Greening global power is a slow burn
LONDON, Jan 19 (Reuters) - Serious entrenchment of wind and solar in the world's power supply looks decades off unless China and India can beat already ambitious targets, through cost cuts, as meteoric growth in developed countries slows.
The renewable energy sector has been on the back foot in the past 12 months, as the financial crisis and falling subsidies created over-capacity in solar panels and wind turbines.
For a more representative view it makes sense to look at 2006-2010. Annual global growth in installed capacity then was an impressive 28 percent for wind and 54 percent for solar, according to data from the Global Wind Energy Council and the European Photovoltaic Industry Association.
The problem for the sector is impact: this growth comes from a small base.
At the end of 2009 (the latest year for global International Energy Agency data), wind power accounted for 3.2 per cent of world installed power generation capacity, and solar for less than half a per cent.
Naturally as the installed base rises percentage growth slows, begging the question: when will wind and solar capacity reach a serious level, say a quarter of the world total?
Alongside nuclear and hydropower, that would pull low-carbon power level with fossil fuels.
Assuming 10 per cent compound annual growth rate (CAGR) for wind and 15 per cent for solar, they only reach a quarter of global capacity (assumed to rise 2.3 per cent annually in line with IEA forecasts) in the year 2030.
That's still a much more ambitious finding than an outlook by the oil company BP which on Wednesday saw fossil fuels continuing to play "a critical role", and renewables at just 11 per cent of power generation in 2030.
What will growth in renewables be? It's useful to see growth and targets at the national level.
SLOWDOWN
If there's a group of countries which defines renewable energy targets it's the European Union.
The bloc has a binding goal for renewables to reach one fifth of all energy consumption (heat, power and transport) by 2020.
The European Environment Agency (EEA) estimated last November that would see renewables account for a third of power generation.
However, the EEA saw a sharp slowdown in percentage annual growth over the coming decade, in line with the 2020 target, summarised in the following table:
TABLE: EU wind and solar power generation, growth (PCT)
2005-2010 2010-2015 2015-2020
Wind 18.5 pct 13.4 pct 9.9 pct
Solar 70.7 pct 23.4 pct 11.2 pct
Source : EEA
Such slowing growth rates are consistent with the estimate above for a quarter or less of the global power mix by 2030.
In the United States, the latest review by the US Energy Information Administration (EIA) showed combined power generation from wind and solar shot up 27 per cent in the first nine months of last year compared with the same period in 2010.
Despite the US shale gas revolution, wind and solar beat rising natural gas power generation both in percentage (27 per cent versus 2 per cent) and absolute terms (18,866 million kilowatt hours versus 12,114 mln KWh).
But wind power still accounts for less than 3 per cent of US power generation, despite a CAGR of 34 per cent over the past 10 years.
And the United States has no federal targets for renewable energy, while it's main support system for wind power expires at the end of December, suggesting slower growth this year and possibly next.
PERFORM
By contrast China and India each have ambitious deployment targets and their roaring economies will account for most added capacity globally over the next quarter century.
China's National Energy Administration last week said its grid-connected wind power grew by half again while solar capacity trebled in 2011.
Beijing has guidance to connect some 200 gigawatts (GW) of wind power by 2020 from 47 GW now (CAGR 17 per cent).
But that growth rate will slow after 2020 to an installed 400 GW by 2030 – a CAGR of 11.3 per cent from 2011-2030, almost identical to the global assumed growth rate above.
China also has guidance to install 50 GW of solar power by 2020 compared with 3GW now (CAGR 40 per cent). India has a target to install 20GW of solar by 2022 compared with about 0.5GW now (also CAGR 40 per cent).
The message? A rapid entrenchment of renewable energy in the world's electricity supply may depend on solar power maintaining its meteoric rise through 2020 and beyond, and major emerging economies beating their national targets.
There is a history of such outperformance in China, whose National Energy Administration has in the past raised its 2020 guidance for wind by a third and solar by 150 per cent.
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Nuclear for remote areas
John, before you decide on a coal plant for your remote area, why not consider the LFTR nuclear option. I believe it is happening now. You should contact Kirk Sorenson.
Greening global power is a slow burn
There are billions of dollars still being invested in the fossil fuel industry and all fossil fuels produce carbon dioxide when burnt. Wind, solar, hydro, tidal and geothermal energy, while proving clean sustainable energy, all have their limitations and are unable to totally replace fossil fuels.
Unfortunately the existing nuclear energy has problems of cost, waste disposal, safety, etc. However there is another form of nuclear energy, yet to be accepted, that uses thorium rather than uranium for fuel. The liquid fluoride thorium reactor (LFTR) energy.
