California Electrical Grid Sources

nice, the envy of the nation.

 

That depends. Compared to Seattle City Light, that is a much better renewable fraction, but a much worse carbon fraction:
Seattle City Light | Fuel Mix

Seattle's non CO2 emitting electric generation exceeds 98%. (There is some bookkeeping sleight of hand here. As the oldest public utility in the region, Seattle can push off the regional carbon power onto others lower on the totem pole, namely the private utilities, and take first pick of the most politically palatable clean stuff.)

I'd think that they could review the net metering and incentive programs to figure out the home solar portion. But Seattle's fuel mix declarations also exclude this.

 

We do have figures from last year -
Total System Electric Generation
10.2% hydro (18% of that imported)
25.5% renewable (25% imported)

From your link

There is some really poor accounting here. I agree with the governor, that trading on the grid is a good thing, it helps put renewable money where it is most efficient. But california imported 32% of its power in 2016, up from 25% in 2010. Other states on the grid are often simply accounting for more fossil in state so they can sell california the renewables. Not building enough cycling resources in state means rate payers pay more, and generation is less efficient as it is going through a larger grid. This has contributed to California rate payers paying the 6th highest rates in the country. Hawaii and Alaska are easy, they are remote, so energy costs more. Connetocut, Massachussets, and New Hampshire, have high costs because they have in the past regulated against natural gas, so pay much higher prices for the feedstock, something that they are reversing. Its not the renewables that are causing the high prices in california, as texas has built more renewables in the last decade and these are much less expensive than california power. Its underinvestment in the grid, and regulations that favor inefficient utility decisions and under investment.

Pushing policies that increase the price of electricity is all well and good if you are trying to decrease consumption, but poor if you want to increase consumption for things like plug-in vehicle and reduce oil consumption. There are some easy reforms, but politically the push for 100% renewable, means that california will not invest in more efficient in state fossil generation, and instead will import this power so that it can look like its more virtuous.

I believe California has now successfully fallen to 5th behind new mexico and alaska. I am not sure how in the world it is a bad thing that california produces much of its own oil instead of importing it. Its low carbon standard on fuel means that it is importing oil from foreign countries. I guess the high regulatory costs of this plan do reduce consumption, but california consumes far more petroleum products than the oil it produces. The problem is consumption and regulation, not production. I have no idea why having a natural resource would lead to california's destruction. Someone should ask the governor.

 

It's all accounting. An electron provided to the grid at Washington's Grand Coulee Dam (large hydro) cannot be sorted from the electrons provided by a coal plant in Utah. Therefore, every customer gets electrons from so called "dirty" and "clean" sources. It's just like the farmer who puts his grain in the local grain elevator. It gets mixed with the grain already in the silo. On paper, the amount of the "deposit" is recorded. When a customer buys from the farmer, whatever seeds are at the delivery point in the silo are given to the customer and the paper record is updated. If you are "off-grid" with your own Mr. Fusion, windmill or solar panels, you use your own electrons.

 

shame they don't count residential solar, that number would be interesting.

 

I know one household that increased that metric, if counted .

 

PG&E tracks our usage or “transfers back to the grid” and does a true-up after 12 months. For the last billing period, pg&e recorded 373 kWh being sent back to the grid from our array.

 

Someone should be able to get a guesstimate but its better from the tax data, since these installs all get registered for federal tax subsidies, the federal government should be able to compile the number of kw installed in each state without giving away any private information. Until recently its been a tiny proportion, but it has grown with low cost solar in the south west (California, Nevada, Arizona, New Mexico) and yes the western grid operator better know approximately what is going on to manage for different demands.

We have a non sustainable trend. Nuclear is going to drop to 0 when they properly close the 2 nuclear generators in diablo canyon in 2024 and 2025. Coal will also drop to next to nothing by 2025.
Regulators vote to shut down Diablo Canyon, California's last nuclear power plant

Hydro is going to drop again. These rains and imports will not continue.

The greatest possibility to reduce CO2 in california in the next 7 years (2025) is more wind, local not utility solar, grid improvements, and building some more ccgt natural gas plants which will reduce imported natural gas and less efficient old steam plants.

 

Im pretty sure if they did an energy balance they could figure it out.

They do come out to perform an “inspection” prior to allowing the system to be turned on. So they are aware of what we have and what it is capable of. There’s just no reason for them to invest any of their energy at this point to know.

The only wild cards are any devices that are not attached to the grid (like a plug-in vehicles) and take their energy elsewhere. Otherwise a 24 hour snapshot should equal out as I do not have a power wall or other capacity storage, so everything is fed backwards through the meter or the meter spins the correct way when the sun isn’t out. Most customers fall into this transmission category.

 

I'll bet you a large pizza that California will raise the electric rates again.
People conserved water, and the rates went up.
Hybrid drivers use less gas, so we get hit with a registration fee increase and a new gas tax.

They keep telling us to conserve electricity. Decrease use. Avoid rolling blackouts in summer. If my power goes off when it's 105 degrees, I'm going to blame Elon Musk! And all you Prime guys that are plugged in.

 

Get some solar panels and avoid the next price increase from the PUC’s.

 

is it higher than 24 cents per kWh?

 

Depends on what tier level your in, but some tiers are north of that and in the rise.