Is Solar really our least-cost utility-based energy supply? The answer is NO.
Let’s look at a Solar PV project in California, assessing Solar costs based on project data in the public domain. Blythe Solar PV Park 1, is located just south of Mesa Verde, California.
The plant details I used are here: https://www.power-technology.com/marketdata/blythe-solar-pv-park-1-us/
This is a 21 MW Solar PV plant, which generates 45,000 MWh. The calculated capacity factor becomes 24.5%. California has many of these “high” solar capacity factors. If the California desert isn’t the best place for solar PV, where’s a better place in the US?
The cost for the 21 MW plant was $120,750,000, or $5,750/kW. However, the real plant cost should be evaluated based on equivalent coal, nuclear or hydro Capacity Factor of ~80%. Coal could easily get to 80% CF if plants weren’t hobbled by RTO pricing policies. So adjusted, we get $18,775/kW. Yep. You read that correctly. Even nuclear Vogtle 3&4, thwarted every step of the way towards commercialization, doesn’t come close to that.
According to the US Energy Information Administration (find information here: https://www.eia.gov/electricity/data/browser/#/topic/7?agg=0,1&geo=vvvvvvvvvvvvo&endsec=vg&linechart=ELEC.PRICE.TX-ALL.M~ELEC.PRICE.TX-RES.M~ELEC.PRICE.TX-COM.M~ELEC.PRICE.TX-IND.M&columnchart=ELEC.PRICE.TX-ALL.M~ELEC.PRICE.TX-RES.M~ELEC.PRICE.TX-COM.M~ELEC.PRICE.TX-IND.M&map=ELEC.PRICE.US-ALL.M&freq=M&start=200101&end=202207&ctype=linechart<ype=pin&rtype=s&maptype=0&rse=0&pin=) in July of 2022, residential electricity prices in California averaged 26.77 cents/kWh. The United States average in July of 2022 was 15.46 cents/kWh..
According to the California Energy Commision (data here: https://www.energy.ca.gov/data-reports/energy-almanac/california-electricity-data/electric-generation-capacity-and-energy) in 2021, 16% of in-state generation was Solar. I realize some 30% of California electricity is imported from out-of-state.
If Solar is the cheapest form of utility-based energy, with California #1 in Solar, why are California’s current electricity prices 73% higher than the US National average?
We are slowly destroying the greatest machine ever built in the history of mankind, the US Electrical Grid, because of unproven claims regarding earth’s ever-changing climate.
Whatever you may think about climate change, solar is NOT cheap. It is very expensive. And ever-increasing electricity prices are crushing the poor.