4 ms·

A Clean Energy Milestone: Renewables Pulled Ahead of Coal in 2020 in the US

32 points by finphil 6y ago

Magodo 6y ago
Can someone help me out with my cognitive dissonance. On the one hand, I keep reading about how climate change will destroy everything very soon and the first person to die of serious climate change has already been born and on the other hand, there's always hopeful news like this... If the first is true why bother with renewable energy at all and why celebrate it as a milestone. If the latter is true, then what's the point of worrying about the climate at all?
- philipkglass 6y ago
  Human driven climate change is going to do significant damage. It's not going to be halted in a mere decade or two. But it's always possible to make the consequences a little more severe by burning more fossils, or to make them a little less severe by burning less. The people who claim "only X years left to save the world from severe climate change" are stretching the truth for effect or don't understand the primary research well enough. There are certain milestones that we'll pass if we don't make deep emissions cuts in those X years, but there's not a bright dividing line between "ok" and "doomed." Telling people that there is a bright line coming up in just a few years is likely to induce cynicism/apathy when we start living on the far side of that line.
  - emteycz 6y ago
    On the other hand, there certainly are significant irreversible events coming up if temperature rise is not capped, deforestation not stopped, industrial agriculture doesn't change, etc.
- pasttense01 6y ago
  Because articles like this are deceptive. In terms of climate change: 1. You need to look at all sources of carbon emissions (not just electricity). 2. You need to look at the whole world--not just the United States. Overall it turns out there is a modest improvement in the U.S. and the other Western industrialized countries.[And even with the modest improvement in the Western industrialized countries, they are still putting massive amount of carbon into the atmosphere every year.] However there is a worsening in the third world--and they are responsible for more emissions that the Western industrialized countries. Thus for example you see articles like: Mexico was once a climate leader – now it's betting big on coal https://www.theguardian.com/world/2021/feb/15/mexico-coal-fossil-fuels-climate-crisis-amlo https://www.theguardian.com/world/2021/feb/15/mexico-coal-fo...
  - tzs 6y ago
    > However there is a worsening in the third world--and they are responsible for more emissions that the Western industrialized countries. That's true for new emissions, but remember that various greenhouse gases once emitted stay around in the atmosphere for a while. For CO2, a while is 300-1000 years. The US plus Europe emitted about 58% of the CO2 that is currently in the atmosphere.
- pjc50 6y ago
  Like coronavirus, it's not a binary but a question of how well or badly we cope with it.
JoeAltmaier 6y ago
...because coal has become extremely unpopular and been replaced almost entirely with natural gas. Not so much renewables beating good ol coal, as coal tumbling to last place. Taking its place at the bottom, along with (all) renewables.
- philipkglass 6y ago
  It's not just a gas/coal swap. Electricity generated from coal and gas combined fell in 2020, largely due to economic dislocations from the pandemic: https://www.eia.gov/outlooks/steo/report/electricity.php https://www.eia.gov/outlooks/steo/report/electricity.php Even after the pandemic it's expected that renewable electricity will grow significantly while fossil generated electricity declines. The electricity generated from coal and gas together is expected to be 157.23 terawatt hours less in 2022 than 2019. Electricity generated from non-hydro renewables (wind and solar) in 2022 is expected to be 211.45 TWh more than in 2019.
- perl4ever 6y ago
  Still, for years I've been reading that almost all new power generation capacity is renewable.
  - JoeAltmaier 6y ago
    I think because they're incremental. A plant that burns something costs billions. Another solar panel or wind tower can be built on a whim.
    - perl4ever 6y ago
      That's not my impression based on eia.gov. Natural gas and petroleum power generators are on the order of $700-800/kW to build, apparently. The majority of them are small, from a fraction of a MW to 2 or 3 MW. Seems like they must be on the order of a few millions to build or less, unless they are very different from the average. https://www.eia.gov/electricity/generatorcosts/ https://www.eia.gov/electricity/generatorcosts/
jfengel 6y ago
But still far behind natural gas. That has less to do with the adoption of wind and solar, and more with fracking. Natural gas is cheaper than coal, and coal plants are gradually being replaced by natural gas. Gas is better than coal, and having renewables pass coal is a win as coal is on the way out. But it's not a case of fossil fuels being phased out. We're still dumping CO2 into the atmosphere at a rate that puts us on target for a 3C or more increase. That will wreak all kinds of havoc. So yay for the milestone, but it's not sufficient, or even on a track to sufficient. Much more has to be change.

