Renewable (Electricity) Portfolio Standards by States

Our state, MN, has reached previous targets and is on track to hit new ones just passed.

 

Targets are like the Bush era 'no child left behind' idiocy. Set the target low enough and everyone is a winner.
California has reached some 29% renewable already, although I do not think that figure takes imports into account. I think the most interesting figure in the CA stats is that they have just about done away with fossil fuels other than natural gas. Good for them!

My home state generated more wind energy than the RPS of ~ 9% required in 2012. I think we are trying to export.

 

Yep, that is the situation of the mid-west states, including all of the RED states that have more than token green energy. Even they do not ignore the resource if it is profitable.

 

That goal for texas at 5.8 GW for 2015 came in 1999, its now 12.3 GW of wind alone, above the old goal for 2025. Many of us want to be at 25GW by 2025 now. Choice + the federal $0.022 has worked better than expected and the state. Texas is the leading consumer of electricity (air conditioning, manafacturing) which means it should do even more as grid improvements allow more power from the west of the state where the best wind and solar is, to the population centers.

One big problem with that map is some states like washington don't include large hydro in renewable, but other states like california do. It makes it hard to compare.

 

So long as you give people choice to pay for dirty fuel, and foot the externalized costs that go along with it, by all means.

 

False.

California only recognizes certain types of small hydroelectric generation as part of it's renewable energy portfolio. It does, however, allow future efficiency improvements to be counted for existing large hydro generation.

Here's a one page summary of what electricity generation sources are eligible for inclusion in the renewable standard in California:

California Renewables Portfolio Standard

Here's the definition of allowable hydro from the present CA eligibility guidebook.

http://www.energy.ca.gov/2013publications/CEC-300-2013-005/CEC-300-2013-005-ED7-CMF.pdf

See page 27:

I believe large hydro generation presently accounts for about 9% of CA electricity generation and it is not counted as part of the renewable portfolio requirements (33% by 2020).

 

Then they aren't doing well toward their goals. They reported 16% of those categories of renewable in california December 2012 to November 2013. I stand corrected if what you say is true that they planning to go from 16% in 2013 to 33% in 2020, but that is a very difficult goal, and I don't see how they will do it with current growth.

Can they import fossil fuel electricity to make the goal and count only fossil generated in state? There has to be some trick they are planning, or maybe they or I don't understand current policies. I see biodiesel in the list. Do they count biodiesel and ethanol as part of power and not diesel and gasoline (E0) as part of fossil? I didn't count the biodiesel but if we add in gasoline ethanol biodiesel and diesel the number drops from the 16%.

Here is older 2012 but broken down to imports and generation.
Total Electricity System Power
15.4% in 2012 versus 11% in 2002
2002 Gross System Electricity Production

 

The 3 big Investor-Owned Utilities (IOUs) that generate 68% of California's electricity had 19.6% average renewable, according to the latest report I've seen. They are roughly on track for 33% by 2020 and are forecast to be ahead of their interim 25% in 2016 goal.

Unless more renewable generation is added (likely) they will be a little behind in actual 2020 generation but can use excess renewable generation against earlier interim goals to temporarily meet their legal mandate.

See:

http://www.cpuc.ca.gov/NR/rdonlyres/71A2A7F6-AA0E-44D7-95BF-2946E25FE4EE/0/2013Q4RPSReportFINAL.pdf

 

Thanks that helps a lot for me to understand the numbers.

So for the RPS we count the big 3 IOU or about 68% of production today. In 2012 they put out about 30 TWh of renewables versus 46.5 TWh produced (34TW) and imported (12.5TW) into the state from all producers from ca.gov out of 302 TW consumed. So the question is in 2025 will the 3 IOUs still be 68% of production (I hope not, other providers would be nice), and what percent will those others be. The goal may not be as out of reach as I thought if you only count the big 3.

 

I think Va is too small for choice, but a group of states regulating together like Md, Va, DC, WV, NC, PA has ample wind, solar, coal, and natural gas to set up a choice system. It would take work with the grid operator and federal government to improve the grid to move the renewables, but there is plenty of good wind in west virginia, which is closer to northern virginia than the west texas wind is to Austin. The hard part is for regulators in those states to work together. The people that would pay more for wind and solar will be able to pay to develop more wind in west virginia and more solar in north Carolina, than residence of those states would do on their own. Given the choice of paying a little more ($0.02) and locking in electricity prices for years many texans chose wind, which pressures coal to shut down during the winter here. By 2025 many of these coal plants will close down completely. Hot summers we use more natural gas, moderate summers more coal, but this also will change as more wind makes the Texas regulatory scheme less profitable to run coal plants.

 

Jeff,

Can you explain why the forecasted online amounts of the different renewable fuels look to be either decreasing or flat in absolute amounts from about 2016 ?

 

Good question! I'm not sure and haven't really had time to look closely at these documents yet.

If you compare the two graphs, it looks like the main shrinkage is coming from the forecast for geothermal-based generation. I'm not sure why.

 

I can imagine cheaper alternatives like PV and wind replacing expensive geothermal, but I do not understand why the total appears to plateau at 50 GWh/year and then decrease for the five years leading up to 2020. That would be rotten news indeed.

One tantalizing possibility is that the IOUs are anticipating lower retail sales into the next decade, presumably from conservation and homeowner PV that are not REC countable.

Oh and by the way, while the report focuses on the three big IOUs, the RPS appears to cover a much larger fraction of total retail sales than the 68% sold by the big 3. I sure wish the feds would come up with a CA level RPS for industry. As it is, retail is only about 50% of utility sales.