FERC Order Facilitates Variable Energy Resources With Bulk Power, NREL Study Says Renewables could Provide 50% Energy by 2050
The Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (FERC) has issued a final rule (Order No. 764) intended to facilitate the integration of variable energy resources (VERs), such as wind and solar, with the nation’s bulk power system. This rule requires two things: (1) public utility transmission providers allow intra-hourly scheduling of transmission rights at 15-minute intervals, in order to reduce imbalance charges that VERs incur when their output departs from the transmission schedule; and (2) new variable energy resources that interconnect with jurisdictional transmission facilities must report meteorological and operational data to the public utility transmission provider in real-time, to enable improved forecasting of generator output.
A new study by the National Renewable Energy Laboratory (NREL) reports that the United States could feasibly obtain 80% of its electricity from renewable resources by 2050 – provided that adequate investments in the nation’s transmission system are made and policies supporting clean energy deployment are instituted. According to the report, the intermittency of renewable energy technologies at this level of market penetration can be overcome by building new long-distance transmission lines, improving grid operations, and aggressively deploying existing storage technologies. It should be noted that according to the report, deployment of renewables at this scale would cause retail electricity rates to increase by between 2.4 and 5 cents per kilowatt-hour by 2050, relative to a “business as usual” scenario. This is some tall order and most likely not going to happen given this legislative environment. Presently, renewable energy technologies, including large hydroelectric facilities, supply 10% of our country’s electricity.
