# Wind Microgeneration Strategy for Meeting California's Carbon Neutral Grid Goal
## 4 Results and Discussion  
Using Equation (1) (below), the total amount of instate production can be estimated, assuming that the growth rate of 0.63% remains constant year to year. The starting year used will be 2018, as it is the latest data available from the California Independent Service Operator [33; 34; 35; 36]. The initial capacity used will therefore be 80,304 MW (80.304 GW). The growth rate is applied once per year, and the number of years assessed will cover the span from the start of 2018 to the end of 2045 (28 years). The average rate used (0.63%) is calculated from the previous five years and will represent a conservative growth of instate supply capacity. This leads to an estimated instate supply capacity of 95,742 MW (95.742 GW) in 2045. In terms of the growth of infrastructure, the state would need to bring approximately 551 MW of capacity online each year until 2045. \[A=P\Big{(}1+\frac{r}{n}\Big{)}^{nt} \tag{1}\]  
where  
* \(A\) = principal amount at time t;
* \(P\) = initial amount;
* \(r\) = rate of change (growth);
* \(n\) = number of times r is applied per unit t;
* \(t\) = number of years assessed. In 2018, wind energy accounted for 7.48% (6004 MW) of the total instate capacity (80,304 MW). If wind is to keep its market share moving forward, then capacity will need to increase by 41.24 MW each year until 2045. In terms of small and micro-scale wind energy for residential and small business applications, this means 3683 turbines at 400 W and 369 4 kW grid-tied battery banks will need to be brought online each year. The cost of hardware alone would be $165 and $103 Million (respectively) over 28 years. Only in 2020, it was announced that Sidewalk Infrastructure Partners (SIP) would invest (once) $100 Million in order for the Californian Grid to be upgraded [37].  
If micro-scale wind energy were to account for the entire net difference between 2018 and estimated 2045 capacities (15.44 GW), then the instate generation would need to construct and install 49,232 wind turbines at 400W and 4924 4 kW batteries in order to meet the future demand. These costs would amount to $2.2 and $1.4 Billion, respectively, over the 28-year period.  
If the 17-year average rate of growth for generation capacity is used (2.23% for the years 2002 to 2018), then the net production capacity difference between 2018 and 2045 becomes 68.61 GW. This would require a much larger and drastic implementation of over 16,000 turbines at 400 W and 1600 4 kW batteries per year in order to keep the 7.48% market share. If required to fulfill the entire difference of the 28-year gain, micro-scale wind energy would need to increase by 218,778 turbines at 400 W and 21,878 kW batteries per year for 28 consecutive years.  
On the other hand, NREL has estimated only for \"greening\" 100% Los Angeles the costs somewhere between $57 billion and $87 billion [38], excluding practically micro-scale wind energy [38]. The various studies focus on greening the cities and not and the accompanying demand without focusing on the independent end-user needs to meet their demand. Therefore, supporting a whole grid and all the infrastructure is, of course, much more costly and expensive. The 2.23% increase includes 5 years where Solar PV increased at yearly rates between 114 and 680% (See Figures 3 and 4). Solar PV's growth over the 17-year timespan was an outlier of 107.43%. This calculation was not carried out and used with the 17-year average growth rate due to the Solar PV rate over the same period of time. When Solar PV is excluded from the growth rate calculation, the 17-year growth rate is 0.11%. Figure 3: California’s capacity by yearly percentage change. As of 2018, over 50% of the state's generation capacity came from natural gas (See Figures 3 and 4, above). This presents a significant challenge when it comes to pushing the grid towards carbon and greenhouse gas neutrality. Natural gas generation is primarily used to meet peak load as combined cycle plants are easily ramped up and down to meet the demand curve during peak hours.