More than a year ago we talked about a joint study of the prestigious US universities Stanford and Cornell which indicated the 'recipe' to make the state of New York self-sufficient from an energy point of view by 2030 with the use of only renewable sources (water, sun and wind), of particular relevance is the fact that the study referred to 100% coverage not only of electricity consumption but of overall energy consumption which therefore included the energy necessary for transport, for air conditioning of rooms (heating, air conditioning) and for industry, therefore there was talk of a deployment of renewable source plants for a good 254 GW of new power installed mainly from solar and wind.
The same research team headed by Prof. MZ Jacobson has re-proposed a similar study, which uses the same methodology, but applied to the study of energy independence of the state of California (the scientific work is paid for but it is possible to find 'clear' copies on the web without too much difficulty) for which a complete electrification of energy end-uses by 2050. The results of the study are certainly interesting, according to the authors of the research, the use of renewable sources will allow the energy independence of the Californian state from fossil sources by 2050an intermediate stage is foreseen for 2030 in which 80-85% of consumption can be covered by renewables. California, due to its greater insolation, is certainly more suitable for the installation of solar plants than the state of NY but in any case, even in this case, a respectable deployment of new renewable source plants is required which for the accuracy would total a 598,2 GW of total power made up of:
- 25.000 onshore wind turbines of 5 megawatts (MW) each;
- 7.800 5 MW offshore wind turbines;
- 1.200 100 MW concentrated solar plants;
- 15 million domestic photovoltaic systems of 5 kW each;
- Medium/large sized PV systems on roofs for a total of 53.600 MW;
- 3.450 large ground-mounted PV plants of 50 MW each;
- 72 geothermal plants of 100 MW;
- 5.000 tidal power plants (waves) of 0,75 MW;
- 3.400 tidal power plants (tides) of 1 MW.
With renewables, the Golden State would effectively become a Green Statethey would create hundreds of thousands of jobs (220) and all of them would be avoided externalities related to the use of fossil fuels meanwhile gradually abandoning the source as well nuclear.
There would also be a drop in overall energy consumption due to energy efficiency measures, overall energy demand would be 44% lower than projected for 2050.
The costs of the transition have been calculated as equal to 1.100 billion dollars and in the study they are compared to the health costs deriving from the use of fossil fuels and to the costs resulting from climate change induced by CO2 emissions in order to be able to certify that the proposed one is a strategy win-win.
The question is certainly very complex, but some doubts about the reasonableness of a necessarily 100% green strategy were raised during the previous study on the state of NY by analysts from Bloomberg New Energy Finance (BNEF) who calculated that 254 billion dollars would be needed by 2030 to build the generation plants alone (382 GW). Bloomberg senior analyst Angus McCrone said “it is too ambitious to think of supplying all the energy needed by the state with renewable sources, even if great progress could be made“. And they also remarked that setting the goal of energy independence as early as 2030 was rather optimistic and that according to Bloomberg researchers "A different combination, for example with more small-scale residential PV and increased use of energy efficiency might be more realistic for 2030".
In the new work on California the shot has been adjusted and the bar of energy independence has been set at 2050, a conveniently distant date which makes any methodological criticism more difficult. The researchers in the new study have inserted (as required) into California's energy mix a heavy dose of PV (residential and otherwise) and good use of efficiency measures, in the new paper it was even specified that in California there is enough space to accommodate all the planned PV and wind plants (another point that was criticized by Bloomberg because in the case of NY, onshore wind would have required 13% of the state's surface) .
We will therefore see if with this substantial facelift the research will obtain the endorsement of the BNEF or if another slating will arrive, pointing out that (probably) the best from a technical/economic/environmental point of view is not a 100% green solution but a golden mean , a balanced mix that gradually moves towards low-carbon sources. In which case it won't be a big deal anyway, the same detailed study could be adjusted and repurposed for the remaining 48 US states*, where it might raise the same objections, except perhaps in the case of Hawaii, islands where electricity is mainly produced by plants that use fuel oil that has to travel halfway around the world and where electricity actually has exorbitant costs. In this case, however, the problem would become the need for surfaces to be dedicated to wind farms. [gb]
* 47 states for the truth why for the state of Washington (along with New York and California) a detailed study has already been done. While for all US states aanalysis less detailed.
