The real cost of wind and solar: Why rates don't match the claims

[OVERKILL]

It's quite an odd comparison to compare costs of an existing nuclear power plant to a new solar install.

What about a new nuclear install vs. a new solar install?

Because wind and solar are being proposed as the cheapest form of generation, often when compared to existing generation assets. Nuke plants aren't being replaced by wind and solar, but they ARE, or were, being replaced by gas plants, which have lower OPEX, or did, during the fracking boom.

A solar array is never going to replace a nuke, so comparing those two is silly. You'd need more than quadruple the installed capacity and a massive amount of storage. Wind IS often pitched as baseload though, and I got into the price difference in a previous thread about how the Virginia offshore wind farm is actually more expensive than Vogtle (which has been a bit of a white elephant). I can re-post that here if you are interested.

 

[OVERKILL]

Carbon taxes are a way of trying to price pollution (ie. negative externality). For example some of the biggest emitters of methane are NatGas producers. Methane* leaks via wells and the distribution network. Methane (a GHG) is a negative externality. How do you levy a cost for that externality? Carbon tax.

One of the largest examples of negative externalities is ocean dumping. Do you think the owners of that trash pay for the true cost to the environment? Historically that inability to assign ownership of a waste stream has been one of the biggest reasons why energy and/or goods were cheap. If an emitter doesn't have to be responsible for their waste that's an additional expense they don't have to incur so they don't have to raise their prices.

From a BITOG perspective we have seen that with the introduction of emissions controls systems over the last 60 years. Fuel injection, PCV/EGR, catalytic converters, SCR, DPF/GPF, etc. All of this technology has made vehicle emissions cleaner but there's a cost.

The biggest fault with the carbon tax is arriving at an accurate dollar amount. It's not possible.


*Annual NatGas emissions from Permian basin equate to about 500k cars.

The problem is that large non-emitting sources have been exempted from carbon tax benefits as well as tax breaks that wind, solar, and biomass (which has much higher emissions intensity and should NOT be lumped in here) receive. The playing field is not level.

In some jurisdictions, gas emissions are also exempt up to a certain point. For example, here in Ontario, gas plant emissions up to like 270gCO2/kWh are exempt, so if the gas plant has an emissions intensity of 280gCO2/kWh, it only pays the carbon tax on 10gCO2/kWh. Big scam! Also, a lot of the VRE is owned by the fossil fuel companies, so they get to reap the tax credits, FIT contracts, and LRP contracts, while also providing the higher compensated back-up power, because standby/peaker operation pays better than baseload.

And I absolutely agree that fugitive emissions from methane extraction and transport are excluded and shouldn't be, it's yet another loophole.

 

[PandaBear]

Large global scale reorganization of the grid and a realization that no one source of power is an absolute solution might help find the answer. No one will want to put aside agendas to get along is an issue. Every source of energy has its benefits and drawbacks. No one wants to foot the bill for overbuilding to handle transients. Some other issues with humanity sucking at being nice to each other.....

Just my thoughts.

This is the reason in some situations, having a "good" dictator with vision (passing down the ownership of a nation to his offspring) can be useful and better.

BTW, one of the major reason of California's rate change is from wild fire settlement / bankruptcy. We pay 50% of our kwh rate into distribution to help PG&E pay off the wildfire from powerline damage.

 

[OVERKILL]

BTW, one of the major reason of California's rate change is from wild fire settlement / bankruptcy. We pay 50% of our kwh rate into distribution to help PG&E pay off the wildfire from powerline damage.

Do you have something that can show that? I'm curious, because Dave's bill I posted earlier, clearly has wildfire charges as standalone, not as part of the rate for electricity.

 

[Rand]

This is the reason in some situations, having a "good" dictator with vision (passing down the ownership of a nation to his offspring) can be useful and better.

BTW, one of the major reason of California's rate change is from wild fire settlement / bankruptcy. We pay 50% of our kwh rate into distribution to help PG&E pay off the wildfire from powerline damage.

I am curious as well. I would think that would be covering grid maintenance.. as well as covering for the people with solar power who dont pay their share of distribution costs.

For example If I had full solar and I'm connected to the grid I get 100% reliability and I'm not paying my share of costs which are based on net consumption. IE I use 600kwh, but my solar flows 500kwh into the grid.. I'm paying 1/6 the maintenance of grid fees I should be.

Granted this is regional based on billing practices
see example bill.
36% is generation charges
36% is distribution
rest are fees/taxes some that grow with consumption some are standard (straight 4$ for example)
If I had solar I would gain all the reliability and usefulness of the grid without paying towards it.. since its consumption/generation based?

