NewEnergyNews: Monday Study – With Biden Law, New Energy Beats NatGas On Price/

NewEnergyNews

Gleanings from the web and the world, condensed for convenience, illustrated for enlightenment, arranged for impact...

The challenge now: To make every day Earth Day.

YESTERDAY

THINGS-TO-THINK-ABOUT WEDNESDAY, August 23:

  • TTTA Wednesday-ORIGINAL REPORTING: The IRA And The New Energy Boom
  • TTTA Wednesday-ORIGINAL REPORTING: The IRA And the EV Revolution
  • THE DAY BEFORE

  • Weekend Video: Coming Ocean Current Collapse Could Up Climate Crisis
  • Weekend Video: Impacts Of The Atlantic Meridional Overturning Current Collapse
  • Weekend Video: More Facts On The AMOC
  • THE DAY BEFORE THE DAY BEFORE

    WEEKEND VIDEOS, July 15-16:

  • Weekend Video: The Truth About China And The Climate Crisis
  • Weekend Video: Florida Insurance At The Climate Crisis Storm’s Eye
  • Weekend Video: The 9-1-1 On Rooftop Solar
  • THE DAY BEFORE THAT

    WEEKEND VIDEOS, July 8-9:

  • Weekend Video: Bill Nye Science Guy On The Climate Crisis
  • Weekend Video: The Changes Causing The Crisis
  • Weekend Video: A “Massive Global Solar Boom” Now
  • THE LAST DAY UP HERE

    WEEKEND VIDEOS, July 1-2:

  • The Global New Energy Boom Accelerates
  • Ukraine Faces The Climate Crisis While Fighting To Survive
  • Texas Heat And Politics Of Denial
  • --------------------------

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    Founding Editor Herman K. Trabish

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    WEEKEND VIDEOS, June 17-18

  • Fixing The Power System
  • The Energy Storage Solution
  • New Energy Equity With Community Solar
  • Weekend Video: The Way Wind Can Help Win Wars
  • Weekend Video: New Support For Hydropower
  • Some details about NewEnergyNews and the man behind the curtain: Herman K. Trabish, Agua Dulce, CA., Doctor with my hands, Writer with my head, Student of New Energy and Human Experience with my heart

    email: herman@NewEnergyNews.net

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      A tip of the NewEnergyNews cap to Phillip Garcia for crucial assistance in the design implementation of this site. Thanks, Phillip.

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    Pay a visit to the HARRY BOYKOFF page at Basketball Reference, sponsored by NewEnergyNews and Oil In Their Blood.

  • ---------------
  • WEEKEND VIDEOS, August 24-26:
  • Happy One-Year Birthday, Inflation Reduction Act
  • The Virtual Power Plant Boom, Part 1
  • The Virtual Power Plant Boom, Part 2

    Monday, January 09, 2023

    Monday Study – With Biden Law, New Energy Beats NatGas On Price

    The Business Case for New Gas Is Shrinking; The Inflation Reduction Act makes clean energy cheaper than more than 90 percent of proposed gas plants.

    Lauren Shwisberg, December 8, 2022 (RMI)

    As the dust settles following the passage of the Inflation Reduction Act (IRA), the electricity industry is only beginning to understand its true impacts. One of those impacts is the continued erosion of the business case for new fossil gas power plants.

    Over the past decade, fossil gas power plants became the default resource option for utility investment, making up a majority of capacity additions. While over the past few years the total capacity of plants built has declined and high profile cancellations have increased, the IRA’s tax incentive provisions will accelerate deployment of cleaner, cheaper electricity — making gas an even less competitive choice.

    New RMI analysis shows just how much the IRA changes the game.

    The Analysis

    ...When we ran 76 GW of fossil gas plants proposed before 2035 through our Clean Energy Portfolios Model, we found that the vast majority of plants were more expensive than their respective clean energy portfolios (CEPs), shown in Exhibit 1. In a scenario where clean energy resources use the 30 percent Investment Tax Credit or the Production Tax Credit at $26/MWh, clean energy outcompetes 93 percent of proposed fossil gas plants — more than 20 percent more than pre-IRA.

    With additional bonuses for investment in energy communities, use of domestically sourced resources, or siting in low-income communities, in nearly every instance, clean energy beats gas on cost alone. That means that when taking full advantage of the tax credits in the IRA, clean, renewable sources will be cheaper than 99 percent of proposed gas plants — plants that are contributing to price volatility in American household energy bills.

    The Power of Financial Incentives

    ...Analysts are projecting that renewables costs will continue to fall — with jaw-droppingly low prices for wind and solar by the end of the decade...Credit Suisse, for example, made headlines when it projected $5/MWh wind and solar by 2029. S&P Global and IHS Markit projected numbers nearly as low — with about $10/MWh solar in 2030 falling to $5/MWh by 2035. Consulting firm ICF’s projections, though slightly less bullish, still predict that a levelized cost of energy for solar and wind in 2030 will be 20–35 percent and 38–49 percent lower, respectively, than pre-IRA.

    In most of these forecasts, renewable costs fall below the go-forward cost of a combined cycle gas plant — generally expected to be at least $30–$40/MWh. This means it will be cheaper on a per megawatt hour basis to build new wind and solar than to continue to operate existing gas.

    ...[Exhibit 3 aggregates Credit Suisse, S&P Global and IHS Markit projections] into charts that show an indicative range of levelized cost of energy for wind and solar post-IRA, compared with NREL’s 2022 Annual Technology Baseline pre-IRA.

    While our analysis in the Clean Energy Portfolios Model only looked at battery energy storage and demand flexibility to provide firm, dispatchable energy, a host of new resource options may also be cost-competitive with fossil gas by the end of the decade. A range of “clean firm” technologies will increasingly compete directly with fossil gas, such as alternative energy storage technologies, geothermal, advanced nuclear, hydrogen-fired turbines, and carbon capture and storage.

    Updated Resource Plans and Procurement Processes Can Unlock $5 Billion per Year in Savings

    ...[RMI’s analysis and other independent analysts show there] are actions regulators and utilities can take today to realize the IRA’s projected $5 billion per year in savings for their ratepayers. New resource plans can include updated resource costs that accurately represent the new tax credits, seek to represent the full range of resources that may be commercially available within the planning horizon, and demonstrate how they will use additional IRA funding sources such as the Energy Infrastructure Reinvestment program. While costs remain uncertain, regulators and utilities can use all-source procurement — a competitive process that solicits bids from all types of resources — for near-term needs to discover the market prices and relative competitiveness across resources.

    ...DTE Energy in Michigan filed its Integrated Resource Plan in early November, with a scenario that factored in IRA tax incentives. Utility executives reported that they expected the IRA to lower the price tag of their 20-year plan for customers about $500 million.

    The Minnesota Public Utilities Commission approved Xcel’s request this week to build 460 MW of solar at a retiring coal plant site — part of a CEP that will avoid a new gas plant. Xcel reported that the IRA was anticipated to save ratepayers 30 percent over its initial estimate of project costs.

    Duke Energy in Florida is providing customers with a $56 million refund as a result of solar tax credits.

    Ameren is proposing to lower customer rates by 4.5 percent.

    To fully realize the benefits of the IRA, now is the time for utilities and regulators to reevaluate plans for investing in new fossil gas power plants and take advantage of the opportunity to deliver ratepayer savings with cleaner options.

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