# Presentation: 679267

## California: Ramping Up Renewables in the Energy Mix  

**Presented by **
**Virinder Singh, Renewable Energy Policy Project**
**for the**
**National Renewable Energy Laboratory’s **
**Energy Analysis Forum**
**August 2001 – Golden, Colo.**

- www.repp.org [] www.crest.org

## Analysis Overview

- By REPP, Center for Resource Solutions and Regulatory Assistance Project
- Currently under review
- Release in September 2001
- Will be available at www.repp.org and www.crest.org
- Please leave your card with me if you want e-mail announcement

- www.repp.org [] www.crest.org

## Goals of Analysis

- Identify ways that existing power mix contributed to California crisis*
- Articulate risk reduction benefits of renewables
- Estimate rough MW potential of renewables*
- Provide action recommendations
- ***To be discussed in this presentation**

- www.repp.org [] www.crest.org

## Key Infrastructural Trends Affecting California – Natural Gas

- 31% of power consumed in California
- Set spot market clearing prices
- Lack of in-state storage after restructuring
- Burst at main pipeline
- High Fall 2000 demand due to low temps
- Overall national market inflation
- From $3/mmBtu to $60 by October 2001

- www.repp.org [] www.crest.org

## Key Infrastructural Trends Affecting California – Hydropower

- 20% of power consumed in California
- 9% imported
- Low run-off in Spring 2000 in Northwest followed by even lower run-off in Spring 2001
- Approx. 1⁄2 of 61-year average

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## Demand Trends

- Sharp growth in CA from 1996 onwards
- Economic growth picks up after stagnant growth in consumption in early 1990s
- High average annual growth in AZ and NV over 17 years
- CA relies on power inflows from surrounding states– could this ever reverse?

- www.repp.org [] www.crest.org

## Response to Demand – Part 1

- Utilities avoided new power plant investments before restructuring
- Inadequate energy efficiency programs since 1995
**Less that half of CEC’s prediction for efficiency was actually realized **
- From 1995 to 1999, 5,500 MW increase in peak demand met by 700 MW of new generation

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## Response to Demand – Part 2

- CEC has approved 11,267 MW of new capacity, mainly in 2000 and 2001
**Approx. 20% increase from existing in-state capacity**
**10,403 greater than 300 MW**
**At least 5,920 MW under construction**
- 6,221 MW currently under review, not including emergency peaker plants

- www.repp.org [] www.crest.org

## Assessment of New Renewables Potential

- No single methodology across technologies
**Adaptation of models, interviews, literature review**
**Thus, different from efforts such as Powering the South**
- Attempted to make estimates under reasonable circumstances, based on pre-restructuring experience
- PV an exception – judgment call on effectiveness of market transformation

- www.repp.org [] www.crest.org

## Summary of Results

- New Capacity:
**Wind – 5,956 MW by 2020**
**Geothermal – 1,000 MW by 2010**
**Biopower – 734 MW by 2010**
**PV – 2,235 MW by 2020**
- Total: 9,925 MW
- Wind results will likely change (will go up)

- www.repp.org [] www.crest.org

## Wind

- Adaptation of model by Berkeley Labs
- Identifies profitable wind farms
- Wind data from early 1980s for 36 sites
- Assumes 500-kW turbines, 28% capacity factor
- 4.5 cent/kWh wholesale price paid
- 1.7 cent/kWh production tax credit
- Reasonable wind capital and O&M costs
- Assumes cost decline over time as more sites developed

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## Slide 12

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## Slide 13

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## Geothermal

- Interviews with CEC
- New sites at Glass Mountain/Medicine Lake area
- Expanded production from Geysers
- Piped wastewater, higher extraction efficiencies
- Binary and flashed-steam only
- 14 sites with potential for flashed-steam

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## Biopower – Part 1

- Assume market prices for different resources
- Associates biomass price with quantity
- Based on (1) review of historical prices and quantities, (2) assumed potential for modest tax credits, and (3) resource estimates by Oak Ridge
- In the case of forest thinnings, we adjust ORNL figures downward due to resource dispersion

- www.repp.org [] www.crest.org

## Biopower – Part 2

- Assumes 2/3 of biomass goes to fluidized bed steam turbines
- 1/3 to gasification (in the latter half of decade)
- No mill residues or energy crops
**Mill closures make new resource availability unlikely**
**ORNL estimates energy crops too expensive (high value of agriculture in CA)**

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## Photovoltaics

**Conservative adaptation of U.S. DOE projections**
- 20% annual global market growth
- 30% U.S. share of global production
- 30% of U.S. production installed domestically
**Ambitious market transformation in residential sector**
- 7.5% of homes in 2001 retrofit w/ 2-kW PV
- 10% of new homes until 2020 w/ 3-kW PV
**60% of cumulative U.S. installations by 2020 in CA**

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## Slide 18

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## Further Analytical Needs

- Better wind data reflecting current tower heights
- CEC and EPRI effort underway
- Better biomass inventory reflecting realistic prices and location of resource
- Climate change: Emissions from emerging power mix, and impacts of regulatory scenarios on cost of generation

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