32 points by finphil 6y ago

Can someone help me out with my cognitive dissonance. On the one hand, I keep reading about how climate change will destroy everything very soon and the first person to die of serious climate change has already been born and on the other hand, there's always hopeful news like this... If the first is true why bother with renewable energy at all and why celebrate it as a milestone. If the latter is true, then what's the point of worrying about the climate at all?

philipkglass 6y ago
Human driven climate change is going to do significant damage. It's not going to be halted in a mere decade or two. But it's always possible to make the consequences a little more severe by burning more fossils, or to make them a little less severe by burning less. The people who claim "only X years left to save the world from severe climate change" are stretching the truth for effect or don't understand the primary research well enough. There are certain milestones that we'll pass if we don't make deep emissions cuts in those X years, but there's not a bright dividing line between "ok" and "doomed." Telling people that there is a bright line coming up in just a few years is likely to induce cynicism/apathy when we start living on the far side of that line.
- emteycz 6y ago
  On the other hand, there certainly are significant irreversible events coming up if temperature rise is not capped, deforestation not stopped, industrial agriculture doesn't change, etc.
pasttense01 6y ago
Because articles like this are deceptive. In terms of climate change: 1. You need to look at all sources of carbon emissions (not just electricity). 2. You need to look at the whole world--not just the United States. Overall it turns out there is a modest improvement in the U.S. and the other Western industrialized countries.[And even with the modest improvement in the Western industrialized countries, they are still putting massive amount of carbon into the atmosphere every year.] However there is a worsening in the third world--and they are responsible for more emissions that the Western industrialized countries. Thus for example you see articles like: Mexico was once a climate leader – now it's betting big on coal https://www.theguardian.com/world/2021/feb/15/mexico-coal-fossil-fuels-climate-crisis-amlo https://www.theguardian.com/world/2021/feb/15/mexico-coal-fo...
- tzs 6y ago
  > However there is a worsening in the third world--and they are responsible for more emissions that the Western industrialized countries. That's true for new emissions, but remember that various greenhouse gases once emitted stay around in the atmosphere for a while. For CO2, a while is 300-1000 years. The US plus Europe emitted about 58% of the CO2 that is currently in the atmosphere.
pjc50 6y ago
Like coronavirus, it's not a binary but a question of how well or badly we cope with it.

JoeAltmaier 6y ago

...because coal has become extremely unpopular and been replaced almost entirely with natural gas. Not so much renewables beating good ol coal, as coal tumbling to last place. Taking its place at the bottom, along with (all) renewables.

philipkglass 6y ago
It's not just a gas/coal swap. Electricity generated from coal and gas combined fell in 2020, largely due to economic dislocations from the pandemic: https://www.eia.gov/outlooks/steo/report/electricity.php https://www.eia.gov/outlooks/steo/report/electricity.php Even after the pandemic it's expected that renewable electricity will grow significantly while fossil generated electricity declines. The electricity generated from coal and gas together is expected to be 157.23 terawatt hours less in 2022 than 2019. Electricity generated from non-hydro renewables (wind and solar) in 2022 is expected to be 211.45 TWh more than in 2019.
perl4ever 6y ago
Still, for years I've been reading that almost all new power generation capacity is renewable.
- JoeAltmaier 6y ago
  I think because they're incremental. A plant that burns something costs billions. Another solar panel or wind tower can be built on a whim.
  - perl4ever 6y ago
    That's not my impression based on eia.gov. Natural gas and petroleum power generators are on the order of $700-800/kW to build, apparently. The majority of them are small, from a fraction of a MW to 2 or 3 MW. Seems like they must be on the order of a few millions to build or less, unless they are very different from the average. https://www.eia.gov/electricity/generatorcosts/ https://www.eia.gov/electricity/generatorcosts/

jfengel 6y ago

But still far behind natural gas. That has less to do with the adoption of wind and solar, and more with fracking. Natural gas is cheaper than coal, and coal plants are gradually being replaced by natural gas. Gas is better than coal, and having renewables pass coal is a win as coal is on the way out. But it's not a case of fossil fuels being phased out. We're still dumping CO2 into the atmosphere at a rate that puts us on target for a 3C or more increase. That will wreak all kinds of havoc. So yay for the milestone, but it's not sufficient, or even on a track to sufficient. Much more has to be change.