Now if I had battery solar at the house and wasnt using the grid(ie sending solar power to it in day) except for a small amount of high demand at night etc.. then that would be more fair.

 

[PandaBear]

Do you have something that can show that? I'm curious, because Dave's bill I posted earlier, clearly has wildfire charges as standalone, not as part of the rate for electricity.

 

[PandaBear]

 

[OVERKILL]

View attachment 99212

Right, and, like Dave's bill, that shows the Wildfire charges separately, not part of the rate.

 

[javacontour]

Subsidies in the form of FIT's certainly have their role, and are present in California:

https://www.ladwp.com/ladwp/faces/l...mZp9kBhZPSLQJ2JZclvJVpYMYpFB1WQKCh!-712099127

Are they the primary driver for increased rates? I don't know enough about California's situation to comment, and yes, PG&E has been a disaster.

Here's a bill that @UncleDave posted recently:
View attachment 99176
And here's one of my Ontario bills:
View attachment 99179

You can see the cost for generation on Dave's bill is roughly the same as for Distribution, and Transmission is another fee on top of that. There's also a wildfire fund charge, wildfire hardening charge...etc So I'd need to see his per kWh rate on top of that to get an idea of how much of a driver on rates VRE has. The overall bill is ridiculous, but without the rate data, it's difficult to point fingers. When we talk about costs, are we talking about the whole bill, including all these fees, which are separate from rates, or just rates?

In Ontario, it's quite easy to point fingers, because we have generator costs, by source, broken out, and Delivery (transmission/distribution) is clearly separated.

Generation is about 37% of Dave's bill. The rest (almost 2/3rds) is a collection of distribution, transmission, and a collection of special fees and taxes related to conservation, decommissioning and probably the "machine that goes bing" in the PG&E system.
I feel sorry for both you folks.
Here is my last bill from Ameren:

About $12/month to be hooked up to the grid. And then about $0.0325/kwH for the distribution and $0.04439/kwH for the generation.
So in round numbers, take out the $12 for just being connected and the generation, taxes and distribution for my 601kwH of usage is about $0981/kwH

FWIW
And yes, I'd like to know how many kwH that $220ish bill was for.
I do have gas to fuel my furnace and HWH, so this is not my complete energy usage from 3/15 to 4/15, just electric.

 

[OVERKILL]

Generation is about 37% of Dave's bill. The rest (almost 2/3rds) is a collection of distribution, transmission, and a collection of special fees and taxes related to conservation, decommissioning and probably the "machine that goes bing" in the PG&E system.
I feel sorry for both you folks.
Here is my last bill from Ameren:


View attachment 99276


About $12/month to be hooked up to the grid. And then about $0.0325/kwH for the distribution and $0.04439/kwH for the generation.
So in round numbers, take out the $12 for just being connected and the generation, taxes and distribution for my 601kwH of usage is about $0981/kwH

FWIW
And yes, I'd like to know how many kwH that $220ish bill was for.
I do have gas to fuel my furnace and HWH, so this is not my complete energy usage from 3/15 to 4/15, just electric.

Our bills were never as low as yours, but they used to be a lot less before the VRE sideshow. Part of our delivery cost is all the transmission build required to connect the disparate wind and solar installs to the grid, which was a massive undertaking.

I'm looking at Pandabear's rates and the rates themselves are also insane at $0.31465/kWh and then he has those other charges like on Dave's bill. Dave must have used almost no electricity for the electricity portion of his bill to be so low compared to Pandabear's.

 

[dnewton3]

Remember folks the primary premise behind renewable energy is to reduce net emissions. The secondary goal is to make it as affordable as possible. IOW..How do you induce adoption. The third goal is to not make the environment any worse off in the process.

BMWTurboDzl - my reply won't be directed at you personally, but the topics you bring up, as I believe you've fairly summarized the typical "benefits" often touted about Wind, Solar, Biofuels.



That's part of the falacy of "green" WSB (wind-solar-biofuels). They are only able to reduce "net emmisions" on the front end. They have MASSIVE concerns to deal with on the back end. I'll address your three goals one by one

Goal 1 - net emmisions
First of all, production of solar panels (and the batteries it takes to make wind/solar viable) is terribly laden with pollution; it just happens in other countries where the materials are mined. Even making batteries is fraught with environmental issues. If one looks at the TOTAL emmisions and pollution from Wind and Solar, it's not really any more attractive than fossil fuels. It's not "net neutral" by any means; it's only "net displaced overseas pollution".

