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Diablo Canyon delivered 17,593 gigawatt hours of electricity in 2022 [1]. If California had continued to install solar power at the same rate it did 10 years ag

Diablo Canyon delivered 17,593 gigawatt hours of electricity in 2022 [1]. If California had continued to install solar power at the same rate it did 10 years ago, that much solar output would have been added in the last 3 years alone. Coupled with battery storage like you suggest, that would also cover the early evening demand peak in California. However, California's rate of solar addition slowed down considerably since 2014. It went from 3,813 GWh of utility scale solar generation in 2013 to 9,932 GWh in 2014 for an annual growth of 6,119 GWh. But from 2017 to 2022 it grew by an average of only 2,994 GWh annually [2]. This happened at the same time that solar hardware costs continued to decline rapidly. California was more aggressive about building large scale solar projects when it was more expensive, and has oddly slowed down compared to other states in recent years. That's a reason that Diablo Canyon is still needed. If California picks up the pace again on decarbonization with renewables, then Diablo Canyon can shut down. It shouldn't shut down while natural gas is still California's top electricity source [3]. [1] https://www.eia.gov/electricity/data/browser/#/plant/6099?freq=A&start=1982&end=2023&ctype=linechart&ltype=pin&columnchart=ELEC.PLANT.GEN.6099-ALL-ALL.A&linechart=ELEC.PLANT.GEN.6099-ALL-ALL.A&maptype=0 https://www.eia.gov/electricity/data/browser/#/plant/6099?fr... [2] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Solar_power_in_California#Generation https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Solar_power_in_California#Gene... [3] https://www.energy.ca.gov/data-reports/energy-almanac/california-electricity-data/2022-total-system-electric-generation https://www.energy.ca.gov/data-reports/energy-almanac/califo...

vlovich123 3y ago
Solar often produces much less power than the sticker because it doesn’t some at night (among other reasons). Someone else in the thread noted that solar efficiency is 20-30% of the installed capacity compared with 92% for nuclear (and solar costs always ignore storage which is a massive cost that would make the numbers waaay worse and is otherwise borne by installing nuclear/fossil fuels/hydro).
- philipkglass 3y ago
  The numbers I posted already accounted for capacity factor differences, because they were generated energy output (gigawatt hours) rather than peak capacity (gigawatts).

vlovich123 3y ago

Solar often produces much less power than the sticker because it doesn’t some at night (among other reasons). Someone else in the thread noted that solar efficiency is 20-30% of the installed capacity compared with 92% for nuclear (and solar costs always ignore storage which is a massive cost that would make the numbers waaay worse and is otherwise borne by installing nuclear/fossil fuels/hydro).

philipkglass 3y ago
The numbers I posted already accounted for capacity factor differences, because they were generated energy output (gigawatt hours) rather than peak capacity (gigawatts).