This form of nuclear power was conceived by Eugene Wigner in 1945, developed by Alvin Weinberg at Oak Ridge National Laboratories in Tennessee in the 1960’s, suppressed by the US government for political purposes and recently resurrected by Kirk Sorenson.
Presentations by Kirk Sorenson, Robert Hargraves and others can be studied and evaluated to explain this amazing technology.
LFTR systems can provide extremely cheap sustainable energy and could replace the existing coal and gas fuelled power stations and use their existing grid connections.
LFTR systems cannot melt down as the fuel would already be in the liquid state and if power to the plant was lost, the system passively shuts down and the liquid fuel automatically drains into a cooling tank.
The LFTR process operates at atmospheric pressure (avoiding high pressure gas explosions), does not require water for cooling and can be used in the construction of small or large power plants, providing flexibility of location.
coal power with the earth not liveable
John,
Please read the editorial in Nature (Jan 5, 2012). The science says if we keep business as usual, then the earth will become unliveable.
Either the coming crisis is grasped or we doom our children and grandchildren to very tough times.
I am astonished how it is assumed that we can ignore the climate crisis because it is inconvenient. The laws of physics don't care about convenience, they just grind on.
China has 1000GW of wind on it's planning board (for 2050 & I suspect they will make more) and it's dramatically growing solar capacity, then it's clearly feasible for Australia to be renewable-powered ... there are 2 studies that say it can be within 10 years at modest costs (not much more than what we'll be paying for oil imports soon).
Solar thermal is a solution to your problem and there seems a chance that the dirtiest coal station in Australia may end up converted to such a plant.
On nuclear, I know what happened to the citizens of Southern Germany when chernobyl happened and my Japanese friends indicate their terror at nuclear contamination. If plants are to be built to be accident free, then the costs will rise dramatically.
If there wasn't another solution, then nuclear would be an option, but the big nuclear power station in the sky (sun) IS a solution. It just needs resolution to make it happen ... it isn't even rocket science.
So, what is the alternative?
I have recently been involved in assessment of power supply for a very remote region. The Owner seeks to construct a new air cooled coal fired multi-unit power station.
There is no water and very little in the way of mountains, so hydro storage is out. Wind is reliable, but not sufficiently so. Solar needs storage. We are inland - no tidal options. Importing power from somewhere else is out of the question - too far and there is no power to be had within reasonable radius.
Unfortunately, the remaining two options are coal and nuclear, so coal it may well be.
So, at present, there is little real option but coal for many underdeveloped nations and their projects which might lift their economies. Sad, but true.
Once constructed, this power station will continue polluting for 40 or 50 years.
Coal won't just go away - it will need to be pushed very hard, especially when hundreds of megawatts of reliable power supply are needed within a tight timetable. That is why I am pessimistic about the chances of winning the climate challenge.
Nuclear too slow, too expensive, too unsafe
Ken, your trilogy of statements about nuclear energy is entirely wrong. I strongly support and have been involved directly in innovative solar projects in the multiple megawatt range. Through careful review of the matter over several years, I have come to realise that nuclear power need not be slow, expensive or unsafe. I now believe it to be an essential part of the energy mix by which we will get on top of climate change.
If fossil fuel usage is to be reduced, as it must, there is no need to slander and then discard any of the contenders to help achieve this. We will need all the help we can get.
where to divert fossil fuel subsidies
An Editorial in the 5 Jan 2012 issue of prestigious science journal Nature makes clear that we must urgently stop using fossil fuel or the world faces dangerous climate change (there is no second planet). That means not only stopping expanding use of gas, coal and oil (not really possible), but rapidly decreasing use of the same.
The only answer is to rapidly grow non-carbon based energy and the quick and sensible way to do this is to dramatically expand wind and solar (while pushing hard on geothermal & wave). Nuclear is too slow, too expensive, unsafe.
So the short answer is to do everything possible to build the renewable energy future ... a happy by-product will be to reinivigorate global economies .... why go broke buying oil, gas and coal when you can get your own energy free once the infrastructure is developed?
Politicians need to start telling the truth not only about subsidies for fossil fuels vs renewables, but also where we are headed. How can on the one hand a low carbon future be touted in Australia, while at the same time dramatically accelerating development of coal and gas resources ... this is the high carbon future.
Before subsidising renewables, stop subsidising fossil fuels
Before we bother with subsidising renewables, how about we start by ceasing subsidisation of fossil fuels?
What should then be done with the tax dollars saved?