Biofuels are just as bad, believe it or not ...
By far, the most common is ethanol, and was supposed to be a miracle cure. Or so we were lead to believe. But here's the reality:

Other biofuels are WAY behind and have not given any hope whatsoever of large scale salvation. Sure - you're enterprising neighbor who can run his Jetta TDI on used fry oil may save his corner of the block from eternal environmental collapse, but bio-diesel is no where near a reality in large scale, and neither are the other forms of biofuels. Rapeseed? Nowhere close yet. Algee bio-diesel? Not as good as was promised. Ethanol is the most prolific, and it's now being fairly viewed as "just about as bad" as fossil fuels when the TOTAL emmissions are honestly accounted for. Ethanol is every bit as bad as fossil fuels.


Goal 2 - make green "as affordable as possible"
That's kind of misleading. Actually, it's really misleading. "As affordable as possible" does not equate to practically afforable. It's really just a spin on words to say "it' won't be cheap, but we can move fungible funds around to make it SEEM affordable". Fossil fuels are cheap, period. Current geo-political topics asside, if fossil fuels were allowed to be developed by free-market options, both crude oil and natural gas would be incredibly cheap in North America. We have PLENTY of crude in North America, and we have stupid-huge amounts of natural gas here as well. To say the "goal" of green energy is to be "as afforadable as possible" is nowhere near the same as saying "make green as affordable as fossil fuels". If WSB had to stand on their on feet, with no subsidy assistance, and fossil fuels were allowed to stand on their feet, with no hinderance, then WSB would die on the vine within months. The unspoken "goal" of green energy is to take the pain of the costs of green and force them onto the fossil fuels; that's making green "as affordable as possible". That's not a legit goal; that's a scam.


Goal 3 - don't make the environment any worse off in the process
Complete and utter total failure there. As I already showed, the true concerns of long term Wind and Solar are just beginning to rear their ugle heads. The MASSIVE amounts of solid and toxic waste are poised to go exponentially high from these "green" technoligies which have almost no ability to be recycled, and when burried, leach toxic heavy metals into the ground. How is that "not making things any worse off" ????



The reality is that the concerns from fossil fuels are very easy to see up front. In contrast, the concerns from WSB are not seen for a couple decades down the road. Typical of many shortsighted cultures, it's easy to blame what's directly in front of you while ignoring the even larger problem your "solution" creates. We're really good at kicking the can down the road, even when it comes to WSB green efforts.

- WSB is not a viable solution in terms of total energy demands; they fail the capacity test.
- WSB is every bit as harmful as fossil fuels when the totality of pollution circumstances are taken into account; they fail the "net neutral" test.
- WSB would never survive a balance-sheet evaluation if they had to stand alone with no subsidy help; they fail the fiscal test.


The "goals" you speak of are not very attractive at all, when the whole truth is known.

 

[javacontour]

That's part of the falacy of "green" WSB (wind-solar-biofuels). They are only able to reduce "net emmisions" on the front end. They have MASSIVE concerns to deal with on the back end. I'll address your three goals one by one

Goal 1 - net emmisions
First of all, production of solar panels (and the batteries it takes to make wind/solar viable) is terribly laden with pollution; it just happens in other countries where the materials are mined. Even making batteries is fraught with environmental issues. If one looks at the TOTAL emmisions and pollution from Wind and Solar, it's not really any more attractive than fossil fuels. It's not "net neutral" by any means; it's only "net displaced overseas pollution".

Biofuels are just as bad, believe it or not ...
By far, the most common is ethanol, and was supposed to be a miracle cure. Or so we were lead to believe. But here's the reality:

Other biofuels are WAY behind and have not given any hope whatsoever of large scale salvation. Sure - you're enterprising neighbor who can run his Jetta TDI on used fry oil may save his corner of the block from eternal environmental collapse, but bio-diesel is no where near a reality in large scale, and neither are the other forms of biofuels. Rapeseed? Nowhere close yet. Algee bio-diesel? Not as good as was promised. Ethanol is the most prolific, and it's now being fairly viewed as "just about as bad" as fossil fuels when the TOTAL emmissions are honestly accounted for. Ethanol is every bit as bad as fossil fuels.


Goal 2 - make green "as affordable as possible"
That's kind of misleading. Actually, it's really misleading. "As affordable as possible" does not equate to practically afforable. It's really just a spin on words to say "it' won't be cheap, but we can move fungible funds around to make it SEEM affordable". Fossil fuels are cheap, period. Current geo-political topics asside, if fossil fuels were allowed to be developed by free-market options, both crude oil and natural gas would be incredibly cheap in North America. We have PLENTY of crude in North America, and we have stupid-huge amounts of natural gas here as well. To say the "goal" of green energy is to be "as afforadable as possible" is nowhere near the same as saying "make green as affordable as fossil fuels". If WSB had to stand on their on feet, with no subsidy assistance, and fossil fuels were allowed to stand on their feet, with no hinderance, then WSB would die on the vine within months. The unspoken "goal" of green energy is to take the pain of the costs of green and force them onto the fossil fuels; that's making green "as affordable as possible". That's not a legit goal; that's a scam.


