ago under the same conditions as the February 2021 freeze event, according to the research.

However, most rooftops that are suitable for solar remain unused. If those roofs were utilized for solar, Texas could install 97,800 megawatts of additional clean power generating capacity – enough to meet about one-third of the state’s electricity 2020 needs and more than 15 times the total operating capacity at the time of the 2021 power crisis.

The paper acknowledges that rooftop solar alone cannot solve Texas’s energy challenges. To make its power grid more resilient, the state also needs energy storage, increased electricity transmission capacity, and greater energy efficiency.

Environment America Research & Policy Center 100% Renewable Campaign director Emma Searson said in an emailed statement:

The energy system of today is vulnerable and that puts all of us at risk.

But the good news is that we have an amazing, abundant clean energy source shining down on our homes and businesses that can help us fix it. Rooftop solar is a win-win for people and the planet, and it has the potential to be a foundational building block of the resilient, renewable grid of tomorrow – in Texas and across the country.

** Volgens het artikel van Environment America Research & Policy Center, Environment Texas Research & Policy Center en Frontier Group, getiteld "Rooftop solar and the 2021 Texas power crisis", zelfs op de twee dagen dat de kloof tussen vraag en aanbod het grootst was (15-16 februari 2021), had zonne-energie op het dak nog steeds ongeveer 40-60% van die kloof kunnen goedmaken door de behoefte aan elektriciteit van gecentraliseerde energiecentrales aanzienlijk te verminderen.

Luke Metzger, uitvoerend directeur van Environment Texas, zei in een verklaring per e-mail:

Zelfs toen miljoenen Texanen, waaronder mijn familie, afgelopen februari in de kou rilden, scheen de zon boven onze hoofden.
We hebben een onuitputtelijke energiebron boven ons die de warmte aan had kunnen houden en we gebruiken hem amper, dat slaat gewoon nergens op. Zonne-energie is schoon, betaalbaarder dan ooit en klaar om te helpen bij het bouwen van een veerkrachtiger elektriciteitsnet.

Het artikel zet de rol die zonne-energie speelde tijdens de vorst in contrast met de rol die het zou kunnen spelen bij het verminderen van de impact op het elektrische systeem bij toekomstige extreme weersomstandigheden. De auteurs gebruikten gegevens van het National Renewable Energy Laboratory (NREL), de US Energy Information Administration (EIA) en de Electric Reliability Council of Texas (ERCOT) om te schatten hoeveel stroom zonne-energie op het dak tijdens de storm van 2021 in Texas had kunnen worden opgewekt. als elk geschikt dak in de staat was uitgerust met zonnepanelen. **

Citaat:

https://www.rechargenews.com/energy-...de/2-1-1085068

Rampant solar's 100GW Texas grid queue puts wind power in the shade

PV projects seeking interconnection to main state electricity system now five times capacity of turbines waiting

20 October 2021

More than 100GW of solar projects are seeking interconnection in the main Texas electric grid, the largest US renewables market – almost five times as much as the wind power queuing to join a system where turbines previously enjoyed explosive growth, latest data shows.

As of 30 September developers had 100.3GW of solar capacity in the queue, 42.4GW of utility-scale battery storage, 22.5GW of wind, 13.5GW of natural gas and minor amounts of other technologies such as biomass.