California and Texas have two quite different regulatory environments, but both have been able to build renewables and decrease coal much faster than the nation. ERCOT is a fairly transparent, free market type of regulation that uses subsidies and choice. If enough people want renewables they will be built. California tries to regulate and build that way, often making power artificially expensive to push building of renewables both systems seem to work better than most of america. Energy use in ERCOT region grows 2.2 percent in 2015 Its fairly noteworthy, that until current deregulation there was less than 1% wind power in texas. In 2010 it was well established at 7.8% of the grid, while coal was at 39.5% about even with natural gas. Now with growth night coal makes less money and wind has caused a shift to natural gas. Wind is at 11.7%, coal down to 28.1%. Solar is tiny in texas but lower prices will increase it greatly according to ERCOT ERCOT releases report on potential Clean Power Plan impacts Probably around 13 GW by 2030 with or without the clean power plan. Without clean power plan though, wind would probably only grow a little, with it, coal will be retired faster and more wind built. Texas is about at the limit of what choice will build on wind, but lower prices and subsidies mean choice can easily build solar. It will take change of regulation to build much more wind or retire coal faster, but really both are at good levels. California is not as fast as texas to update figures so we have only 2014 so far. Electricity From Wind Energy Statistics & Data California Solar Energy Statistics & Data Wind was at 5.9 GW and 13 million MWh Solar was at 6.9 GW and 12.6 million MWh Combined they produced 25.6 million MWh compared to 40.8 million MWh of wind in Texas. I know people think its higher instead of much lower, but california is cooler with less manufacturing which means they need less electricity. The PUC also tries to keep prices high also reducing use. This gave california 12.3% solar + wind power, slightly higher than texas in percentage terms. Of course some of this was imported from out of state, mostly arizona and nevada. Both systems are working. California is doing much better than texas on coal only producing 0.5% in state and 5.9% out of state totalling 6.4%. Extra powers granted CARB allowed it to keep instate coal low. When contracts end the total coal will get very low, as utilities should stop importing coal power. In texas its trickier, as coal helps diversify the portfolio and its already built. It may be difficult dropping bellow 20% in a choice type system even with Clean Power plan. 2014 california produced 20% as renewables, 5.5% large hydro, and 8.5% nuclear making it 34% fossil fuel free. 15% was unspecified, that should probably be counted as natural gas, as this is either natural gas or renewables that have had their recs sold.