Goal 3 - don't make the environment any worse off in the process
Complete and utter total failure there. As I already showed, the true concerns of long term Wind and Solar are just beginning to rear their ugle heads. The MASSIVE amounts of solid and toxic waste are poised to go exponentially high from these "green" technoligies which have almost no ability to be recycled, and when burried, leach toxic heavy metals into the ground. How is that "not making things any worse off" ????



The reality is that the concerns from fossil fuels are very easy to see up front. In contrast, the concerns from WSB are not seen for a couple decades down the road. Typical of many shortsighted cultures, it's easy to blame what's directly in front of you while ignoring the even larger problem your "solution" creates. We're really good at kicking the can down the road, even when it comes to WSB green efforts.

- WSB is not a viable solution in terms of total energy demands; they fail the capacity test.
- WSB is every bit as harmful as fossil fuels when the totality of pollution circumstances are taken into account; they fail the "net neutral" test.
- WSB would never survive a balance-sheet evaluation if they had to stand alone with no subsidy help; they fail the fiscal test.


The "goals" you speak of are not very attractive at all, when the whole truth is known.

Affordable to people who make policy means something different than it does to people who sit at a kitchen table and pay bills.

 

[OVERKILL]

Affordable to people who make policy means something different than it does to people who sit at a kitchen table and pay bills.

Yep. When your offshore wind farm is supposed to be "too cheap to need subsidies" (but gets subsidies) and then ends up costing more per kWh than the boondoggle $25+ billion dollar nuke plant, you know somebody is spreading manure.

 

[JeffKeryk]

Perhaps @OVERKILL @UncleDave @javacontour can chime in on my bill. I don't pretend to understand it. But I think PG&E is getting fat off my solar project.... All good.
d.

 

[eljefino]

Uhhh...hehe, uhhhmmm heehehhee


If everyone is charging "off peak", then what does that time period become? Hey, while I wait on your answer, I'm gonna go cut off the first 6' of our 12' long rug, and sew it on the other end so we will have a longer rug.

Fine, charge at the sweet spot on the duck curve.

 

[OVERKILL]

Perhaps @OVERKILL @UncleDave @javacontour can chime in on my bill. I don't pretend to understand it. But I think PG&E is getting fat off my solar project.... All good.
d.View attachment 99326

Quite the opposite, it looks like they are boning themselves since you aren't being charged all the other stuff that UncleDave and Pandabear are paying. I also don't see that huge charge for delivery they are getting hit with.

 

[javacontour]

Quite the opposite, it looks like they are boning themselves since you aren't being charged all the other stuff that UncleDave and Pandabear are paying. I also don't see that huge charge for delivery they are getting hit with.

Probably not the whole bill. Look like it is just the net energy statement, not a complete bill.

 

[JeffKeryk]

Quite the opposite, it looks like they are boning themselves since you aren't being charged all the other stuff that UncleDave and Pandabear are paying. I also don't see that huge charge for delivery they are getting hit with.

My minimum delivery charge is $10.44.
I suggest PG&E is not doing any of us any favors.

 

[OVERKILL]

My minimum delivery charge is $10.44.
I suggest PG&E is not doing any of us any favors.

Well, if you and Pandabear are ultimately shuffling the same number of kWh over the lines but you pay $10 and he pays $90, clearly he's paying far more of the share of the grid upkeep and maintenance than you are. That's one of the things with these solar contracts that I think I pointed out previously, even with NEM, paying full retail to customers for their back-fed power is still a net loss for the utility, which has plenty of other expenses associated with providing those poles, wires and transformers to your location. By getting out of delivery on the amount of power transmitted (and that's not your fault, that's how they've structured this, somebody was braindead or didn't give a crap) you are almost using the infrastructure for free.

People with solar should be paying full pop for delivery for the total # of kWh moved on the wires. They should also be paid whatever the wholesale rate is for power at that time, because that's the value of that electricity at the time it is being delivered to the grid.

 

[JeffKeryk]

Probably not the whole bill. Look like it is just the net energy statement, not a complete bill.

No, I do not have any other electric charges. My electric bill for the month is zero. And is generally less than the minimum delivery charge.

I do not pretend to fully understand the solar program I have, I suspect @OVERKILL is correct.
By the way, my bill is not really zero; I have a $28 credit.