ColdFusion - Amid Pandemic, Renewables Now Supply More Energy than Coal in the U.S.

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Starting point is 00:00:28 Hi, welcome to another cold fusion video. There's something interesting going on with energy production in the United States. It signals a growing change in the trend of energy generation, and I find it interesting to watch. So what's going on? Electricity generated by renewable sources, such as solar, wind and hydro, have exceeded coal-fired power in the United States for a record 40 days. This is according to a report based on US government data. released earlier this month. For some, this doesn't sound like much, but as we'll see, it's actually very significant. On the flip side, in the area of renewable energy, there's also some

Starting point is 00:01:10 serious questions that we should be asking. We'll explore that later in the video, but for now, let's kick off the episode. You are watching Tall Fusion TV. According to the Institute for Energy Economics, the boost for renewables is due to a seasonal increase in low-cost solar and and hydro power generation. This is alongside an overall slump in electricity demand of 3%. The slump has been caused by pandemic-related reduced demand from commercial and industrial sectors. As you'll soon see, hydro generation is actually falling as well, so it's wind and solar that are rapidly increasing. For many years on this channel, we've been taking note to the fall in solar prices and increase in efficiency, now up to almost 50% with the latest research.

Starting point is 00:02:07 In the United States, every day from March 25th, solar, wind and hydro plants produced more electricity than coal-fired plants. This accounts for about a fifth of the United States power requirements. The longest back-to-back stretch previously was nine days in 2019. And in total, in 2019, renewables beat coal on just 38 days at spotty times throughout the year. So over 40 straight days of renewable energy beating coal is very, very significant. When power production needs to be ramped down, like in this pandemic, coal tends to be the first power source that's cut by utilities. This is because renewable sources are cheaper to operate and are often backed by state clean energy mandates. So the full story is a bit more murky

Starting point is 00:02:55 when government-led initiatives are making alternative power sources more attractive. Still though, from a strictly technological standpoint, I find it very interesting that this is happening. According to current financial analysis, coal's percentage in the US power generation market is expected to collapse into single digits by 2025. In 2014, coal supplied 38.6% of the nation's electricity needs, and by 2019, that figure had dropped to 23.4. Coal demand is forecast to fall a whopping 20% this year, while renewable energy generation

Starting point is 00:03:32 will grow 11%. This 11% growth is due to grid operators favouring their lower operating costs. Natural gas prices are also dropping, compounding the move away from coal. This story of renewables overtaking coal is as much about the collapse of coal as the rise of renewables. There have been many coal company bankruptcies, as well as a production overcapacity. This has all led to capital investment drying up. Interestingly, according to IBS World Statistics, The energy production of hydroelectricity is also falling due to more droughts.

Starting point is 00:04:08 Hydro production has fallen 0.7% over the last five years, so solar and wind are making up more of the difference in the renewable sector. Amidst this backdrop, the US Energy Information Administration forecast large amounts of wind and solar capacity are being added to the grid. Hey, y'all's Kelly Clarkson with Wayfair. Ever order furniture online and wonder, what if? Like, what if it doesn't hold up? That sofa was four days old.

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Starting point is 00:05:09 Spotify advertising, you're among fans. As governments and businesses seek cleaner power sources, often replacing retiring coal plants. On the flip side, the Department of Energy has warned that over-reliance on solar and wind can reduce the dependability of the grid. This is because the power generation is intermittent. Fossil fuel plants can store the fuel on site

Starting point is 00:05:33 and are more reliable. Though, if you've been following this channel for a while, you'll know what the solution here is. Electrical energy storage. So when the sun is shining and the wind is blowing, we can use utility scale batteries to store the excess amount of energy. Though, when the sun isn't shining and the wind isn't blowing, these batteries can feed back the energy onto the grid.

