Fascinating new EIA data
South Dakota produced 110% of its electricity demand with just Wind-Water-Solar for the full year Oct 1 '23-Sep 30 '24
77.5% Wind 30.1% Water 2.2% Solar
Also produced 16.8% gas, 11.7% coal
So SD produced 138% of demand, exporting 38%
https://web.stanford.edu/group/efmh/jacobson/WWSBook/Countries100Pct.pdf
Cool, except that it’s South Dakota.
He also posted a list of the top 10 states by electricity demand met by renewables (Which is also in the linked pdf).
There’s also a list of countries by renewables percentage, but it’s from 2021:
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_renewable_electricity_production
while this is great and should be celebrated, keep in mind the specific word electricity. Those of us from warmer states probably arent familiar with how many joules of heat come from oil or gas furnaces which significantly reduces the electricity demand of each home. I was really surprised when I moved from FL to MA that I only had a 100A service line because the furnace and water heater are fueled by #2 oil. Gross. Anyway, according to these guys:
https://www.eia.gov/state/analysis.php?sid=SD
the population of SD is tiny so they don’t use much for heating either so that’s cool, hopefully with a bit more electrification they can reduce their consumption even more.
They mainly heat with electric there, and it is absolutely terrible, and outrageously expensive. Winter is not a fun season when it gets to negative temperatures with 50mph winds quite regularly, and then you get the electric bill. Its absolutely the worst energy source for heating, please stop wishing it on other people.
But were those renewables able to meet demand 100% of the time with sufficient battery backups?
Well it doesn’t matter if it exports the surplus to other states and cuts their fossil fuel usage. It means that 100% of that renewable energy was cut from fossil fuels.
There is always a need to smooth out troughs. That can be through, selling, shifting demand (cheaper tarrifs during surplus), storage or as a last resort bridging gaps with other fuels.
Let’s not let perfect get in the way of good. Every tonne of CO2 out the air gives us more time and a little more chance for at risk countries to stay above water.
It’s certainly good, but I think it’d be better if we had some additional clean way of covering our base load. Like nuclear.
Renewables + storage (batteries, etc.) can be more than enough. And you can get that in a much lower cost, at a much faster time than nuclear.
https://web.stanford.edu/group/efmh/jacobson/Articles/I/NuclearVsWWS.pdf
The same person has also published studies and plans for 100% renewables in the USA and in the world.
USA
Grid reliability in the USA with 100% renewables
World
All of which he updates every couple of years.
cool now give it back to the indigenous people you stole it from
That’s impossible, no one can give more than 100%. By definition, that is the most anyone can give.
its about what you need and what you can produce. you can produce more then what you need.
it’s from the simpsons: https://youtu.be/mfcTcSbGMmo
