Wind Power costs at 2 cents per kilowatt hour

Technology advancements and cost reductions have driven wind power down to 2 cents per kwh. This is from the annual report released by the U.S. Department of Energy and prepared by Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory (Berkeley Lab). Key findings from the U.S. Department of Energy’s Wind Technologies Market Report include: Wind power capacity additions continued …

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Germany and California could made a faster move to 100% clean power by adding instead of removing nuclear power

California and Germany could have mostly or completely decarbonized their electricity if they have invested in nuclear power instead of solar and wind renewables. If Germany did not begin a nuclear power phase-out in 2011, then they would still have 131 Terawatt hours from nuclear power. Germany could have built forty-six 1.6 GW EPR reactors …

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Using 82 Terawatts of solar and wind to Green the Sahara as a side effect would cost at least $82 trillion

Researchers simulated the effects of around 79 terawatts of solar panels and 3 terawatts of wind turbines. Computer modeling looked at the effect of covering 20 percent of the largest desert on the planet in solar panels and installing three million wind turbines. There would be 16X the rain in the aridest parts of the …

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Canada sized Solar and wind farms could make the Sahara Desert green again with double the rain

A team of scientists has concluded that deploying solar and wind farms across the region that the Sahara encompasses will produce significantly more rain, and therefore, natural vegetation, in the areas that they would exist. In what the study refers to as “albedo—precipitation—vegetation feedback” (albedo is basically the reflection of incident light and electromagnetic radiation), …

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Rotor sails are cylindrical mechanical sails that spin which can reduce shipping fuel use by 7-10%

Two 30-meter tall Rotor Sails have been installed onboard the product tanker vessel Maersk Pelican targeting a reduction in fuel cost and associated emissions on typical global shipping routes of 7-10%. Norsepower Oy Ltd., together with project partners Maersk Tankers, Energy Technologies Institute (ETI) and Shell Shipping & Maritime, today announced the installation of two …

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Cubic miles of oil and hundreds of gigawatts per year of added electricity

A cubic mile of oil per year is about 5.084 Terawatts per year with continuous power generation. making current world energy use around 15 TW. The world is using about 3.9 cubic miles of oil per year in electricity. The world was using 3.19 cubic miles of oil per year in electricity in 2006. The …

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Natural gas and renewables will be most of US power and US will export oil, coal and gas

Natural gas is continuing to dominate energy usage in the United States. Coal provided 60% of US electrical power 30 years ago and was still providing 50% in 2005. Coal is very competitive in certain parts of the United States, including in the coal hotbeds of Appalachia and the Powder River Basin in Montana and …

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Global Renewable power spending has been virtually flat for seven years and most countries will need expensive grid upgrades to handle more solar and wind

Global investment in renewable energy (Solar, Wind, Hydro and biofuel) edged up 2% in 2017 to $279.8 billion, taking cumulative investment since 2010 to $2.2 trillion. The level of global renewable power spending has been virtually flat for seven years. There has been an increase in overall installed renewable power each year because of the …

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In California, 100% Solar and Wind in 2045 will need $350 billion in energy storage

In California, both wind and solar generation are about ten times less in the lowest months versus the top three months. If California reaches the 80% mark for renewables there will be massive amounts of surplus generation during the summer months and would need 9.6 million megawatt-hours of energy storage. Achieving 100% would require 36.3 …

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