Starting point is 00:05:58 It's very clear now that the potential for electric energy storage is huge, from electric cars and aircraft to utilities. storage. Over the last decade, a surge in lithium-ion-battery production has led to an 85% decline in prices. This makes electric vehicles and energy storage commercially viable for the first time in history. Battery technology has been getting better as well. This is a 1700-m-hour battery from a 1994 laptop. And this is a 5,000-m-hour battery in a phone. But batteries are about to get a lot better. The financial incentive to create even better batteries is now huge, much larger than it's ever been. When we talk about battery technology, a lot of people still think it's 2015 and there's

Starting point is 00:06:49 never going to be better batteries because there's no incentive. But just think, the company that creates a breakthrough battery and licenses this technology could own a multi-billion dollar market. UBS estimates that over the next 10 years, the energy storage market in the United States could grow as much as $426 billion, and in a post-pandemic world, this could be even more. So when there's a demand for better technology, there'll be companies trying to provide that technology. For utility-scale storage, there's even other methods beyond lithium iron batteries, such as liquid batteries or flow batteries.

Starting point is 00:07:28 And currently, there's a massive race that's on. Even the other week, Samsung came out with a very interesting scientific paper on a new method of a solid-state battery, which solves the two major problems surrounding the technology, the elimination of dendrite formation, which would kill the battery in the long run, and the elimination of low internal efficiency. This battery has 50% more energy density and a 200% longer lifecycle than previous solid-state efforts. So even today, the batteries that we have are viable for utility energy storage. but they're only going to get cheaper and better in the long run.

Starting point is 00:08:04 These are some very interesting times indeed. So on the flip side of all of this, we should be thinking about the other side of the equation. While it's good that we're looking at alternative energy sources, we have to ask ourselves some hard questions. How much energy is going into building solar panels from the mining of the materials to the transportation? For wind turbines, how much energy is being used for the same processes,

Starting point is 00:08:33 including construction? If we weigh up all of this, what is the total net energy output? How long will solar and wind structures last? How would the sector look if there wasn't any government help? These are hard questions to answer, and it depends on the efficiency of the specific equipment used and the supply chains involved. So are there alternatives to the alternatives? Well, in this vein, there's been a growing movement among scientists and engineers to revisit

Starting point is 00:09:01 nuclear power in a big way. The reactor technology that we have today isn't the same dangerous equipment used in the 60s and 70s. Plus, it's one of the most energy efficient processes. If you want a $3,000 a month payday for life, what would you feel free to do? Maybe take a long weekend, every weekend, or try a bunch of new hobbies. Would you feel free to upgrade and listen ad-free? Don't worry, we get it. Every $20 ticket could win you $3,000 a month for life and supports life-saving cancer research at the Princess Margaret.

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Starting point is 00:10:29 The rubby waste to energy works by taking in the garbage, keeping it in a bunker for about five days to allow the moisture to sip, and then burning it at about 1,000 degrees centigrade, turning that into heat energy that is then able to move steam turbines that in turn generate electricity. Simultaneously, we're able to capture what would-have-be pollutant gases and turn them into inert materials and make sure that there is no major pollution from the facility. We have this facility that is taking this much garbage with almost a total of 500 million kilograms of garbage for the whole year. Now you don't have to dump that in new landfills. That is land. Now that could be used for constructing housing, doing other projects. We have precious land that is now kept out of being a storage for garbage forever.

Starting point is 00:11:41 I really do enjoy engineers thinking outside the box when it comes to these things. So the Institute Energy for Economics and Finance Report concluded, quote, Short-term economic uncertainty caused by the pandemic and the recent collapse in oil prices may slow down this transition slightly, but the trend is clear. Coal is being driven to the brink by continued, gas prices and steady additions of wind and solar.

Starting point is 00:12:08 It's interesting to see this shift of low-cost solar and wind actually making such meaningful contributions to energy in the United States. The next 10 years should be very interesting to say the least. Coal is falling off a cliff and renewables are starting to rise. That being said, we should ask ourselves about the bigger picture of all the moving parts in this story of energy. So what do you guys think? Let me know in the comment section below.

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Starting point is 00:13:35 Cold fusion. It's new thinking.

ColdFusion - Amid Pandemic, Renewables Now Supply More Energy than Coal in the U.S.

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